Capturing Federal Contracts As A Small Business

In the current fiscal environment of reduced federal budgets, the ability for small businesses to grow and win more government work, both as a prime contractor and as a subcontractor, is becoming more and more difficult. Gone are the days when a small business could rely on winning small business set asides or being added to a large company team just because of their socioeconomic status without solid marketing and capture activities. My background is in the federal market space, specifically Intelligence and Department of Defense. Therefore, I will commonly refer to marketing as the business development process or a structured capture process that I feel is needed by any small businesses to win work in the federal market space.

Your First Government Contract introduces the small business entrepreneur or new public sector account executive to the world of government contracting. Scott introduces the reader to what to expect with their first opportunity, the government procurement cycle, industry terminology used, and winning strategies for proposal writing. Starting the book with basic vendor registration, Scott quickly transitions to why some companies succeed in government contracting while others do not, marketing to public agencies, types of government customers, contracting vehicles, how offers are evaluated, and how to beat the competition. Scott's method for crafting a simple winning proposal is described in detail, with applicability for any level of government, and designed for maximum collaboration within your company. Over his 15-year government contracting career, Scott has led sales and proposal writing efforts to secure over $125 million of government contracts, specializing in new and developing government contracting business units.

How to Get Government Contracts demystifies the process of how a company can enter the government market, win its first and subsequent contracts, and then grow itself into a multi-million-dollar government contractor within a couple of years. It offers an insider’s view into the latest best practices that government contractors use to succeed in an increasingly competitive market, and it shows exactly how your company can apply these techniques to build a strong business. Many companies venture into the government market with a certain naiveté and pay a hefty price to find out that there is much more to winning a contract than writing last-minute proposals in response to publicly posted solicitations. To stop the bleeding of precious resources, they need to step back to learn how professionals win business in the federal arena. This book shows you how to find, for example, the best potential customers and opportunities for your company. It also explains the secret to winning consistently by conducting pre-proposal preparation (also called "capture") and practicing a disciplined, process-based approach to proposal development. This book provides a recipe for winning government contracts over and over again, the way seasoned government contractors do it. After reading this book, you will know exactly what to do to position your company to win a government proposal before a solicitation becomes public, including building customer relationships, gathering intelligence, developing a "win strategy," performing competitive analysis, selecting the best teammates, and developing a solution. As a result, you will apply professional techniques to organizing your proposal effort, outlining a proposal document, and writing RFPs that persuade evaluators to award the contract to you.

Inside strategies and tips for small businesses seeking government business This guide takes the small business owner through the different vehicles of the government procurement process, showing how the government selects a contract winner. It goes step-by-step from registration through the bidding process and beyond. And while the book is weighted to federal contracts, there is plenty of coverage on winning state and local contracts as well. • In 2006, small businesses won $77 billion in federal contracts • Slow economy forcing small businesses to procure more contracts, at all levels of government • Inside strategies and tips: a vast majority of small business owners know nothing about getting government contracts

Federal contracting . . . easy? With the fourth edition of Federal Contracting Made Easy, it is! Whether or not you consider federal contracting easy, it is certainly easier with this guide. Used successfully by thousands of contractors and feds, this book offers practical, hands-on, no-nonsense advice. Now in its fourth edition, Federal Contracting Made Easy lays out the entire federal contracting process in a readable and easy-to-understand style. This book covers how government procurement works, what you can do to cut though the red tape to speed your way to winning a contract, who the key players are, and tips for overcoming obstacles. New in this edition: • Discussion of government-wide acquisition contracts (GWACs) • Updates on women-owned small business • New status of service-disabled veteran-owned small business • Expanded list of relevant websites and resources • Introduction to the new System for Award Management (SAM) Whether you are about to enter the competitive world of federal contracting or have been bidding for contracts for years and are now looking for updated information and ideas, this is the book you need. The federal government awards billions of dollars in contracts for goods and services every year. This book will help you win a piece of that business.

This paper garners information crucial to understanding business growth for new entrants and small businesses who contract with the federal government by utilizing publicly available contracting data from the Federal Procurement Data System (FPDS) to track new entrants from 2001-2016. This information is then used to evaluate entrances, exits, and status changes among federal vendors with the purpose of comparing challenges faced by small businesses with those of larger ones. Measuring market trends over time and in multiple sectors shows how the challenges facing small businesses, such as market barriers to entry and imperfect competition, keep them from growing. The final results compare the survival rates between small and non-small new entrants contracting with the federal government and analyze the graduation rates for those small new entrants who grew in size during the observation period and survived after ten years. The study finds that around 40 percent of new entrants exit the market for federal contracts after three years, around 50-60 percent after five years, and only about one-fifth of new entrants remain in the federal contracting arena in the final year of observation. Across the six samples studied, thegraduation rates of small businesses consistently decrease.

Winning Government Contracts shows you the way. It begins at the beginning, assuming no prior knowledge of the government marketplace and its sometimes complicated terminology. Written in a clear, easy-to-understand language by experienced sales and marketing professionals, this book takes you through the registration and bidding process step by step.

Packed with techniques necessary to find, negotiate, and win government contracts, this updated guide for small business owners includes the latest processes for competing. Ten easy steps are detailed for entering a business into the federal procurement system, receiving bids for lucrative federal contracts, and successfully competing for government contracts. Small business owners learn how to use the Internet to get government contracts, find government buyers, write and submit a winning proposal, and capture their share of a $350 billion market.

It has been clear for at least 50 years the disadvantages that small businesses face in competing for U.S. government contracts. The Small Business Act of 1953 created the Small Business Administration (SBA), an independent agency in the executive branch that counsels and assists specific types of small businesses including firms owned by minorities and other socially and economically disadvantaged individuals and firms owned by women. Women-owned small businesses, however, are underrepresented or substantially underrepresented in some industries. In 2002, the SBA Office of Federal Contract Assistance for Women Business Owners (CAWBO) organized a draft study containing a preliminary set of approximations of the representation of women-owned small businesses in federal prime contracts over $25,000 by industry. Because of the past legal challenges to race- and gender-conscious contracting programs at the federal and local levels, the SBA asked the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies to conduct an independent review of relevant data and estimation methods prior to finalizing the CAWBO study. The Steering Committee on Women-Owned Small Businesses in Federal Contracting was created and charged with holding a workshop to discuss topics including the accuracy of data and methods to estimate the use of women-owned small businesses in federal contracting and the definition of "underrepresentation" and "substantial underrepresentation" in designating industries for which preferential contracting programs might be warranted. Analyzing Information on Women-Owned Small Businesses in Federal Contracting presents the committee's report as well as the recommendations that committees have made.