Posts Tagged startup

Your Elevator Pitch Needs Work

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… or you wouldn’t be reading this.

Yes, you. The “small, woman-owned company established in 2008, located in Alexandria, VA, that prides itself on excellent customer service and always striving to do best for our clients“.  Because if that sounds like you, you just wasted 20 seconds of everybody’s time for no good reason.

A truly great elevator pitch takes planning, practice, and precision. Especially in government contracting, where industry events are comprised of many companies of similar industries, you need to stand out, or you may as well be invisible.  Here’s what I mean:

  1. Planning. Know your audience.  Who is going to be in the room? What is the key takeaway you want them to remember? How will your 30-second opportunity set you apart from everyone else?  The point of the elevator pitch is for the listeners to spark an interest. Not to pre-emptively answer all their questions.  Naturally, your elevator pitch will be different in an open forum, in a 1-on-1 with a government agency, a potential teaming partner, or a banker.
  2. Practice. Every time you say “umm” or “you know” or “as I said” – you’re stealing seconds from your allotted time; losing the listeners’ attention; and killing your credibility as an expert.  Know what you will say ahead of time. Run it by a few people – a family member, friend, partner, a PTAC or SBDC counselor.  Be sure to test on people that don’t know the technical specifics of what you do, because if you’re speaking in code (or jargon), your customers may not understand what you’re saying.
  3. Precision. What are the key elements you want to convey that would want your listener to want to ask you more questions?  Look at a few templates for constructing the pitch, You can start  with this guide or this one. A generic, 1-size fits all blurb will fit no one. An appeal targeted specifically for the present audience will be more productive.

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Before You Start… (and how to make the best use of your APEX Accelerator)

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Virginia APEX Accelerator (and our nationwide colleagues) are happy to welcome you to government contracting. We will do our best to help you succeed at selling to state, local, and federal agencies.

Some businesses, however, aren’t ready for government contracting, and your meeting with a procurement counselor, or your attendance at a class can be frustrating, overwhelming, and (let’s be honest), disappointing.

So let’s get this secret out of the bag: APEX Accelerators are not intended to help you start a business. That’s outside our mission, that’s something our grant funder (Department of Defense) specifically frowns upon, and that’s the kind of assistance we recommend you seek from our resource partners, such as the Small Business Development Centers, Women’s Business Centers, Veterans Business Outreach Centers, and SCORE.

In fact, before you meet with a procurement counselor or attend even our introductory “Basic Training” class, we recommend that your company obtains:

Legal Requirements (for any business)

  1. State entity registration if your business is anything other than a sole proprietorship (LLC, Corp, LLP….)
  2. Federal Tax ID Number (TIN / EIN) from the IRS
  3. Business license from your state / locality (in Virginia, it’s called a BPOL)
  4. Business Plan

Procurement Counselors won’t usually ask to look at your documentation, unless they’re helping you submit a certification that requires above-mentioned paperwork.  However, in order to start registering as a vendor to any government entity, businesses must meet certain basic requirements.  If you are sure that you are going to pursue government work, get these out of the way.  And as far as the Business Plan – again, while we don’t require written proof that you created one for your business, we do want to ascertain that you are serious, that you have considered the pros and cons and financials and business structure and have a plan.  We will absolutely help you refine it, give you a reality check, and assist with a proof of concept; but if you’re not serious about your business, there really isn’t much we can do to overcome that.

Government Contracting Specific Prerequisites

  1. Identify your NAICS and PSC Codes (Federal)
  2. Identify your NIGP Codes (State / local)
  3. Register in SAM = obtain a CAGE Code & UEI.

This is a bit more of a chicken-and-egg category.  Yes, we can help you figure out all of these codes and numbers and what you should select.  However, the best advice at the outset is that you try to identify the codes that apply to your business. See if you can register in SAM.  If you get those steps out of the way without a snag, then your meeting with your counselor can cover more in-depth, “next step” material.  And if you do have questions or run into technical difficulties, that’s absolutely an area where a counselor’s perspective will be invaluable.  (Hint: make sure the physical address for your Virginia SCC registration, Tax ID, and SAM is *identical* down to the letter and abbreviation).

You and your counselor should review your registrations during your session, and we will have some insight into additional / related / adjacent codes to consider.  You’ll hear tips and tricks in classes.  We’ll explain the purpose and utilization of all of these by your target customers. And we’ll give you next steps, like competitive and customer analysis, DSBS profile creation (and much more!) — built on the foundation of the basics you have completed.  There’s a lot more to government contracting, so the sooner we get these “prerequisites” out of the way, the sooner we can do some real work.

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Common Federal Procurement Acronyms

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Download: Common Federal Procurement Acronyms

ACO – Administrative Contracting Officer
ATO – Authority to Operate
B&P – Bid and Proposal
BAA – Broad Agency Announcement
BAFO – Best and Final Offer
BD – Business Development
BDO – Blanket Delivery Order
BOA – Basic Ordering Agreement
BPA – Blanket Purchase Agreement
CA – Cooperative Agreement
CAC – Common Access Card
CAS – Cost Accounting Standards
CDRL – Contract Data Requirements List
CFR – Code of Federal Regulations
CLIN – Contract Line Item Number
CMMC – Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification
CO – Contracting Officer
COC – Certificate of Competency
CONUS – Continental United States
COR – Contracting Officer Representative
COTR – Contracting Officer’s Technical Representative
COTS – Commercial Off-the-Shelf
CPAF – Cost Plus Award Fee
CPARS – Contractor Performance Assessment
Reporting System
CPFF – Cost Plus Fixed Fee
CPIF – Cost Plus Incentive Fee
CRADA – Co-operative Research & Dev’t Agreement
DAU – Defense Acquisition University
DCAA – Defense Contracting Audit Agency
DCMA – Defense Contract Management Agency
DFARS – Defense FAR Supplement
DLH – Direct Labor Hour
DSBS – Dynamic Small Business Search (Now SBS)
EDI – Electronic Data Interchange
EDWOSB – Economically Disadvantaged Women Owned
Small Business
EFT – Electronic Funds Transfer
EO – Executive Order
EPA – Economic Price Adjustment
eSRS – Electronic Subcontracting Reporting System (Now SAM.gov/esrs)
FAR – Federal Acquisition Regulation
FAS – Federal Acquisition Service
FFP – Firm Fixed Price
FMV – Fair Market Value
FOIA – Freedom of Information Act
FOUO – For Official Use Only
FPR – Final Proposal Revision
FSC – Federal Supply Code (Class)
GAO – Government Accountability Office
GFE – Government Furnished Equipment
GFM – Government Furnished Materials
GFP – Government-Furnished Property
GOCO – Government Owned, Contractor Operated
GWAC – Government-wide Acquisition Contract
HCA – Head of Contracting Activity
HUBZone – Historically Underutilized Business Zones
IDIQ – Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity
IFB – Invitation for Bids
IG – Inspector General
IQC – Indefinite Quantity Contract
JV – Joint Venture
LOE – Level of Effort
LPTA – Lowest Price, Technically Acceptable
KO – Contracting Officer
MAS – Multiple Award Schedule
MATOC – Multiple Award Task Order Contract
MILSPEC – Military Specification
MOA – Memorandum of Agreement
MOD – Contract Modification
MOU – Memorandum of Understanding
NTE – Not to Exceed
NTP – Notice to Proceed
OCONUS – Outside the Continental US
ODC – Other Direct Costs
OIG – Office of Inspector General
OSDBU – Office of Small & Disadv. Business Utilization
OSBP – Office of Small Business Programs
OTA – Other Transaction Authority
PAS – Pre-Award Survey
PCO – Procuring Contracting Officer
PEO – Program Executive Officer
PIEE – Procurement Integrated Enterprise Environment
PII – Personally Identifiable Information
PO – Purchase Order
POAM – Plan of Action and Milestones
POP – Period of Performance
PV – Prime Vendor
PWS – Performance Work Statement
R&D – Research and Development
RFI – Request for Information
RFP – Request for Proposal
RFQ – Request for Quotation
SAM – System for Award Management
SAP – Simplified Acquisition Procedures
SAT – Simplified Acquisition Threshold
SBLO – Small Business Liaison Officer
SBIR – Small Business Innovation Research
SBS – Small Business Search (formerly DSBS)
SBU – Sensitive but Unclassified
SCIF – Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility
SDLC – Software Development Lifecycle
SDVOSB – Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business
SIC – Standard Industrial Classification (Codes)
SIN – Special Item Number
SOW – Statement of Work
SPRS – Supplier Performance Risk System
SSP – System Security Plan
(also used for ‘Source Selection Plan’ in some RFPs)
SSN – Sources Sought Notice
STTR – Small Business Technology Transfer
T4C – Termination for Convenience
T4D – Termination for Default
T&C – Terms and Conditions
TO – Task Order
TS – Top Secret
TS/SCI – Top Secret, Sensitive Compartmented Information
T&M – Time and Materials
UI – Unit of Issue
USP – Unsolicited Proposal
WAWF – Wide Area Workflow
WOSB – Women Owned Small Business

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