Federal Visibility vs. Federal Revenue
A Data-Backed Analysis of 370,000 Small Businesses
Executive Summary
Winning federal contracts is often described as a function of pricing, past performance, or relationships. While those factors matter, our analysis of more than 370,000 SBA-registered small businesses shows something more fundamental:
Federal visibility is one of the strongest predictors of whether a contractor will ever win — and how much they can earn when they do.
Using a proprietary Federal Visibility Score (0–100) and matching businesses to verified award data from USAspending, we found:
- Vendors in the top 10% of visibility are over 3× more likely to win a federal contract than those in the bottom 10%.
- Visibility exhibits a threshold effect: win rates increase sharply once a contractor crosses roughly the 60–70th percentile.
- High-visibility vendors do not just win more often — they capture a disproportionate share of total federal dollars, with dramatically higher upside.
This case study explains how visibility shapes opportunity, why low-visibility vendors occasionally win anyway, and what these findings mean for small businesses competing in the federal marketplace.
The Problem: Capability Isn't the Bottleneck
Most small businesses entering government contracting believe success hinges on one of three things:
- Being the cheapest
- Having the right past performance
- Knowing the right people
In practice, the federal acquisition process introduces a more basic constraint:
Contracting officers cannot evaluate vendors they never see.
Before pricing, before capability reviews, before negotiations, agencies must first identify potential vendors. That discovery phase depends heavily on structured data — registrations, classifications, certifications, and activity signals.
This is where visibility quietly determines who gets shortlisted and who never enters the conversation.
Defining Federal Visibility
Federal visibility refers to how discoverable, legible, and credible a business appears across government procurement systems.
To quantify this, we calculate a Federal Visibility Score (0–100) derived from multiple categories of signals, including:
- Registration completeness and consistency
- Structural discoverability (NAICS coverage, certifications, classifications)
- Profile richness and clarity
- Historical activity and system signals
Importantly:
Visibility scores are computed independently of contract dollar amounts. Award data is used only later for analysis — not to inflate the score itself.
This separation allows us to study visibility as a predictor, not a circular metric.
The Dataset
For this study, we analyzed:
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| SBA-registered small businesses (DSBS) | 372,000+ |
| Matched by UEI to federal award records | Yes |
| USAspending award data | FY2016–FY2026 |
Aggregated metrics:
- Lifetime obligations
- Last-12-month obligations
- Transaction counts
- First and most recent award dates
All results reflect real, verified federal spending activity.
Finding #1: Visibility Multiplies the Probability of Winning
We divided vendors into visibility deciles (10 equal groups from lowest to highest visibility) and measured the percentage of vendors in each group that had ever won at least one federal award.
Probability of Ever Winning a Federal Contract
| Visibility Decile | Win Rate |
|---|---|
| Bottom 10% | 17% |
| 20% | 25% |
| 30% | 24% |
| 40% | 16% |
| 50% | 23% |
| 60% | 26% |
| 70% | 37% |
| 80% | 35% |
| 90% | 48% |
| Top 10% | 54% |
That is a 3.18× increase in the likelihood of winning between the bottom and top deciles.
This gap is not marginal. It represents a fundamental shift in whether a business ever breaks into the federal market at all.
Finding #2: Visibility Is a Gate, Not a Dial
One of the most important insights from the data is how visibility affects outcomes.
Win rates do not increase smoothly from low to high visibility. Instead, they remain relatively flat until a tipping point is reached.
The Threshold Effect
- Below ~60% visibility, win rates fluctuate between 16–26%
- Above ~70% visibility, win rates jump sharply:
| Percentile | Win Rate |
|---|---|
| 70th percentile | ~37% |
| 90th percentile | ~48% |
| Top 10% | ~54% |
This suggests that visibility functions like a gate rather than a linear advantage.
Once vendors become sufficiently visible, they are meaningfully more likely to be shortlisted — and therefore considered.
Finding #3: Visibility Drives Earning Potential, Not Just Wins
Winning a contract is only part of the story. The next question is scale.
When we examined lifetime contract dollars by visibility group, the differences became even more striking.
Lifetime Earnings by Visibility (Winners Only)
Among vendors who have won at least one federal contract, earnings vary dramatically by visibility level:
| Visibility Decile | Median Lifetime $ | P75 Lifetime $ | P90 Lifetime $ | Median Txns |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bottom 10% | $146K | $812K | $4.7M | 9 |
| 20% | $252K | $2.1M | $13.1M | 11 |
| 30% | $109K | $722K | $4.6M | 8 |
| 40% | $145K | $1.1M | $7.0M | 10 |
| 50% | $131K | $820K | $5.2M | 9 |
| 60% | $189K | $1.5M | $10.0M | 12 |
| 70% | $219K | $1.9M | $14.2M | 13 |
| 80% | $339K | $3.2M | $22.7M | 20 |
| 90% | $518K | $5.7M | $44.2M | 29 |
| Top 10% | $2.54M | $28.3M | $124.6M | 61 |
The top 10% earns 17× more in median lifetime contract dollars than the bottom 10%.
Dollar Concentration
The concentration of federal dollars is even more striking:
| Visibility Group | Share of Total Federal Dollars |
|---|---|
| Top 10% | 48.5% |
| Top 20% | 65.0% |
| Bottom 50% | 16.8% |
Half of all federal contract dollars flow to the top 10% of visible vendors.
High-visibility vendors are not just more likely to win — they are far more likely to compound wins over time.
Visibility appears to correlate strongly with repeatability and scale.
Finding #4: Visibility Predicts Repeat Wins and Sustained Success
Federal contracting rewards consistency. The most successful vendors don't win once — they win repeatedly. Our data shows visibility strongly correlates with this pattern.
Repeat Winner Rates by Visibility
| Visibility Decile | % Repeat Winners | % With 5+ Transactions |
|---|---|---|
| Bottom 10% | 14% | 10% |
| 20% | 23% | 18% |
| 30% | 20% | 15% |
| 40% | 12% | 8% |
| 50% | 23% | 17% |
| 60% | 32% | 25% |
| 70% | 24% | 18% |
| 80% | 31% | 25% |
| 90% | 45% | 37% |
| Top 10% | 51% | 46% |
High-visibility vendors are 3.6× more likely to become repeat winners than those in the bottom decile.
Award Recency: Who Wins More Often?
We also analyzed how recently vendors in each visibility band received their last award:
| Visibility Band | Median Days Since Last Award |
|---|---|
| Low (0-49) | 313 days |
| Mid (50-69) | 110 days |
| High (70-84) | 92 days |
| Elite (85+) | 55 days |
Elite-visibility vendors receive awards nearly 6× more frequently than low-visibility vendors. This reflects the compounding advantage: once visible, vendors stay in the procurement pipeline.
Addressing the Objection: "Low-Visibility Vendors Still Win"
This is true — and the data confirms it.
Approximately 17% of the lowest-visibility vendors have won at least one contract.
However, those wins tend to share three characteristics:
- They occur less frequently
- They are smaller in dollar value
- They rarely compound into sustained growth
In other words:
Low visibility does not make winning impossible — it makes success rarer, slower, and more fragile.
What This Means for Contractors
Based on the data, visibility bands roughly translate to different operating realities:
| Visibility Band | Operating Reality |
|---|---|
| Below 50% | Inconsistent discovery; wins are unlikely and unpredictable |
| 50–70% | Occasional consideration; results vary widely |
| 70–85% | Regular shortlisting; materially higher win probability |
| 85%+ | Strong positioning; repeatable access and higher upside |
For many businesses, the difference between stagnation and momentum is not capability — it is crossing the visibility threshold.
The Strategic Implication
Federal visibility work is often dismissed as administrative overhead.
This analysis suggests the opposite:
Visibility is leverage.
Small improvements in visibility can produce outsized changes in:
- Probability of winning
- Consistency of outcomes
- Long-term earning potential
You do not need to be the most visible vendor in your category — you need to be visible enough to matter.
Conclusion
Across hundreds of thousands of small businesses, the pattern is clear:
- Visibility strongly predicts whether a business will ever win
- Visibility unlocks access once a threshold is crossed
- Visibility shapes not just wins, but scale
For contractors serious about long-term federal growth, visibility is not optional — it is foundational.
Next Step
If you are registered to do business with the federal government, the most important question is no longer whether visibility matters — but where you stand today.
Understanding your visibility percentile is the first step toward understanding your real earning potential in the federal marketplace.
Check Your Visibility Score
GovCon In A Box provides a free Visibility Gap Analysis that shows:
- Your current visibility score (0-100) based on 13 measurable factors
- Your percentile ranking compared to 372,000+ SBA-registered businesses
- Specific gaps in your profile that are reducing your visibility
- Actionable recommendations to improve your score and cross the critical 70% threshold
Data methodology: This analysis matched 372,000+ SBA DSBS profiles to USAspending award records (FY2016-FY2026) by UEI. Visibility scores were computed independently of award data using registration completeness, certifications, NAICS coverage, profile quality, and activity signals.