Resolution #10: We Will Know Our Competition By Thinking of “ET” (Competitive Intelligence)

January 16th, 2009 | Posted by Ashok Mehan

You are a new company entering the federal space, or an experienced government contractor with years of experience. You may have had little to no success in selling into the federal government, or may have already sold millions!  You might have a GSA Schedule, a BPA, or GWAC, or maybe you are a company just happy being a subcontractor to a larger prime. You are sure that you know a thing or two about unearthing federal opportunities, deft at sifting through the web to find what you need to make your next sale, or perhaps you have just recently learned how to spell Fedbizopps.

You could even be one of those who are always confident about the company’s bright future - good economy or bad – or you could be paranoid like me despite some bright spots in the future.

You are sitting in this federal planetarium and looking up, seeing agencies and contractors as stars in your birds eye view with ease. Experienced or not, you derive a sense of comfort from being able to see the visible federal universe, but then you remember someone at work told you that the Federal Acquisition Regulations were really designed to “encourage competition”, and from what you see you cannot tell which one of these companies is a competitor! Competition usually eats your lunch you suddenly recall, like a swirling black hole can gobble up a million stars. Black holes! You shift anxiously staring at the federal dome above you, circling and craning your neck you see no signs of a black hole. Zilcho! Nada!

Enter Competitive Intelligence. The kind of extra terrestrial information needed to stave off aliens and save your little planet, your very own company! You give a 1000-yard stare as your senses are awash with thoughts of aliens from an advanced civilization, far more advanced than yours. You know the world is cut-throat, but you didn’t bargain for ET not being cute and friendly. You learn the hard way that ET is deft, stealthy, knows our company inside out, can hack into our company secrets, knows which agencies you have sold to, what was your pricing, and how many bids the contracting officer received on the contract you snared away from him. ET wants your lunch bad! A colleague interested in black holes tells you they aren’t exactly black. They emit radiation and light at their periphery, the event horizon!  You rub your hands in glee, you are ready to travel to the event horizon to learn about ET as much as he does about you! Close encounters of the competitive kind! But where do you start?

Resolution #10 will help my company; a service disabled veteran owned business (SDVOSB), stay ahead of its competition. I will click on each piece of information below and learn the kind of information needed to travel to the event horizon at light speed and eat some alien food:

For each of my industry group codes I will find out:
1.    Companies who won contracts in my NAICS Sector 54 and are SDVOSB
2.    Their most recent contract awards, by contracting office at each Agency
3.    Contracting vehicles for each competitor with: GSA, BPA, GWAC with amounts
4.    Details of each contract award, GSA, IDV or regular contract
5.    A birds eye view of comparative years for all contracts for each competitor
6.    Top large contractors by industry sector to team on opportunities, by agency

To see these steps in live action, email amehan@fedmine.us and request to receive a free demonstration of how you too can unearth your competition. Visit www.fedmine.us for more information.

Tags: Competitive Intelligence, FEDMINE, GSA, NAICS, SDVOSB, subcontract

This entry was posted on Friday, January 16th, 2009 at 9:30 am and is filed under Federal Agency Spending, New Year's Resolutions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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