5 Ways to Win Federal Contract Dollars

From early market research to Price to Win positioning, Richter & Company’s goal is to help you win business.  Here are five of our top recommendations for consistently winning federal dollars:

Plan your work; work your plan.  Get involved in the program early.  If you’re an incumbent contractor, even earlier than that.  Preparation for the re-bid begins on day 1 of the contract.  Build relationships with the buying and end user customers.  Influence the RFP, so that discriminators rule in your favor.  Prove the benefit of your solution.  Build a value added team, build a plan, and then follow the plan, making necessary changes as you go.

Proofread.  Don’t finish your proposal two hours before it’s due; there’s just no time to proofread if you’re making changes last minute.  Make sure pricing in your proposal matches pricing in your cost volume.  Don’t leave internal comments in your final document.   Obvious, but it happens all the time.  You don’t want your outbrief to be a rundown of your glaring mistakes.

Examine and assess your own company.  Many companies don’t examine their own structures to target cost reductions.  Look at your salary percentiles:  consider the labor needed in the contract against the labor you’re offering.  Build cost pools to bill direct costs to your customer, and leave out those unnecessary to the contract.  Reduce cost.  And be aware of where the costs you do have are coming from.

Build a compliant solution.  (Read:  Don’t sell your existing solution.) Build a notional bottoms-up solution based solely on the requirements of the RFP:  where does this solution leave your Total Evaluated Price?  Be sure all your additional capabilities are ones that matter to the government.  Prove the benefit of your solution.  Make sure the value you’re adding outweighs higher price.  Know your customer, and cater your solution to their needs.  Even “COTS based” solutions should be tailored to the needs of your customer.

Don’t go status quo.  Today’s current hypercompetitive environment is not what it was five years ago.  Ten percent fee and gold plated benefits packages won’t pass muster before evaluation committees.  Make sure your bid is both reasonable and realistic.  Know what your competition looks like before the final stages of capture, and position accordingly.  Employ consultants like Richter & Company to help you find your position to win!