The Funders of Summer

August 2, 2012 | By: Sean Murray

What’s new? Who funded? What happened? Merchant Processing Resource will try to give you a glimpse into the Merchant Cash Advance (MCA) universe:

We all know salespeople love to fund, but underwriters?!! This banner hangs on the wall of the underwriting department at mid-sized MCA firm, Rapid Capital Funding:

Holy Moses Batman! $10 Million in a month?! Yellowstone Capital is reporting a new personal monthly funding record of $10,245,000.
batman yellow

There has been an influx of really creative instructional/promotional videos about MCA lately. Cartoons are really “in” right now:

PayPal white labeled a Merchant Cash Advance program in the U.K.

Will the mega banks be next?

It feels like 2006 all over again says First Annapolis Consulting in a recent article:

This seems to be the same bullish sentiment that surrounded the industry in 2006, when there was a constant influx of new MCA providers into the industry and what appeared to be unlimited financial sources. What might be different now is the experience accumulated in the industry during the recession. In the last few years, and as a result of the mounting losses that the industry suffered during the economic crisis, MCA players have implemented more conservative risk management practices and procedures.

Underwriters industrywide are also reporting that stacking, splitting, double funding, and fake statements are on the rise. It certainly brings back some nostalgia for veterans and not the good kind. A screenshot of a current ad on craigslist that is directed at bad apple merchants:

novelty bank statements

A new chapter opened for Merchant Cash Advance (This is soooo last month but a great read if you missed it).

http://greensheet.com/emagazine.php?issue_number=120602&story_id=3088

Is the loan shortage a banking problem or a merchant problem? Ami Kassar makes the case in his New York Times column.

“Where are the leads? I need the leads. Can you tell me where the leads are?” We literally get asked daily where to get leads from. We recommend:

http://SmallBusinessLoanRates.com
http://meridianleads.com

By the way… for every company that says cold calling doesn’t work, there’s a company getting rich doing just that. Same goes for SEO, mailers, e-mail blasts, PPC, and so. Marketing is an art form. Just because it doesn’t work for you, doesn’t mean it doesn’t work period. Keep doing what you’re doing. Too many ISOs/agents/marketing directors abandon campaigns after 30-60 days. Practice makes perfect!

Have you abandoned social media? We ask this question: What looks worse to a prospect?

Not having a business twitter account or having one but failing to tweet at all in the last 8 months?
Not having a business blog or having one but failing to add any new blog posts in over a year?

We didn’t spend much time researching hard data but we would surmise that freshness is a psychological component to a prospect’s shopping experience. If a business blogged regularly on their site up until May, 2011 and then stopped, might a merchant think the entire business itself is abandoned or gone? Is a facebook fan page with 1 post from 8 months ago a positive or negative selling point? WE SAY: If you build it, maintain it. Nothing brings down your presence on the Internet like abandonment. We understand that smaller companies might not have the manpower, time, or creative energy to write informative articles or engage people through social networking, especially when it’s hard to measure the results and value it creates. Consider the value you might actually be losing by projecting to the world that you have given up. It’s like operating a store with a sign out front that says “THIS BUILDING HAS BEEN CONDEMNED” even though you are actually open for business. If WE stopped posting articles for a year, would you still come back several times a month?

abandoned blog