Selling goods and services to the public sector has a reputation for being something of a mystery, but it can be a great opportunity to work with a fair and loyal customer offering good payment terms with little or no risk of bad debt.
In 2019 alone, the public sector awarded 45,000 contracts to 16,000 suppliers worth £93 billion, yet relatively few choose to approach it.
The Institute of Sales Professionals (ISP) thinks this is a missed opportunity, so we are launching a public sector sales group to help our members do business in this growing market.
The initiative is being led by Matt Spencer, managing director of Govsell Services Limited and a fellow of the ISP. Matt has worked in business-to-business selling for more than 35 years, and for the last 20 years has focused on selling into the public sector. Most recently he headed the public sector sales team at Telefonica O2.
The ISP is launching the new public sector sales group with a webinar on Wednesday 16 March 2022 at 09:00. (Click here to join us: https://www.the-isp.org/events… )
The online event will explain how the UK’s public sector is organised, where to find information to bid for work, more about the vast number of products and services bought by the public sector, and how much deals are worth.
Matt said: “This is a great opportunity for ISP members to understand how the public sector does business and how private organisations can work with them.
“In the past, people have told me they’ve given up trying to sell to the public sector because it’s too difficult, but the process doesn’t need to be complicated. There are clear rules, the system is open and fair, and the cost of sale is often lower than selling to a private sector company.
“I think there are real business opportunities and benefits which I am keen to share with ISP members.”
Matt will be joined on the video call by Lloyd Johnson from Tussell. Tussell was founded in 2015 to offer information on government contracts, helping companies do business with the public sector and helping public sector bodies get better value.
Tussell has also become the media’s trusted source of insight on public contracts. It raised the alarm about the government’s contract with ferry company Seaborne Freight, which had no ships and had never run a ferry service, and Tussell’s Covid-19 contracts tracker has been used to scrutinise government spending in response to the pandemic.