Creative Business Financing Tactic

Can anyone clarify the mystery of creative business financing? Surprisingly enough, there is a myriad of misinformation -- and just plain bad advice swarming this topic. If you're at the point of utter frustration in your search for straight talk about truly creative sources of business start up funding, then read on.

Join me in weeding out "the crap" (pardon the expression) versus the truly creative business financing solutions, by exploring what's hot and what's not in business start up funding. Let's start out by looking at what's not.

What's Not! Borrowing from Family & Friends

This is usually not a very good idea. It's one thing to risk your own assets, but what happens if your business doesn't do as well as expected?

Credit Card Financing

Using credit cards as a source of start up funding is a very bad move. Not only is the interest rate unfavorable, but so are the repayment terms. Read the fine print of your card holder agreement and you'll see exactly what I mean.

Merchant Account Financing

This is like a loan, in that you are given a sum of money up front. However, there are no loan repayments. The lender takes a chunk of each and every one of your credit card transactions as repayment. Please, please, please - this is a very bad idea!

Peer-to-Peer Lending Groups

This is a loan from a non-traditional source - but nonetheless a loan. The major players are Prosper, Loanio and Zopa.

Before We Continue, Let's Make a Quick Stop in Oz...

Did you know that creative doesn't have to mean difficult? Challenging circumstances are often conquered with very simple -- dare I say, childlike solutions.

Remember Dorothy and Toto? Dorothy just wanted to get home to Aunty Em. What she didn't realize (until it was pointed out) was that she had the means to get back to Kansas the whole entire time. She just needed to understand how to effectively manage what she already had. Along comes Glenda her personal coach (a/k/a The Good Witch).

Glenda provides Dorothy with the training she needed to utilize the resources already at her disposal (exhibit A: the ruby red slippers). The end result? Dorothy is empowered to use what she already had, to get to where she really wanted to be. So what is the moral of this story? Are you trusting in "so called" Wizards?

Learn proven, creative financing strategies to fund your start up by exploring the benefits of bootstrapping.