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The course, Recovery Act Opportunities: How to Win Federal Contracts, is part of a federal government-wide initiative announced last month by President Barack Obama and is led by SBA and the Department of Commerce.

The free, self-paced, instructional guide gives an overview of the federal procurement process.

"The SBA online training course can help businesses access the federal purchasing system and position themselves to compete for the commercial opportunities offered by government contracting," SBA Administrator Karen G. Mills said in a statement.

Chris Olson is consultant at the Frederick County Small Business Development Center and president of the Frederick County Entrepreneur Council.

"The SBA's website is a very rich resource, with lots of great tutorials and other reference and instruction materials for business owners, especially on the topics of financial management and government contracting," Olson said. "We always recommend it in our business start-up seminars."

Olson said business owners are often surprised by the range of products and services required by the federal government.

"Especially now, with consumption down in the private sector, it makes more sense than ever for businesses to investigate opportunities to sell their product and services to the government, not just the federal government, but at the state and local levels, as well," Olson said.

Olson said there's also a lot of local support available for would-be government contractors.

That includes the Fort Detrick Business Development Office, Small Business Development Center and the Procurement Technical Assistance Program, downloadable resource guides at the Entrepreneur Support Network's website (www.FrederickESN.org), the Frederick Innovative Technology Center incubator, and SCORE.

"Online resources like the SBA's new tutorial can only make the support environment even stronger," Olson said.