By Gloria Larkin
President, TargetGov
The federal government agencies follow a fiscal year beginning October1 and ending September 30. We have just entered the final quarter starting July 1. Historically, over $150 billion will be spent in the next three months with companies both large and small receiving competitive and single source contracts.
Whatever monies federal agencies and military operations have not yet spent will go to the vendors who have built a proactive strategy targeting and building relationships with decision-makers.
Vendors have just weeks to make strategic moves to capture that business. Informed vendors research the budgets and forecasts to identify what specific target agencies are planning to spend. They then plan tactics to market their company aggressively to the appropriate people within each individual agency based upon the services and products on the short list of funded purchases.
While many private sector companies are slowing down for a long, sluggish summer, savvy government vendors are actually going full speed ahead from July through September with targeted, aggressive marketing and sales campaigns to aggressively pursue the federal end of year spending rush.
The driving force behind this process is that any agency that has not spent their budget in full must find appropriate purchases to spend all the monies allotted to them or risk having the next year’s budget reduced even further. These decision-makers feel much more comfortable reaching out to those companies that they know and trust.
Top Ten Recommended Federal Marketing Tactics For Increasing Fiscal Year End Sales:
1. Update and verify the existing customer relationship management (CRM) listing of all decision-makers in target agencies (annual turnover tracked at 43%.)
2. Identify additional targeted contacts through agencies’ forecasts, web sites and FedBizOpps.
3. Create a Fiscal Year End offer to grab their attention.
4. Update the company’s social media platform and connect with all target agencies, bases and offices.
5. Plan for a 24/7 customer service phone number ready to answer questions from July 1 through September 30.
6. Contact each decision-maker, ask for a briefing to update company offerings and discuss any open contracts for specific products or services.
7. Ask to be notified of all fiscal year-end buying needs.
8. Ask about any sales opportunities below the $25,000 and $150,000 thresholds.
9. Ask permission to email them information.
10. Stay in touch via phone, email, social media and direct mail every week through September 30.
Gloria Larkin is president of TargetGov and a national expert in business development in the government and corporate markets. She is WIPP’s Educational Foundation Vice-Chair, a dynamic speaker and book author and is adept at negotiating the government contracting maze on behalf of clients. Visit www.targetgov.com or call toll-free 1-866-579-1346 for more information.
www.wipp.org
July 1 Begins Final Quarter
of the Federal Fiscal Year
—Strategize & Execute Now to Increase Sales