To provide an overview of how to seek funding, here's what we have got for you. But before we get into the points, let's be clear that the discussed ideas are more convenient when you are looking for small business financing.
- Bootstrapping: It is like funding your own needs. As the business grows, it allocates some cash to enable future growth. If the owner calculates the sales funnel and business and plan ahead, there is no need to sell part of his company.
- Self-funding: On the similar thought, some businessmen can take personal loan as a credit card or second mortgage to keep the business going and growing. A harsher step would be to sell off the personal assets to get the cash for the time being.
- Cloud funding: apart from being a bit cautious about how the cloud funders operate, it is a significant move in terms of small business funding. There are many groups which allow pitching individual ideas online. Typically, if this type of funding is successful, there will be multiple contributors for the project/business.
- Venture capital: there are firms who often are ready to provide early stage funding for small scale businesses. But make sure if there are other interests such as controlling the business deals or more.
- Crowd funding: primarily web-based projects, there are hundreds of crowd funding platforms which help to reach out to thousands of potential investors.
- SBA loans: Small Business Administration can help the business owners in more ways than one. But primarily they help to fund the business but needs a guarantee that the loan will be repaid. It follows more of the traditional lending process.