Starting Out the New Year with Government Contracts

December 30, 2013 Federal Contracting No comments

Like many companies, you would undoubtedly like to add federal government
revenues to your 2014 commercial sales. It is the time of year for the
proverbial resolutions; we would therefore suggest the following if you are new
to the federal market.

In the first week of January, arrive at a decision as to whether your company
really wants to tackle this market. By making the decision early in the year,
you and your sales staff will not be distracted by this issue throughout the
year. The negatives involved are that it can take significant sales dollars and
a year or more to crack the market. If you are inclined to take a stab at
entering the market, you must recognize the patience and dollars needed to
network the federal buyers. The possible rewards associated with federal sales
are worth the investment your company makes. The two keys to being successful in
this market are persistence and perseverance. Don’t consider entering the
marketplace if you aren’t willing to accept both of these ideals.

If the decision is a go and your company is one that sells services, focus
your efforts initially on just one agency. If you sell products, limit your
focus to only a couple of agencies. In doing so, you will have increased your
likelihood for success. Bore deep into the agency – the buyers are there. Avoid
the inclination to take a cursory look at the agency only to decide that there
are no opportunities there for your company.

Once you have identified an opportunity, you must make the sales call. If you
are fortunate enough to have a networking connection, have that person make an
introduction for you. If you do not, you must make the proverbial cold calls. As
we all know, a vast majority of us do not like cold calling. If you are like
most, we recommend setting a rigid schedule and making the cold calls early in
the business day. Sales calls left to later in the business day have a way of
getting moved to the next day.

Most agencies do not have their 2014 fiscal year budget approved yet.
Therefore, January is a critical time to start your federal sales initiative as
contract expenditures will be pushed to the end of the year (September 30th).
Decide now if your company intends to pursue the market and start the sales
calls now.

Fedmarket’s goal is to make federal contracting as simple–and as profitable–as possible through our one-stop source for information and expertise. Fedmarket’s free content, training seminars, procurement data products, and hands-on consulting services enable organizations to achieve their federal sales goals. We work with:

Customers new to the federal marketplace who are hungry for a realistic assessment of the challenges that will confront them, and ways to address them
Customers successfully selling in the federal marketplace who are looking for tactical solutions to overcome specific circumstances that stand between them and increased federal sales

Customers who have entered the marketplace and want to develop a strategic marketing and sales program based on the fundamentals that drive federal sales success

Customers established in the marketplace that are looking to expand their market share faster or with additional, expert support.
Fedmarket’s offering covers four areas:

  • Professional services – our subject matter experts specialize in GSA Schedules, federal sales, proposal writing, procurement procedures, and preference programs.
  • Seminars and workshops – the courses presented cover a range of topics relevant to both current and aspiring federal contractors and are delivered through various media: hands-on workshops, seminars and webinars.
  • Tools and applications – these include everything from quick start guides to software applications that address and support compliance requirements, proposal writing, GSA Schedule contract management, and other functions central to the success of a federal contractor.
  • Data and research products – resources span from search engines focused on identifying procurement opportunities and databases that provide contact information for federal buyers, to in depth analysis of procurement trends.

At its core, Fedmarket blends a strong dose of reality, deep expertise, and a can-do attitude to propel those customers that work with it to the next level in federal sales.

Call 888 661 4094, Ext.2 for complimentary consulting.

Provide a Solution, Not a Sales Pitch

December 20, 2013 Federal Contracting No comments

The process of arranging meetings with federal procurement officials (end users) is not an easy one. End users are busy and vendors from countries all around the world are trying to sell the end users their wares. On the other hand, end users are expected to be open to meeting with all vendors and are not supposed to show favoritism. Getting through the door of an end user’s office requires people and sales skills.

The most important thing to remember is that end users are people trying to do their job. They are naturally more eager to meet with those who appear to understand their problems and offer solutions. They will figure out a way to avoid meeting with vendors who appear to be on a fishing expedition.

An obvious question is, “How can I know an end user’s problems without meeting with them first?” Identifying problems is not easy but it can be done. Use the Internet and phone calls to conduct research on the targeted agency’s programs, the structure of the organization, and each individual’s job responsibilities. Talk to other vendors, use your networking contacts, and deduce what their problems may be.

IDIQ Contracts: A Hunting License for the Federal Market

December 17, 2013 Federal Contracting No comments

Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contracts are becoming the preferred way that federal buyers make purchases. In order to compete in either the federal product or service sectors, your firm must have an IDIQ. As the use of IDIQs becomes increasingly more predominant, those which do not will be squeezed out of the market.

Looking at the issue from a practical perspective, one could say that those who have IDIQs have a hunting license. More specifically, such companies have a license to seek and bag a particular species in a specific jurisdiction. In the case of the federal market, only the holders of a specific IDIQ are permitted to bid on designated projects. Don’t be caught out in the wild without the proper license!

Essential Elements Federal Proposal Writing

October 30, 2013 Proposal Writing No comments

The five C’s required to write a winning proposal are: customer knowledge, creativity, compliance, clarity and conciseness. All five C’s are needed to maximize proposal evaluation scores.

Newcomers to the federal market underestimate the importance of the five C’s and typically think that slapping together a quick proposal is enough. Proposal evaluators love quick and dirty proposals because they can reject them within minutes and cut down on the work of proposal evaluation; they can get on with evaluating the others in the huge pile of responses. Evaluators hope that many proposals in the pile will lack the five C’s.

Customer Knowledge: The federal buyer must know you and what you can do to solve their problem. You probably should not waste valuable resources writing a proposal without customer knowledge beyond the Request for Proposal (RFP). Advanced sales and customer contact provides (1) the federal buyer with the comfort of reduced risk in selecting you for an award, and (2) you learn what the buyer really wants in order to create a tailored and creative solution to the buyer’s problem (the most critical part of the proposal).
This is what the insiders do (companies with direct federal contracts). They live with the customer and can’t help but understand their needs.

Compliance: Complete compliance with every requirement of the RFP is a necessity because any compliance flaw in your proposal can cause an immediate proposal rejection. Any missed compliance requirement, however small, can relegate you to the reject pile.

Creativity: Once you know the customer, you must creatively present your solution to their problem. A creative technical approach seals the deal. A winning technical approach emanates from (1) customer knowledge and (2) a highly structured proposal writing system. A structured system can take various forms, but the essential element is that the system should produce a detailed proposal outline containing legacy content and instructions before any writing begins.

Most technical writers (the people on the firing line) need structure and guidance to write a clear and concise technical content. Without a system, chaos usually results, particularly if there are several technical writers involved.

Clarity and Conciseness: Your English teachers probably taught you that clear and concise writing begins with a tight outline (organization structure). Government proposal evaluators do not like evaluating lengthy tomes and demand clarity and conciseness. Your proposal evaluation scores will suffer without it. A structured proposal writing system enhances clarity and conciseness.

Avoid letting your CEO throw in self-serving sales pitches without backup and clear evidence relevant to the requirements. An example of this: “ABC Co is a World Class or Best of Breed Company.” Proposal evaluators laugh at such statements; they are the polar opposite of clarity and conciseness.

NASA SWEP V Due Day Extended to November 1

October 18, 2013 Federal Contracting, Proposal Writing No comments

Interested parties in the Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement – SEWP V Procurement are hereby notified that NASA/GSFC received a significant number of questions to the subject solicitation. Amendment #5 to the solicitation has been released to extend the proposal submission date to November 1, 2013.

All Questions and Answers will be posted for Industry’s review and updates to the final Request for Proposal shall be incorporated in the next release. The next amendment is anticipated to be released on or about October 22, 2013.

This announcement was published on October 17th, 2 minutes after the announcement that the date has been extended to November 1, 2013. Note the statement about the number of questions received and the timing of the posting would indicate that the questions were received within 2 minutes of the extension announcement. To us this would indicate that another extension could be forthcoming on October 22.

Small businesses have by far the best chances of an award by responding to Category B/Group B & Category B/Group C. You have the least technical requirements in these two groups (complimentary IT products) and it is set aside for small businesses. You would be competing with only your peers.

Fedmarket is offering SWEP proposal writing services.

Call sales at 888 661 4094, Ext. 2.

OASIS: Small Businesses Can Still Make an Offer

October 16, 2013 Federal Contracting, Proposal Writing No comments

OASIS FBO Notice of October 7:  The OASIS Program Office fully intends to establish the proposal due dates 10-14 calendar days from the date that the Government shutdown is resolved. While we foresee no changes to this plan, if there are any changes, the OASIS Program Office will update Offerors here on FedBizOpps.

Most people are predicting that the shutdown will end mid next week which would make the OASIS due date around November 1.

Companies that are primarily information technology (IT) service companies may qualify for OASIS if they have:

  1. Two (2) professional service that carry NAICS Codes that are not IT codes.
  2. Minimum of three (3) and up to five (5) primary projects (contracts), each as a prime contractor, and the combined annual value of all primary projects must be equal to or greater than $750,000. And no individual project can be less than $150,000 per year.

By qualifying for OASIS, IT companies have the opportunity to expand their capabilities into other professional service disciplines like management consulting, engineering, and finance. Everyone needs broader capabilities in the current federal market

Our OASIS Model Proposal Template saves companies 4 – 6 billable days of proposal writing time and gives you a head start if the proposal writing deadline is tight.

Read more about Fedmarket’s OASIS Model Proposal and call us to view the template.

Fedmarket also offers full-service proposal writing services for OASIS, call 888 661 4094, Ext. 2 for more information.

OASIS Due Date Extended Indefinitely

October 6, 2013 Proposal Writing No comments

On 10/3 GSA issued an Amendment to both the Small and Large Business OASIS Solicitations at FBO.gov. Fedmarket published the OASIS solicitation links on our home page. As indicated in the Amendment the new offer due date is unknown and will be published as an amendment at FBO.gov.

In consideration of the Government shutdown and the associated potential impact on the OASIS proposal preparation process, the proposal due date of this solicitation is hereby suspended indefinitely. A definitive proposal due date will be established once the Government shutdown situation is resolved. Offerors are instructed to NOT submit proposals until further instruction. No other changes.

The updated OASIS Quick Reference Guide at Fedmarket.com shows the core qualifications required by GSA for an award. The primary stumbling blocks that most companies are encountering are:

Contract documents for 3 to 5 primary projects meeting the qualifications requirements in the Quick Reference Guide must be submitted to prove the required attributes of the projects. A contact documents means a document from the government, not a document created by you. Subcontracts with federal prime contracts do not qualify (a clarification in Amendment 4).

You must prove through government documents that you have two Pool Qualification Projects performed under at least one of the listed NAICS Codes to qualify for a pool. Each pool you qualify for is awarded as a separate OASIS contract. If you are having trouble finding NAICS Codes in your contract documents, ask the government for a document that shows that you performed the project under specific NAIS Codes(s).

Evaluation points are heavily weighted toward the evaluation of 3 or more primary projects with high performance evaluation scores. 4 projects are better than 3 and 5 projects are better than 4.

Projects not scored in the federal past performance data base must provide a performance rating questionnaire obtained from the government. You must use the government’s standard point scoring table to score yourself based on the subjective rating in the past performance questionnaire. (The table is not part of the questionnaire). The conversion of subjective ratings to point scores in required in order to complete the self-scoring document required in your offer.

Fedmarket’s OASIS Model Proposal can save days of proposal writing time. Not to mention the proposal writer migraines’ caused by an overly complex solicitation.

Read more about Fedmarket’s OASIS Model Proposal and call us to review the template

Fedmarket also offers full-service proposal writing services for OASIS, call 888 661 4094, Ext. 2 for more information.

OASIS Amended and Extended

September 12, 2013 Federal Contracting No comments

It’s back to the drawing board for both large and small businesses. GSA has amended the OASIS RFP for the third time.

The newest update to the OASIS solicitation includes 11 updated forms and changes to the instructions for 5 out of 6 volumes, including file naming convention changes. The government has reduced the number of required relevant experience projects and the minimum values. This may enable some small businesses to participate in the OASIS opportunity who thought they were excluded due to a lack of projects.

OASIS is a complicated solicitation, and after 3 amendments, each with numerous updates, many proposal writers are lost in the quagmire. Save yourself the trouble of trying to decipher – not only the solicitation itself, but the modifications to the RFP you begin working with. Fedmarket offers updates to customers who purchase our OASIS Model Proposal product. We are currently up-to-date with the most recent amendment issued on September 11, 2013.

OASIS: More Amendments and an Extension, Yes or No?

September 8, 2013 Federal Contracting, GSA Schedules No comments

Currently it appears that GSA is not going to amend the OASIS Small and Large Business Solicitations again or extend the due date of 9/17/13.

Multi-disciplined professional services companies cannot afford to pass up the large revenue potential of OASIS. OASIS is one of a kind and offers great flexibility for federal contracting officers. Historically contracting officers have experienced trouble procuring multi-disciplined professional services through a multiple award contract and have been forced to use expensive and time consuming public bids.

Small businesses are questioning their project experience qualifications because the experience criteria in the solicitation is stringent. Small businesses on the edge should consider bidding because:

  • GSA may have trouble qualifying enough small businesses to be politically correct with Congress and the small business community.
  • The solicitation scoring scheme encourages bidders to submit qualifications that partially meet the solicitation criteria.
  • Proposal writing is largely mechanical using Fedmarket’s OASIS model proposal template with its compliant file structure, file names, and required forms. Technical content is not required and the bulk of the proposal effort involves assembling proof of project experience. Project experience criteria in the solicitation require the bidder to show contract size, work scope, the NAICS code(s) for the contract and proof of performance from (1) contractual documents, (2) federal performance databases, or (3) a questionnaire completed by the federal customer.

It’s all about your score across a wide range of criteria and the number of bidders that qualify for each of the seven pools.

Questions about OASIS call 888 661 4094, Ext.2.

OASIS: More Amendments and an Extension, Yes or No?

September 8, 2013 Federal Contracting No comments
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