Know what you're walking into.
RFP Recon reads federal solicitations and tells you whether the bid is wired, who the real competition is, and where your proposal effort should actually go. In 60 seconds.
No credit card. No sales call. See how it works →
- SAM.gov + FPDS data
- No proposal writing
- Results in 60 seconds
Built from interviews with 20+ federal BD leaders.
“We know we are missing opportunities by bidding on projects we have no chance on. We believe this platform gives us the best shot.”
Bad allocation of finite proposal capacity.
Every small contractor faces the same two simultaneous failures.
Problem 1
The bids you can't win.
$15K–$50K
wasted per RFP that was wired from the start
40–70% of federal RFPs are sculpted to lock in the incumbent. Most contractors can't tell until after they've written the proposal — when the award notice names the company everyone in the room already knew would win.
The average small contractor writes 15–25 proposals per year. If even 5 are wired, that's $75K–$250K in unrecoverable bid cost — before opportunity cost.
Problem 2
The bids you don't see.
30%+
of strong-fit opportunities never make it onto your radar
Staying in your lane feels safe. It also means missing the bids where you'd actually win. Most BD teams are so buried in active proposals they don't have capacity for real opportunity discovery.
Win rates under 20% aren't just a proposal quality problem. They're a bid selection problem. You can't write your way to a higher win rate on the wrong opportunities.
Recon in both directions.
One tool that solves both sides of the allocation problem.
Recon on the bids you're considering.
Paste any SAM.gov solicitation. In 60 seconds, get a structured field report with everything you need to make a defensible pursuit decision.
- Wired-RFP signals with exact suspicious language quoted
- Incumbent identification with full contract history
- Capability fit scored against your company profile
- Realistic PWin estimate with reasoning chain
- Expected-value math: proposal cost vs. contract value × PWin
- Printable decision memo for leadership
Recon on the bids you're missing.
Continuously scans federal opportunities and surfaces winnable RFPs your team would otherwise miss — scored by predicted fit and competitive density, not just NAICS match.
- Weekly intel digest: ranked by where you'd actually have a shot
- Fit scoring against your capability library, not just codes
- Competitive density analysis before you commit
- Alerts for adjacent opportunities outside your usual lane
- Tracks recompetes before they hit SAM.gov
- Filters for contract vehicle alignment
The wired-RFP detector.
A wired RFP is a federal solicitation where requirements have been sculpted to favor a specific vendor — usually the incumbent — making the “competition” effectively a paper exercise.
RFP Recon identifies these signals automatically, quotes the exact language, and explains why each flag matters. You read the evidence and decide — we don't ask you to trust a black box.
Why this matters
GAO bid protest win rates are under 25%. Knowing a bid is wired before you write the proposal is the only actionable intelligence — after you've submitted, your options are a protest with low odds or a sunk cost.
Mandatory proprietary system experience
Requirements that name a specific platform only one vendor has operated.
“Contractor shall have a minimum of 7 years supporting [Agency]'s proprietary [Internal Platform Name] in a federal operational environment.”
Key personnel criteria that name an individual
Clearance levels or experience profiles so specific they describe one person.
“Program Manager shall hold active TS/SCI with CI Poly adjudicated within the last 18 months at [specific program office].”
Certification requirements that don't fit the scope
Certifications required for work that doesn't justify them — because the incumbent already holds them.
“All personnel in a senior technical role shall hold CMMI Level 3 certification issued within the preceding 24 months.”
Suspicious recompete patterns
Three or more consecutive awards to the same incumbent with escalating scope.
“[Incumbent Vendor] — 3 consecutive awards: $3.1M → $5.4M → $9.2M over 8 years.”
Sculpted evaluation weighting
Technical criteria weighted so heavily that price becomes irrelevant — designed to surface the known incumbent.
“Technical approach: 70 pts. Past performance: 25 pts. Price: 5 pts. (on a straightforward support services contract)”
Three steps from solicitation to decision.
Upload your capabilities.
Past performance, certifications, key personnel, target agencies, and contract vehicles. We build a structured fingerprint of what your company actually wins.
Bring us RFPs or let us bring them to you.
The analyzer runs on demand — paste any SAM.gov URL or upload the solicitation. The weekly intel digest runs continuously in the background.
Get clear, defensible answers.
Bid, walk away, or pursue with these specific teaming partners. Every recommendation cites its reasoning. Every flag quotes the exact language that triggered it.
Every other GovCon tool is built around volume. We're built around allocation.
GovWin, GovTribe, Bloomberg Government — they're subscription businesses whose revenue depends on perceived opportunity volume. They're structurally incentivized to make every alert feel like a real opportunity, because if you stop believing there's opportunity, you cancel.
RFP Recon is the opposite. Our job is to help you walk away faster from the bids you can't win, and find the ones you actually should be chasing. We make money when you make better pursuit decisions — fewer wasted bids, higher win rates on the bids you do pursue.
We're the only tool in GovCon whose interests are actually aligned with yours.
Other tools optimize for
Volume
RFP Recon optimizes for
Allocation
The result
Higher PWin
Transparent pricing. No “contact sales” walls.
Annual billing saves 20%. Cancel anytime.
Starter
For BD teams running their first structured recon process.
- 10 RFP recons per month
- Weekly intel digest
- Wired-RFP detection
- Field report export (PDF)
- 1 team seat
- Email support
Growth
For active BD operations pursuing 20+ opportunities per year.
- 50 RFP recons per month
- Continuous opportunity scanning
- Capability library (full profile)
- Teaming recommendations
- Expected-value modeling
- Up to 5 team seats
- Priority support
Enterprise
For firms managing large BD pipelines across multiple divisions.
- Unlimited recons
- API access
- CRM / pipeline integrations
- Custom capability profiles
- Dedicated onboarding
- Unlimited seats
- SLA + dedicated support
“I spent years in performance marketing analytics watching companies pour budget into channels that didn't work. The patterns were obvious in the data — but only after you had the right tools to see them.
Federal contracting has the same problem at 100x the scale. The difference is that a bad bet costs $30K instead of $300 — and the feedback loop is 18 months instead of 18 hours.
I built RFP Recon after talking to dozens of small contractors who all told me the same thing: they know they're missing opportunities and chasing the wrong ones, and they have no system for fixing it. This is the system.”
Questions we get asked.
Run recon on your next RFP. Free.
No credit card. No proposal writing. Just clear, defensible intel before you commit.