Keys to Success in Government Contracting

By: Rosalind Dix | Government Contracting Advisor

The Montana PTAC (Procurement Technical Assistance Center) assists businesses with navigating the government marketplace.  Our goal is to help make government contracting easier to understand and support local businesses in finding a focused path through the maze that is government contracting.  Government contracting requires businesses to learn how to do it and PTAC advisors are here to be their teachers and coaches along the way.

Here are some of PTAC’s top keys/processes to success in government contracting:

  1. REGISTER

    • Get registered in all of the appropriate systems that make you eligible to be a vendor with federal and state governments. We advise our clients to do their registrations first so that they are free to start the learning process and are immediately eligible to bid on projects should an opportunity come along.

 

  1. RESEARCH

    • The research process is where a lot of learning begins. We recommend utilizing publicly available resources to find out which agencies purchase a business’ products or services to help narrow down who their potential customers are.  For example, there over 400 federal agencies and they are not going to buy every single product and service available.
    • We also recommend researching/learning about the different methods that both federal and state agencies purchase products and services. It varies by agency as well as dollar value of the contract.

 

  1. RESPOND

    • Responding can mean several things in the government marketplace. Here are some examples:
      • Finding an opportunity and submitting a bid
      • Contacting agencies to market your business and develop a relationship
      • Submitting a response to a sources sought notice to influence the acquisition strategy

 

The Montana PTAC is here to help!  We provide our services free of charge and are happy to take any Montana business through these processes and help them identify where they fit within the government marketplace!