GSA Offer Best Practices, Volume 3

Let’s talk Government. They’re in a league of their own, right? It’s true! They have their own way of organizing things, classifying things, and interpreting things. To sell to the Government you have to understand how they operate. It’s very different from dealing with other commercial entities.

Now, let’s relate this to GSA Schedules. To make your offer successful you have to know what Schedule and Special Item Numbers are applicable to your business. The “scope” of your products and services is one of the most important things the GSA will look into when you submit your offer. If the offer is out of scope you’ll be rejected right away – they won’t even look at the rest of the content. Do yourself a favor and look into all the potential Schedules your business may fall under. Then select which one is the best fit.

Here’s an example. You offer instructor led-training and your courses are designed to teach the average employee how to engineer and operate a Smart Building System. You have a few options here:

1. Instructor Led Training (Schedule 874)
2. Engineering and Integration (Schedule 871)
3. Smart Building Operations (Schedule 03 FAC)

We will start by breaking down each schedule and seeing what the services really entail. Instructor Led Training doesn’t include any training that can be offered under the scope of any other Schedule. So, if there is training available under other Schedules that is more relevant to what you’re actually teaching – then you can’t use Schedule 874. Schedule 871 doesn’t quite fit because you’re not really doing the engineering work, just training on that. Schedule 03 FAC allows for training in direct relation to what you’re teaching. Schedule 03 FAC it is!

As a reminder – don’t just take the descriptions of the Schedules at face value. Look at your competitors and research what they’re offering under Schedule. Don’t have specific competitors to look for? Performing market research on the different vendors awarded under each Schedule will benefit you tremendously.

When in doubt – give me a call!

Stephanie Gowin