SAM.gov is a powerful, free platform for finding government contracting opportunities, and understanding how to navigate its features, particularly "Sources Sought" notices, is key to winning federal contracts.
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For the sake of today's video, we are
talking about sam.gov.
If you have questions, free to ask them.
So on sam.gov,
if you need to register, this is where
you go. This is the million-doll play. sam.gov
sam.gov contracting
contracting
advanced search.
and may have a little bit of a delay,
but this is the million-dollar play. You
want to know how to win, how to write a
proposal. There's some out there saying,
"Oh, get certified and you can get paid
to help people." Whatever your hopes and
dreams, your dreams and nightmares, your
goals, your desires are, you can have
them come true through sam.gov. So, you
can easily do that. So here in sam.gov
you can see different opportunities contracting
contracting
contracting opportunities subcontract
reports. So we're going to go to
contract opportunities
and we are going to talk about sources
sought notices. So at this time of the
year when we're in the third quarter,
April, May, June is third quarter, a lot
of organizations are trying to figure
out, do we want to spend? Are we going
to have the money to spend? What are we
interested in spending? So you're able
to determine if this is something you
should go after, if this makes sense.
And I have like a 9010 rule. 10% of your
opportunities should be sources sought.
So sam.gov gov. Search advanced search
sources all that's all I've done. If
you're here with me so far and this
makes sense, make sure you type yes or
type yes during the replay. That's all I
did. There's 3700.
Well, one of the complaints is, well, Kizzy,
Kizzy,
I went in there and the dates are old.
What? How? I don't want all this old
stuff. Okay. Well, great. Dates next
three months. So you see that the number
decreased. It went from 7,000
to 1,000
there. SAM.gov is set up in this way to
be confusing. I am here to help make it
more palatable so you're not freaked out
and you are able to leverage it to
easily win a contract. I recently just
had a student win a contract in my
ultimate edge class. So it's more than
possible. So sources saw are
opportunities where they're looking to
see who can potentially do the work. So
here is a very or potentially easy one.
Door repair, HVAC, painting, walls. You
do not need to do the thing. It's you're
trying to figure out is this something
you could bid on, find someone to do the
work, and you get your margin or your
profit. So, they're looking for requests
for information,
market research,
and you can see this is what they're
looking for. So, what you want to find
out is you want to reach out to the
contracting office. And this is also
another good thing, too, cuz you see the
little swirly, right? I have what's up,
y'all? I have a Mac and they just
recently updated Chrome. So, it doesn't
mean that there's anything wrong with
SAM.gov. I just need to change to a news
browser. And the same works for you.
We're not here looking for reasons to
give up. We're here to use sam.gov
appropriately. That is the whole point.
So, what I'm going to do is now go to
Microsoft Edge because we need to see
what is the information, what is there.
Because if you're already like saying to
yourself, well, it's not working. I'm
just going to go. then why have a
business? It's not about just giving up.
There's no reason that you can't win an
opportunity, but you have to persevere.
That's all it is. That's all you got to
do. So, I'm going to run us through the
same process. I'm just going to share a
different screen. And make sure you
like, subscribe, hit that notification
button, too. You may see a black screen
between shares. And also, there may be a
short delay. Okay, so here we go.
So we go to advanced search and we are
looking for notice type sources saw it
and you can see 3,000 but we want to
narrow it down to the next 3 months. So
we have 1,000. So we're looking at the
hanger door repair. Okay. So you see
there's no swirly. Correct. There's no
swirly there. That's correct. No
solicitation, but the swirly is not
there because I use a different window.
So, this is really important when you're
doing this. Correct. So, there's no
attachments. This is a sources saw. So,
basically, they're trying to see, are
there vendors out there who can provide
these types of services? So, it says the
automatic doors on the right are no
longer functioning and needs repairs.
And then they said only written
responses has to be 15 megabytes. Phone
calls will not be acknowledged. So what
I would do is there's two approaches.
one, you can go into chat GPT and ask
for it to write a one or twopage response
response
for how you would repair a hanger door
wi in which the repairs may include the
following. Okay. Next, you're going to
also want to identify three to 10
vendors in this area. And you may want
to confirm with them. Send them an
email. Is the door in Fresno? Is it near
Fresno? Where is the door located? Who
can provide the repair and get
information from them as far as what is
needed? Are there any special
considerations that they need to have?
Because this is not like repairing your
garage door. This is not, oh, we're
going to get the boys together. We going
to fix it. This is not that. This is a
hanger in building 100. Is this
something that one of you could w? Of
course. If you believe it, you will
achieve it. There's no reason you can't
win this. So, in order to win, here's
what you need. These are the things you
need to do. Number one, the company or
the person that you identify, you really
want to make sure that they give you
pictures. They break down how they will
handle it. They break down how they will
be able to access. They're even going to
take in consideration hours. They're
going to give you the how, when, where,
why around hanger door repairs in the
great state of California. And make sure
you take other things in consideration.
For instance, I would also send an email
cuz let's check out the date. This is
due the 20th of June. I would also send
an email to the point of contact. What I
would do is contact the email the point
of contact and just say, "Do you have an
idea of when you're wanting this to be
done? you. I don't know if there's a
rain situation, if they have fires in
this area. I have no idea, but you may
want to ask them, is there a particular
time of the year that you're looking for
this to be done? Also, when you're
talking to the vendor, are there
tariffs? Is there anything they need to
take in consideration? Do they try and
charge some extra fees? I don't know.
The more that you get all of the
information that's needed, you present
it in your written document, you ask
questions ahead of time, the more this
particular client prospect is going to
want to do work with you. So adding on,
if you're like Marlene and your small
business WSB, EDWSB or hub zone, then by
you saying, "Hey, I'm a WOSB." And if
there's a second WOSB who submits,
chances are they could make this a
womanowned small business set aside. So
you want to treat this as if they've
given you a solicitation. That's what
you want to do. However, they haven't.
This is a sources sought. It says purely voluntarily
voluntarily
voluntary. They're trying to determine
who's interested and their method of
procurement. Here's another bonus. If
you have a GSA schedule, it's really
going to set yourself apart. So, you
want to say, "Here's my GSA schedule. We
are able to run this through the GSA
schedule." Listen, let me just tell you,
I know I'm probably the 110th person to
call you like, "I'm trying to win a
contest." And let me tell you what I'm
trying to win. A federal government
contract. This is a contract that, you
know, Elon isn't trying to get rid of
cuz you know, Elon and Trump over there
fighting. I'm just trying to help out
the 144th fighter wing. I'm really
interested in getting a price cold from
you and I want to make this as easy as
possible. Again, I understand I could be
the 117th person who's called you and
you don't want anything to do with me
and that could be it. I'm not here to
waste your time. I'm just here to get us
both business. If this is of interest,
you know, does that work for you? You
It's identifying ahead of time the pain
points and what will easily lead to n I
want to talk to you. You know, they've
been called a lot. You can interject
some humor. I know I'm the 210 person to
call. That's like 210. No, dude. You're
the 10th. Okay. Okay. Well, you know, I
I bet a lot of people have called you.
You know, it's like finding something in
common. Oh, I see you're located in San
Bernardino. Oh, I know that area. I'm
just throwing things out there, y'all.
It's to get a price quote in order to
win something like this or any kind of
opportunities. It involves negotiation,
sales, building rapport. I want to
emphasize something. When it comes for
requests for information, you don't have
to give them pricing. It's up to you.
But all they're looking for is
information. But the more information,
images, hey, here's some testimonials.
Hey, the the sub I'm using got four
stars, 4.8 stars out of five. The more
they're going to say to themselves, man,
Javier, I want to go with this Javier
guy. That's who we want to go with.
That's what they're going to do, and
that's what they're going to say. So,
let's take a look at some other ones. We
got that. Let's take a look. Once again,
sam.gov advanced search three months
anytime sources. It's all we're doing. Okay.
Okay.
I mean, I'm just interested. Pepsi.
Guess I want some Pepsi on Guam. Okay.
Well, if this is you, if you're into
distributing Pepsi, then I would say bid
on it. If you got access to a Pepsi
distributor, this is for you. If you're
like, I have no idea, then guess what?
You keep it moving. But I want you all
to see the variety. Many think, oh,
there's nothing to bid on. There's a ton
to bid on. Here's another interesting
one. Boat racks. So, what was it? The
Navy. Yeah, the Navy wants boat racks.
So, they've outlined what they're
And they do have an attachment.
Sometimes with a source of salt, they'll
have an attachment, sometimes they
won't. And I will open that up for
everyone here. With something like this,
one of the reasons many people falter
when it comes to a product is they're
just thinking, "Oh, okay. Let me let me
find palettes. Let me go chat. Let me go
to Gemini. Let me let me go to Claude.
Let me go let me I just I'm I'm okay. I
found it." 42 deep. I found them. Let me
just get some prices. Whoa. Pump the
brakes. Pump the brakes. Can you afford
andor is any money needed up front for
the pallets? Is any money needed up
front? Make sure when you look into this
they include tax. They include shipping.
And find out from who's this? Carol with
a K. Where where is this being shipped
to? Like where do you need to ship this
to? What you want to do is make sure you
win and you're in a powerful position,
not that you win and then you want to
give it back. That's not what we're
trying to do here.
So, you have to ask yourself, do you
have or can you get the money that's
needed for something like this? Because
it's old boat barn pallet racks. That's
why. And if this is for you, you this is
something you have to ask them Javier
and everyone else. You have to ask them
how does payment work? What are the
terms? And you want to find out is this
vendor bidding on something like this.
This is considered a sources saw notice.
The government is doing research just
like you like, oh, let me let me look
who's got the best deal. Who's who's
Let's see who's got the best deal on a
cruise. You're not just going a
Carnival. Who got best deal in a hotel?
You're not just going with Marriott or
Hilton. You might go to hotels or one of
those websites. You're trying to figure
out the best deal. The same thing for
the Navy. They're trying to figure out
the best deal. Lynn, do you have to have
a professional email? Lynngmail.com.
There you go. That's professional
enough. Lynn at Yahoo. I advise against Hotmail
Hotmail
cuz it kind of dates you, but you'll be
fine. So I'm showing you SAM can seem to
be very confusing and in reality it's
not. It's not confusing at all. It's
just understanding how to leverage the
tools that are before you. That's all it
is. So let's look at the actual
attachment. You can put the chat GPT and
put in a prompt such as please provide
the key things that I need to know in
this statement of work in order to
create a written response. So, they're
letting you know San Diego
J uh July 20 July 11th and it looks like
they want let's see you have to have
your own lifts and all of the materials.
So, if this is up your alley by all
means if you're like oo I don't know
then it's time to pass. It's all it is
at the day. The whole goal is to
identify opportunities that you can win.
Not to go after things that you have no
chance of winning, but to go after
things that you can win. I'm going to
show you all another one and then we're
going to look at solicitations. Many in
the transportation industry would love a
transportation opportunity. If you're in
transportation or you're able to
identify a mover for Hawaii, this is the
opportunity for you. two young guys I
interviewed, they won an opportunity in
Guam for Porter Potties. So, there's no
reason you couldn't win this. So, you
can see that it's not a request for a
quote. If you give them information on
pricing, that's great, but they didn't
ask for it. Then, here's what they want.
A capability statement, estimated
pricing. So just give them a price range
and they're letting you know this hap
has to happen before 1 July and I will
share the attachment with each and every
one of you here in 1 second. So for this
moving let's take a look cuz this is
something you can easily bid especially
because they're not looking for you to
have everything together. They're just
looking for basic information. That's
all that they're looking for right now.
So you can see they want you to provide
labor materials equipment to relocate
government furniture from one hanger to
the next in Hawaii. That's what they
want. The distance is 500 ft. You got to
use stairs. All of the details are here.
Now the one thing about Hawaii is
there's a lot of pride there and so
companies know if you're calling them
that you're calling about this. It
doesn't mean that they're not interested
in working with you. What it means is
you want to really be express a lot of
gratitude. Okay. There is something
that's really interesting that stands
out. Gratitude when you're reaching out
to these companies for quotes and to get
information is this DB bids credential.
So what I would do, okay, hold on. must
pre-enroll no more than 30 days and no
less than five days before access is
required. Okay? So, what this means is
you can't send felons. You want to make
sure you're not sending felons there.
You're not showing pe sending people
with active warrants. You're not sending
people who smell like they've been
hanging out with Snoop. You want to make
sure that the people who are going there
can easily pass a basic background check
to gain access to the location for
something like this. Let's say you find
the most amazing moving company. They
give you a deal. They're excited to work
with you. You still have to oversee
this. You see it right here. Check-in
procedures. Provide multiple and
redundant means of communication. ensure
everyone knows their roles and
responsibilities. This is vital for you.
You can see at the top all the
information that they're going to want.
So you then have to ask yourself, is
this something you want to go after?
Because the misnomer is, oh, I I just
provided these. I'm make some money. I'm
out. And it's more than that. It's not
much more, but it's more than that. You
got to manage it. Uh so someone said if
you find information that will wait to
get paid unless you're providing the
service yourself. Somebody said I
thought services don't require upfront
capital. So for Lynn and everyone else
it just depends on what you're bidding
on. These are moving services. So for
moving services they may say to use two
guys and a truck you're going to have to
pay X amount up front. Maybe you just
find some people off of Angie's List.
But it's these are questions you have to
ask on the front end. But what happens
is people get scared and they don't want
to ask and all it does is cause more
chaos. So now what we're going to do is
take a look at active requests for
proposals. 90% of what you go after
should be active proposals. So we're
just sam.gov advanced search. I'm not
logged in. I'm not paying anything.
Note is tight. And also, I know some of
you, you're like, well, can't I just pay
a company to do all this for you? You
can, but let me know the results you
get. So, now we're looking for combined
synopsis solicitation,
and we're going to do set aside total
small business.
So, you can see there's 8,000. We're
going to do d do in let's do 1 month.
Now, we're at 2,300. I'm going to select
an opportunity to go out over with
everybody here, but I just find of
interest. You can change the page
results. So, it doesn't matter what kind
of computer you have. If something
doesn't work on one browser, use a
different browser. You don't have to
limit it to 25. You can have more
results. A lot of these things are not
things that most of us would sell.
That's why I'm scrolling. Okay, here we
go. Hold on. Side by side UTV.
side by side UTV.
So, it's due in third. It was posted on
the 7th, due on the 13th. It's a little
questionable because the turnaround is
really fast. However, you know, you
don't know if this is something that
you're able to find and deliver and you
have the cash to be able to pay for
this, then by all means, go after this.
But they've given you a description of
what they want. You can see there's a
lot of text here. And I know we like
shortcuts. So all you have to do is you
can cut and paste it into chat GPT. I
will have a new AI opportunity coming
out really soon. The attachment that I
just opened, it is basically a cut and
paste of what they have in the um
onsam.gov. So, they had a PDF and it's
really helpful to have Microsoft Office,
to have PDF. If you can't afford it,
just find free or um trial versions of
other things out there so you can see
what they're looking for. You can use
the past performance of the company that
you get the um side by side from.
Everything that you need is here. So
far, in the short time that we've been
together, I've identified numerous
opportunities for you. So, there's no
reason you can't win something. There
isn't any reason you can't take full
advantage of Sam backup. You just have
to ask yourself why. Is it a
perfectionism thing? Is it because
you're scared you're going to mess it
up? Who knows? It's about what is
holding you back. There's tons of
opportunities on here. I love religious
opportunities. There's several of them
right now. There's no reason you
couldn't win a religious opportunity.
And speaking of religious, I just ran
into one, so I'm going to kind of lean
into that. So you see a couple. We have
title services and Protestant musician
services in Kansas and Catholic
services. So they're looking for the
lowest price. Sometimes for musicians,
they will ask for um somebody to
audition, which only makes sense because
you don't want to put a terrible
musician. But for something like this,
if you're interested in this, I would
ask them who was the incumbent, what was
the contract number, what was the value
of the contract. I would and ask their
name because chances are using LinkedIn
you can find out who the musician is.
And more than likely that musician is
going to still want to remain in the
position regardless of who holds the
contract. So look at this, a military
working dog obstacle course. That could
be something for you to subcontract out.
In Tampa, often what happens is people
think, "Why would somebody work with
me?" But before I get into that, let's
go to the questions. Can nonprofit
organizations win bid? Yes, Lynn.
Capability statement scares me. Okay.
Well, that's fine. Just send me an
email. That's why you have tons of free
sort resources online, but you also have
paid resources available. Like for
instance, one of my coaching students
just want a contract for wash machines.
And many of my students are in the same
situation. There's things they don't
understand. There's things that they
need help with. And that's why invest in
coaching. So, as you can see here, this
is a potential opportunity working dog
obstacle course because most people
aren't going to bid on it. They're going
to say, "I don't know anything about
that." And instead, people lean into the
areas that they know. And there's again
nothing wrong with leaning to the areas
that you know. You just have more
competition. firing range maintenance,
title service, purchase snowmobile
trailers. If you have the cash, you're
going to set yourself apart because most
people can't afford to buy trailers.
Drug testing labs, trailer, a boat and
trailer. Again, most people don't have
enough money for that. If you're setting
on 50 to maybe 150,000, this is a good
opportunity to bid on. There's a lot of
opportunities that are here. It's just
are they a good fit for you? Hi,
Trophus. A 10person restroom trailer.
This is something you get a price quote
from three to five vendors and all of
the additional information is in the
Q&A. So, one thing I look for in the Q&A
is how long is it? It's one page. It's
very reasonable. They want the Let's
see. The price quote is due on June 9th.
They want two 10erson trailers, it looks
like. And probably more than likely, all
they literally want is pricing. And I'll
show the I'll share the documents with
you all so you can see what I'm
referring to. And all of this is on
sam.gov for free. I didn't log in. I
didn't pay for anything. I just I'm on
sam.gov. So you can see this is what
they're looking for. Unit price. I I'm
just throwing out a price. And your
price would include all expenses,
transportation, gas, any kind of
additional fees, any of that. And your
margin. Okay? So then it' be 20. And
then you give them 30 days. Maybe you
give them more than 30 days. Let's say
July 10th. You give the delivery date.
We're small. We're woman. You put your
ueI. You put your cage code.
If you have a GSA number,
boom, there you go. And then in the Q&A,
two trailers, 60 days. They tell you
they want to purchase two trailers. So,
you got to get you have make sure you
have the cash for that or see if they
give you a loan or accept terms.
meaning, hey, I'm going to buy the
trailers and I will send you the money
30 days from when I receive it. No services
services needed.
needed.
They want a warranty. They want aluminum
cuz it's going to be used in the desert.
Okay, it's pretty self-explanatory.
So, either you have the money for the
trailers, you don't have the money for
the trailers, this is interest, this is
of an interest to you or not. It's
important in this space to not get
caught up on the emotions. It's not to
be emotional. It's not to get caught up
in any of that. It's to stay even keel
and to focus on business. SAM.gov is a
beautiful tool. It's being prepared.
When you win, can you execute? Do you
have the money to pay for it? So, there
are tons of opportunities. I just shared
with you. I just shared with you the
opportunities that I just found as we
are here. There's no shortage of
opportunities. Nothing is oversaturated.
It doesn't matter who's president. It
doesn't matter about Elon Musk,
President Trump. It doesn't matter about
Kanye West. What matters is, are you
willing to find bid and win profitable
contract? Are you willing to do what's
needed? Are you willing to really
understand some of the nuances on
sam.gov and unison? That's what it's
about. Well, I love and adore each and
every single one of you. And please make
sure you like, subscribe, hit that
notification button. Keep coming back.
Do not give on your up on yourself cuz I
haven't given up on you. So, I just want
to let you all know that. Until next
time, everything is possible. And thank
you all for being here. Take care of y'all.
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