FA300225SC002- FY26 AoI 0002

UNITED STATES AIR FORCE (USAF)

AIR EDUCATION AND TRAINING COMMAND (AETC)

AREA OF INTEREST (AoI)

FA300225SC002 FY26 AOI-0002

Creative Productions and Media Purchasing

Title: Phase 1 – Whitepaper AoI - Total Force Marketing and Accessions Support for Creative Production and Media Purchasing

1. Introduction

The United States Department of the Air Force (DAF) Air Education and Training Command (AETC) is seeking innovative, commercial solutions to modernize its marketing and advertising operations. The primary goal is to acquire innovative, commercially available solutions that can support the DAF's new Organic Integration Marketing Model. The Government is seeking partners who can provide capabilities across the full spectrum of modern marketing and advertising, enabling the DAF to execute data-driven, multi-channel campaigns with speed, flexibility, and transparency. This solution is expected to significantly enhance the DAF's recruitment efforts by leveraging its extensive internal capabilities and data sets.

2. Purpose

All items, technologies, and commercial capabilities using a CSO will be treated as commercial items. The Government encourages proposals that span a wide spectrum of possible technical and business solutions in response to this specific AoI. The Government reserves the right to award any combination of proposals which offer the best overall value to the Government, and to oversee any and all processes and approaches once initiated. The award, as a result of this announcement, shall be Fixed Price in accordance with RFO Part 12 commercial contracts.

Award resulting from this CSO -AoI will be made based on the evaluation results of a two-phased proposal process. The Government reserves the right to fund all, some, one, or none of the proposals submitted; may elect to fund only part of a submitted proposal; and may incrementally fund any or all awards under this CSO – AoI. All awards are subject to the availability of funds.

All coordination and communication between offerors and the Government will be conducted using (www.sam.gov) and the points of contact associated with this Phase 1 – White Paper.

3. Notice to Offeror(s)/Supplier(s)

Funds are not presently available for this effort but expected to be there at the time of award. No award will be made under this solicitation until funds are available. The Government reserves the right to cancel this Phase 1 – White Paper solicitation, either before or after the closing date. In the event the Government cancels this Phase 1 – White Paper solicitation, the Government has no obligation to reimburse an offeror for any costs. The Government reserves the right to re-open a phase at any time.

4. General Information

Points of Contact: Sasha Stewart, 338 ESS/PKA, sasha.stewart@us.af.mil and Joseph Sitterly 338 ESS/PKA, joseph.sitterly.2@us.af.mil.

http://www.sam.gov/ mailto:sasha.stewart@us.af.mil mailto:joseph.sitterly.2@us.af.mil

Questions regarding the content of this AoI Phase 1 – White Paper must be addressed to the Contracting Officer(s) listed above and AFICC.338ESS.CSO@us.af.mil.

All correspondence for this AoI must include the following in the title of the email

“FA300225SC002 FY26 AOI-0002”

5. Submission

AoI Phase 1 – White Paper submissions are DUE 21 August 2026 no later than 11:00AM CST. Please email submissions to the AOI Phase 1 – White Paper to the Contracting Officers listed above and AFICC.338ESS.CSO@us.af.mil . Confirm receipt with a separate email (not containing attachments).

Phase 1 – White Paper submissions will only be accepted during the specified period and shall be prepared in accordance with the formats in Attachment 1.

Offerors should monitor (www.sam.gov) for amendments to this AoI Solicitation.

Phase 2 – Solution Submission with Pricing

Offerors whose Phase 1 White Papers are selected for further consideration will be formally invited to Phase 2. During Phase 2, the Government will issue a formal Request for Solution

(RFS).

Invited Offerors will be required to submit: A customized, solution-specific Statement of Need (SON) detailing their commercial methodologies, workflows, and deliverables. A populated Government Master Product Catalog Template specifying their standard commercial products, unit definitions, and Firm-Fixed-Pricing (FFP). Based on the templates provided in attachment 2 and 3.

To ensure mutual alignment, the Government may conduct interactive, bilateral feedback and collaboration sessions with Phase 2 offerors to refine their proposed SON, deliverables, and pricing structures prior to final evaluation. Detailed instructions, review timelines, and submission deadlines will be provided in the formal Phase 2 RFS invitation, criteria for evaluations can be found mentioned in section 9 below.

AoI - Problem Statement

The DAF faces significant challenges in access to creative production and media sources in order effectively increase brand awareness and increase effective recruitment marketing:

• Agile Creative Production: Rapid development of creative concepts for the production of multi-format creative content (video, digital, audio, static) that resonates with target audiences (ages 17-40 and their influencers). A demonstrated process for producing high-quality creative assets on-demand, optimized for various platforms in different markets, and aligned with DAF brand standards, with full Government data and intellectual mailto:AFICC.338ESS.CSO@us.af.mil mailto:AFICC.338ESS.CSO@us.af.mil http://www.sam.gov/ property rights.

• Specialized Campaign Execution: Turnkey execution of targeted campaigns for specific career fields, events, or demographic audiences, from concept through to reporting and analysis.

• Flexible & On-Demand Execution: A commercial business model that allows the DAF to procure specific, well-defined marketing "products" or "capabilities" (e.g., a video shoot, a digital media campaign, a reporting package) with predictable pricing and deliverables executed via a pre-negotiated Master Product Catalog. The Government is also looking for the ability to reuse, rework and disperse deliverables.

• Full Compliance & Rights Management: A robust system for ensuring all deliverables comply with applicable regulatory standards (e.g., FCC, FTC) and for managing all third-party intellectual property (e.g., music, stock assets), granting the Government unlimited and perpetual use rights.

• Transparent & Optimized Media Performance: A capability for planning, executing, and reporting on complex media campaigns with market-level transparency, demonstrating how investment is translated into measurable reach and frequency against target audiences.

• Data-Driven Strategic Insights: The ability to provide the Government with actionable analytics and post-campaign analysis, including validated performance data, spend reconciliation, and recommendations for future optimization.

• Seamless Integration & Collaboration: A proposed model for working within a multi-vendor environment, seamlessly integrating Government-furnished assets, data, and strategic direction to achieve unified campaign objectives.

• Budget and Workforce Constraints: The DAF must shift to utilizing its own internal capabilities and cost-effective commercial solutions to achieve marketing goals

6. Objectives

The DAF aims to acquire a commercial solution that achieves the following objectives:

• Create authentic, targeted recruitment campaigns by leveraging the DAF’s internal content and personnel capabilities.

• Support diverse missions by providing customizable products tailored to the unique needs of various national, regional, and local mission areas.

• Reports capturing robust ROI and KPI tracking to measure market interest and effectiveness to optimize reach.

• Deliver robust ROI and KPI tracking to measure campaign effectiveness and optimization of media.

• Provide creative, brand forward productions increasing awareness and interest while providing individual capabilities of each component.

• Ensure compliance with Federal, DoD, and State standards.

• Ensure scalability, resilience, sustainability, and adaptability to accommodate evolving requirements and market interests.

7. Scope of Requirements

The DAF requires a solution for obtaining productions and media with the following capabilities:

7.1. Campaign Productions

• Component specific productions that can span from photography to full scale commercial production.

• Creative concepts for specific components

• Final production in variety of formats such as:

o Static Asset Package o Social/Motion Content o Photography o Video Production o Commercial Production

7.2. Media Purchasing

• Media purchasing on a variety of platforms, at local, regional and national levels.

• Media Strategies that show the platforms and level of engagement.

• Reports for each component and market segment requested showing engagement, and based on audience attributes, behaviors, and preferences.

7.3. Scalability and Security

• Ability to conduct production on location, nationally within Air Force and Space Force installations.

• Compliance with accessibility standards (e.g., Section 508), and FCC guidelines to ensure deliverables will be viable on all media platforms.

• Compliance with installation regulations while on location

7.4. Specific Capabilities of Interest

• Media Opportunities: Tools leveraging capabilities for optimal media spaces in diverse markets and segmented to the ideal market for each component.

• Media Reach: Abilities to meet component specific markets at local, regional and national levels.

• Rapid Deployment Capabilities: Ability to deploy creative productions into market within a short timeframe.

8. Desired Outcomes

The DAF expects the solution to deliver the following outcomes:

• Increased Recruitment Effectiveness: Higher engagement and conversion rates among

17-24-year-olds through effective media purchases and creative productions built through more DAF directed campaigns.

• Streamlined Execution: Rapid creation and development of media strategies and productions with DAF directed campaigns.

• Operational Efficiency: Streamlined purchasing through pre-packaged deliverables.

• Actionable Insights: Robust ROI and KPI reports delivered with the deliverables.

• Scalability and Adaptability: An adaptable and resilient development of packages that will evolve with DAF needs and emerging technologies.

9. Evaluation Criteria and Selection Process

The Government will review each White Paper (Phase I) and select offerors that provide the greatest potential to bridge the gap in AETC/MK’s internal capabilities for Media and Creative deliverables based on the AoI. Initially, a determination will be made on each offeror’s technical solution capability and their comprehensive understanding to undertake the requirement based on the information they provided. The Government will determine the most technically competent and capable of the qualified offerors using the criteria below:

• Criteria (Factors) for Selecting White Paper for Full Proposal Submission:

o Technical Capability/Importance to program o Alignment to DAF objectives.

• Relative Importance: All factors are of equal importance

• Method of Evaluation: Subject Matter Expert Evaluation

The evaluation criteria listed above will be used to evaluate submittals for all phases, but additional criteria will be used for the full proposal submission and that can be found below.

Prices shall be considered to the extent appropriate, but at a minimum, to determine that the price is fair and reasonable. Proposals need not be evaluated against each other since they are not submitted in response to a common performance work statement or statement of work. The Government reserves the right to fund all, some, one, or none of the proposals submitted or may elect to fund only part of a submission under this CSO.

Phase 2 will evaluate the following areas:

• Agile Production Scalability & Velocity: Evaluation will be conducted on the execution of rapid, on-demand, multi-format (video, digital, audio, static) creative development. A highly rated proposal must demonstrate a repeatable, sprint-based workflow that scales up or down to meet unpredictable recruiting needs without cost inflation or schedule slippage.

• Commodity Catalog & Asset Lifecycle Management: This factor shall be evaluated based on the feasibility, predictability, and flexibility of the offeror's Master Product Catalog. The proposal must demonstrate a clear methodology for pricing, ordering, and delivering products related to media-based needs and creative production requirements (e.g., a specific video shoot package or static asset set).

• Intellectual Property: The Government will evaluate the Offeror’s methodology and legal guarantees for securing and delivering royalty free, worldwide, nonexclusive, irrevocable license(s) or transferring ownership rights for all Intellectual Property and/or deliverables developed on individual Task Orders to prevent vendor lock-in.

The Government will also evaluate the Offeror's framework for identifying and clearing all third-party rights in Intellectual Property and/or deliverables developed on individual Task Orders. The Government will also evaluate the Offeror’s process for compliance with SAG-AFTRA, FCC, FTC, and other regulatory requirements before delivery.

• Performance Verification & Media Transparency: Evaluation of the offror’s capability to plan, execute, and report on media strategies at different levels of complexity (e.g. National Media vs. Local), with absolute transparency on all media deliverables. The offeror must demonstrate how they utilize third-party ad-verification servers to validate impressions, reach, frequency, and spend reconciliation (proving that 100% of the media buy budget went to verified publishers).

• Multi-Vendor Collaborative Integration: Evaluations will focus on the offeror’s model for working seamlessly within a multi-vendor, multi-agency DAF environment.

The proposal must outline specific protocols for integrating Government-Furnished Information (GFI).

• Data-Driven Optimization & Strategic Analytics: Offeror’s will be evaluated on the capacity to translate raw campaign metrics into actionable, strategic recommendations.

A highly rated proposal must outline a data-driven process for conducting rigorous Post-Campaign Analyses (PCAs) that advise the DAF on which career fields, demographics, or geographic markets to target in future "Turnkey" campaigns.

All phases will be categorized as Recommended, Selectable, or Non-Selectable as follows:

• Recommended: Proposals are recommended for acceptance if sufficient funding is available and normally are displaced only by other Recommended proposals.

• Selectable: Proposals are recommended for acceptance if sufficient funding is available, but at a lower priority than Recommended proposals. A Selectable proposal requires additional development. To ensure a diversity of approaches, a Selectable proposal may be prioritized over a Recommended proposal if the Selectable proposal presents a unique approach unlike any of the Recommended proposals.

• Not Selectable: Even if funds were available, the proposal should not be funded.

Attachments:

1. Attachment 1 – White Paper Format

2. Attachment 2 – Draft SON

3. Attachment 3 – Draft Product Packages

ATTACHMENT 1. WHITE PAPER FORMAT

A1.1. The white paper should include a discussion of nature and scope of the effort and the offeror’s proposed technical approach. The Government will review the white papers in accordance with the evaluation criteria set forth in this announcement.

A1.2. The white paper page limit is ten (10) pages, not including the cover sheet and executive summary. Any pages exceeding the ten (10) page limit will not be evaluated. White paper shall be single-spaced (must use standard single-space function in Microsoft Word), with text in Times New Roman, no smaller than 12-point font and submitted in Portable Document Format (PDF). Pages 8.5 x 11 inches paper, with one-inch margins on both sides, top and bottom. All text, including text in tables and charts, must adhere to all font size and line spacing requirements listed herein. Illustrations, flowcharts, drawings, and diagrams are part of the page count, therefore if adding such items, be mindful of the page limitation. All pages, shall be numbered starting with the executive summary page being page 1. White papers must not exceed a file size of 25 MB.

A1.3. The white paper will be formatted as follows:

A1.3.1. Cover Sheet: The following information shall be contained in a cover sheet submitted with the proposal:

(a) CSO number, AOI number, and AOI name

(b) Full company name and address

(c) CAGE code, Dunn & Bradstreet (D&B) and Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS) number

(d) Unique Entity ID number

(e) Business Size Classification (large, small, or other)

(f) Offeror’s socioeconomic status

(g) Point of contact, name, title, phone number, and email address

(h) If the proposed work to be performed is classified, add the following information:

Classified level at which company is cleared, contract address for forwarding classified material (name, address, zip code), cognizant security office (name, address, zip code), and offeror’s security officer’s name and telephone number).

A1.3.2. Executive Summary. Provide a one (1)-page executive summary of the technology and a brief overview of your organization, including qualifications, experience, and relevant certifications.

A1.3.3. Technical Concept. Describe the unique aspects of the technology and the proposed work as it relates to the AOI. Identify whether the effort includes the pilot or demonstration of existing commercial capabilities (identified as commercially ready and viable).

Identify aspects which may be considered proprietary. The technical portion of the solution shall include a discussion of the nature and scope of the effort and the offeror's proposed technical approach/solution. It may also include any proposed deliverables. Descriptions of facilities and equipment, and a proposed SON are not required to be submitted with the white paper.

A1.4. White Paper Submission Requirements

Interested vendors are requested to submit a response addressing the following:

• Solution Description: Describe your proposed solution to meeting area provided within the draft SON, Attachment 2. Emphasizing the potential for creating packaged deliverables that cover a variety of creative and media elements, while providing information on the flexibility and rapid capabilities of your solution.

• Data and Intellectual Property Rights: Acknowledgement of Government’s rights in deliverable data and intellectual property. Describe your solution for delivering royalty free, worldwide, nonexclusive, irrevocable license(s) or transferring ownership rights for all Intellectual Property and/or deliverables developed on individual Task Order, how third-party rights in Intellectual Property and/or deliverables developed on individual Task Order will be handled, and the solution for ensuring compliance with SAG-AFTRA, FCC, FTC, and other regulatory requirements.

• Integration and Security: Detail your solution’s data integration capabilities, automatic data parsing, field reporting features, and security measures, including compliance with DoD standards (e.g., FedRAMP, CMMC) and accessibility standards (e.g., Section 508).

• Compliance and Accessibility: Provide your solutions for ensuring compliance to Federal, State, and Local regulations for media and productions.

• Scalability and Performance: Provide metrics demonstrating your solution’s ability to handle fluctuations in budget, mission, and capabilities in both complex and simple media and production packages.

• Case Studies: Provide examples of successful deployments for similar clients, preferably in government or large-scale organizations.

• Pricing Information: Provide high-level pricing details or a pricing model. Note:

Detailed pricing will be requested during subsequent phases.

A1.5. Anticipated Price/Offeror Viability. Provide an overview of business establishment and operations, a rough order of magnitude cost estimate, and an estimated cost breakdown over estimated package options, see Attachment 3. The Government is looking for solutions at 1-, 2-and 3-year periods.