As a GSA contractor, you have access to a bustling government marketplace that includes federal as well as state and local agencies. While you are part of a smaller pool of businesses and can go after unique opportunities that other commercial businesses can’t, competition still exists. How do you stand out from your competitors in this market? In this blog, we’ll discuss 8 strategies you can use to set your business apart.

Working with the federal government can be a cumbersome process, even as a contractor through the General Services Administration (GSA). With an abundance of necessary paperwork and regulations associated with acquiring and maintaining a GSA Schedule contract, a common practice is to hire a GSA Schedule consultant to guide your company through the process.

Certifying as a small business is an important step for GSA contractors who qualify, and some small businesses can even go further to certify for one of the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) socioeconomic programs. This includes the Women-Owned Small Business (WOSB) and Economically Disadvantaged Women-Owned Small Business (EDWOSB) programs. This certification allows small businesses access to exclusive set-aside opportunities. Women Owned Small Businesses make up 5% of the government’s acquisition goals, and it’s important all businesses that qualify know how to certify.

When you are preparing your GSA Schedule offer, there’s a whole section dedicated to your past performance and experience selling your products and/or services called the technical section. Just like a resume and cover letter acts for a job interview, the government wants to know you have experience and success selling your solutions before you offer them through a GSA Schedule. Once you get your contract awarded, the evaluations don’t stop there.

GSA Schedules offer the opportunity for contractors to provide their products and services to federal agencies at pre-negotiated rates, making it easier for the government to acquire what it needs and for commercial companies to secure reliable contracts. However, securing a GSA Schedule is not simply a matter of filling out paperwork and submitting it to GSA. Rather, vendors must ensure they are offering fair and reasonable pricing to the government. Once this pricing is determined in the award process, contractors must maintain their established rates and report their GSA sales quarterly or monthly.

As a government contractor, you have likely become familiar with SAM.gov. There are a number of features in SAM, but arguably the most important is the entity registration feature. Since registering your entity in SAM.gov is required in order to do things like apply for contracts or receive grants from the federal government, this creates a database of thousands of companies. Not only that, but these registrations require resubmission every year in order to remain active.