If you have ever tried to sell to the federal government, then you have come across SAM.gov. The System for Award Management (SAM, SAM.gov) is the official website for people who make, receive, and manage federal awards. GSA teamed up and integrated with partner sites to curate a powerful tool to register, report, search opportunities, and sector data. On SAM.gov, you can search contract opportunities and entity registration, access data reports, check assistance listings, and connect with resources to help your business of any size succeed.

While it’s important to make sure you are prepared to pursue a GSA Schedule contract, it’s also important to ensure it’s the right fit for your company. When deciding whether your company is eligible to get a GSA contract, you should make sure you can compete in the federal marketplace. When compiling your GSA Schedule offer, you will need to adjust your commercial market rates to be determined “fair and reasonable”, while also making sure there is a market for your offering. A good way to determine this before going through the entire offer process is by completing GSA’s Readiness Assessment, identifying the scope of your offering, and researching your competitors.

There are multiple facets to obtaining and understanding a GSA Schedule contract. One of the most important prerequisites to acquiring a GSA Schedule is having a set North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Code, which corresponds to the core of your business. Your NAICS Code relates to the products and/or services you hope to be offering in the federal marketplace and serves as an important identifier for business size and relevant contracting opportunities. So, what are these numbers? How does their format play a role in your GSA contract? Throughout the course of this post, I’ll be going over what NAICS Codes are, their role in GSA, and their structure.

Small businesses play an integral role in federal procurement, and in 2022, there has been a strong push to focus on small business prioritization. One of the recent initiatives to improve the procurement process for small businesses is the PRICE Act. President Biden recently signed the Promoting Rigorous and Innovative Cost Efficiencies for Federal Procurement and Acquisitions Act (PRICE) Act, which would expand opportunities for small businesses to work with the federal government.

Another Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) Solicitation Refresh is on the horizon—on March 31, 2022, GSA plans to release the MAS Solicitation 47QSMD20R0001 - Refresh # 10 to all existing GSA contracts. Once the Refresh is issued, GSA will release an accompanying Mass Modification (Mass Mod) which must be accepted by all contractors within 90 days. It’s important you are aware of all the changes in the Refresh, even if it may seem like they won’t greatly affect your GSA contract. We’ll break down everything you need to know about this Solicitation Refresh, so you are prepared to accept the Mass Mod.

Selling to the government with your GSA Schedule contract is more than showing up at events and finding new opportunities. To successfully sell to the federal government, you need to understand your targeted government customers and their unique needs. Each branch of the government influences the spending choices of the other, so it’s important to understand how each branch affects your company’s ability to sell to agencies. Focusing on a few best practices will shape your company’s public sector efforts and make you stand out in the government marketplace.