In the products market, end users often are familiar with the products they are buying. Did you meet with a Microsoft salesperson before purchasing Microsoft Office? Does Microsoft even have salespeople? Our company bought Oracle software and Sun servers without meeting with salespeople. We learned about the products through word of mouth and Internet research. Fortunately, competition and open-source software have changed the environment that existed back then and even the mighty Microsoft may have to sell its more complex offerings today. Maybe karma really exists.

Although products companies must build relationships, their investment in terms of time and money is not as great as in the services setting. As in the services market, a federal product sale is closed using a multi-vendor contract transaction or a public bid. The public bid is usually posted in the form of a Request for Quote but, in some instances, a Request for Proposal is used.

Responding to a Request for Quote usually does not require a voluminous proposal. Bids can be submitted on hope alone. If you lose the opportunity, use the Request for Quote as your mechanism to interact with the customer. Consider calling the customer afterwords to ask why you were not chosen and then sell him on the great worth of your products.