Posted on 09/28/15 by Tara Palacios
Guest blog post courtesy of Lori Atwood of Fearless Finance, LLC.
You are a visionary, an entrepreneur. You know there is a need for your product/service and you know you can give your customers what they need. All you need is a little cash. You need seed money, something to get you started implementing your vision, right?
You know you need financing. You’ve heard about venture capitalist, angel investors, crowd funding and even stodgy bank financing. You’re ready to talk to anybody… but are you really?
What do you need to know like the back of your hand to really engage in a meaningful discussion about financing your business? It’s not simply knowing that you need financing. You may get just a minute or two with someone who could change your life. Be ready!
Here are the five things I want my clients to know better than their own phone number:
Until you have a great response to the 5 items listed above in your sleep, you should not go out for financing. What you should do is the homework and planning to get the right answers to the 5 questions raised here. You can only do that with solid financial planning for your business.
You need a solid financial model of your business that allows you to run scenarios and see what happens to your business under certain circumstances. It allows you to see how you are doing versus your goals and how to correct it if something goes off the rails.
If you have not started doing business yet, your financial model is a set of projections based on your intimate knowledge of your business space and customer base. If you are doing business, it’s a model of the actual data you have AND projections for the future.
You already do all the jobs in your business probably, you will also need to be your own CFO until you can afford to hire one. Know what makes your business go, financially.
Want to know more? Lori Atwood will have more insights on finding business financing with "Show Me the Money," a workshop on how to achieve financial goals for your business. Click here for more information or to register for this free workshop.
Topic: BizLaunch