An opportunity alert can get a promising contract onto your radar, but it should not have the final say over your proposal calendar. The date beside a listing may look perfectly clear until you open the procurement documents and discover it belongs to an entirely different milestone. New York offers a useful example. As checked […]
Ask a business owner whether they sell to the Army, and the answer may come before the question is finished: “We don’t make weapons.” That response makes sense if the Army brings to mind armored vehicles and ammunition, but it can also rule out a customer before anyone checks what the customer actually purchases. Keeping […]
December has a way of turning a manageable administrative task into something everyone promises to handle after the holidays. For GSA Schedule contractors, that is a risky approach to Transactional Data Reporting, especially when the person who understands the sales spreadsheet is also taking the last two weeks of the year off. GSA’s applicable TDR […]
You found a government opportunity that looks like a great fit. Your company can do the work. You have relevant experience. The deadline is manageable. Then comes the question: Who has time to write the proposal? For many small business contractors, the answer involves a business owner working late, a small team juggling several responsibilities, […]
A prime contractor opens an email from a small business, reads a paragraph about quality and customer service, and reaches the familiar question: “Do you have any opportunities for us?” The sender may be excellent at what they do, but the message leaves the prime to figure out the connection. Someone has to identify a […]
You have your federal certification, your capability statement finally looks the way you want it, and a county solicitation appears to fit your business perfectly. Then you reach the supplier requirements and find an unfamiliar acronym, a different certification office, and another application asking for documents you are fairly certain you have already submitted somewhere […]
RJ’s Printing, a family-owned business in Kalamazoo, Michigan, had never considered the Nuclear Regulatory Commission as a customer. According to an October 7 SBA article, the company did not know the agency existed until connecting with an NRC representative at a supplier matchmaking event in Detroit. That introduction led to an award for signage, displays, […]
By the time a city posts a bid for a major project, several things may already have happened: funding was approved, the governing board discussed the work, staff developed a schedule, and someone started figuring out how to purchase what the project needs. For a small business contractor, those earlier events can be useful. They […]
You can spend months learning an agency’s needs, introducing your business, and preparing for the next opportunity, only to discover that the customer plans to buy through a contract vehicle your company does not hold. Your capabilities may be a perfect fit, but the conversation now includes a purchasing question you need to answer. That […]
Your saved searches are doing their job. New government contract notices keep arriving, and several look like work your business could handle. Yet when it is time to commit proposal hours, the list of serious contenders gets much shorter. Some requirements are too large. Others are outside your service area. A few seem promising until […]