Many of my most successful clients started with a single small sale to one federal agency. Like the old cliché the first sale is always the toughest, they were able to build upon this initial sale, provide a noticeably better product or service and grew from there.
These small sales are able to take place because the federal government has a credit card similar system called SmartPay. This SmartPay system allows federal buyers (from over 300 agencies) to purchase goods and services in amounts up to $10,000 for micro purchases as well as assists in larger transactions.
As part of the GSA Schedule process a firm is automatically put through the process with the federal government to accept GSA SmartPay cards. This help federal buyers know that when they are purchasing from the GSA Schedule system the vendors there will have the ease of the SmartPay or the ability to use their federal credit cards.
As you can see from the picture below the SmartPay card looks very similar to your normal Mastercard.
How Big is SmartPay Spending
The federal agencies put a lot of transactions through the SmartPay system which totals around $20B annually. Below shows the agency spend via SmartPay cards as well as the number of transactions.
SmartPay Transaction Size
The average transaction size for a purchases using a SmartPay card has grown to $1,170K. The size of SmartPay card transactions is favorable to government retailers as the US Ecommerce benchmark for non-governmental order of between $70-130 per transaction.
Most Common SmartPay Product Purchases
Most Common SmartPay Service Purchases
GSA Schedule Holder Advantage
GSA Schedule Holders are setup with SmartPay as part of the schedule process. Therefore federal buyers look to GSA Schedule holders first because they know these vendors can accept their easiest method of payment SmartPay!
