Bid Pricing Mistakes That Lose Contracts
Most lost bids are not lost on price alone — they are lost on the bid pricing mistakes hiding inside the price. A bid can be too high, too low, or internally inconsistent, and each of those failures traces back to a small number of repeatable errors. The good news is that these errors are […]
Firm-Fixed-Price vs Cost-Plus Contracts Explained
One of the first things you will see in any solicitation is the contract type — and it changes everything about how you bid, how you get paid, and who bears the risk if costs run higher than expected. The two types small contractors meet most often are firm-fixed-price (FFP) and cost-plus (usually cost-plus-fixed-fee, or […]
How to Price a Government Contract Bid
Pricing is where many small contractors lose a contract they were otherwise qualified to win. Price too high and you are out on value; price too low and you either lose money on every hour of the contract or get flagged as unrealistic and lose on technical risk. Learning how to price a government contract […]
How to Use Past Award Data to Price Your Bid
Pricing is where most new federal contractors lose money — either by bidding too high and losing, or by bidding too low and winning a contract that bleeds cash for years. The antidote is past award data: the prices the government has actually paid for similar work, published for free in FPDS and USAspending.gov. A […]
How to Find Incumbent Contractors Before You Bid
Every re-compete has an incumbent — the firm currently doing the work — and that firm starts with advantages you do not have: they know the customer, the site, the quirks of the requirement, and the contracting officer. Bidding against an incumbent without knowing who they are, what they charge, and when their contract ends […]
How to Research Your Competitors’ Federal Contracts
In federal contracting, your competitors are not a mystery. Every contract they win is a public record: the agency, the value, the period, the vehicle, and the set-aside type are all published. A small business that researches its competitors properly can see exactly where rivals are strong, where they are stretched thin, and where they […]
USAspending.gov for Contractors: A Practical Guide
USAspending.gov is the federal government’s public spending database, and for a contractor it is the most approachable way to answer a deceptively simple question: who is spending money on what I sell? Every federal contract action recorded in FPDS flows into USAspending, where it is presented with charts, maps, and search tools designed for non-specialists. […]