Magazine for the professional nail industry.
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Social lending. Social lending connects borrowers with individuals or groups of people willing to lend at an agreed upon rate, without using traditional banking as an intermediary. Sites provide a forum for business owners to go online and apply for loans ranging from $1,000 to $35,000. Individuals or interested groups can then view your credit pro⇒ le, learn how you plan to use the money and if they are interested, group together with others to fund your request. In other words, a $10,000 loan for your business could actually be funded by 100 individ- uals putting up $100 each. > Examples of these organizations are Lending Club (www.lendingclub.com) and Prosper (www.prosper.com). Matching services. These sites match business borrowers with lenders. You can register with these sites, and your pro⇒ le and lending request will be shown to hundreds of lenders on their system who may be inter- ested in funding your request. Borrowers can get in front of signi⇒ cant numbers of lenders very quickly, a key bene⇒ t when expediency is key. > Some examples of matching services are Lendio (lendio. com) and Biz2Credit (biz2credit.com). As many small business owners know, the world of ⇒ nancing can often be frustrating. However, the tools I've outlined above are changing the way small businesses are able to grow by leveling the lending playing ⇒ eld and increasing transparency. Going forward, always remember that when tackling your next opportunity or emergency, preparation is half the battle. Knowing exactly where you stand in terms of your credit, as well as what your ⇒ nancing options are, will help your business through its next transition. 98 | NAILS MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2012 www.nailsmag.com/fifi/23304