Having money loaned is an essential part of managing small businesses. Whether you need to scale your staff, buy new equipment, or cover extra expenses you might search for the ways to get funding. However one in four business owners say they can’t get enough funding. The process of getting a loan may take months and that results in the lost opportunities and inability to scale.

In this guide you will find out:

• Ways to use business loan to grow your business
• All benefits of Prospa Small Business Loans 
• How to become eligible for Prospa Small Business Loans 
• Prospa Small Business Loan process: from request to repayment

Ways you can use a small business loan to grow your business

There are multiple ways small business can benefit from a loan.

56% of small businesses apply for funding to expand their business, pursue a new opportunity, or acquire business assets and 44 percent needed the funding to meet operating expenses.

entrepreneur.com

Here are some ideas on how you can benefit from getting a business loan.

• Buying or repairing equipment

If your business uses expensive equipment, it is likely that you will need extra funding to upgrade or repair it. The productivity of your company highly depends on the equipment you use, and by upgrading it you will be able to scale your business considerably. This is true for businesses in different industries: manufacturing, agriculture, food and restaurant as well as creative industries. 

• Hiring new employees

People are the most important asset for your business. If you want to scale you want to hire more qualified employees who will be able to bring new expertise and strengthen your team. However, it takes time for new employees to start paying off. Therefore, you will need extra funding to cover the expenses for the new staff. 

• Setting up marketing efforts

In order to scale your business, you have to acquire new customers regularly and this is not possible without investing in marketing. Quality advertising is an important component of business development. In order to keep your business profitable you can use a loan for your marketing efforts. It will be paid off by the increased sales volume many times over.

• Improving the quality of your product or service

Sometimes it is impossible to scale without investing to improve the quality of your offering. Customers are more likely to choose a product or service over other alternatives if it has higher quality and exceeds the expectations. Investing a loan in such improvements, will definitely make a difference for your business shortly. 

• Landing the right space

Whatever stage your business is at, having the right premises, factories or facilities is one of the most important things to get right. You’ll need to think about whether to buy or rent, and of course there are pros and cons with both. Either way, a small business loan can help you move forward with the right decision.

Benefits of Prospa Small Business Loans 

There are multiple ways you can get extra funding, however not all of them will be beneficial for your business. At Prospa we know exactly what challenges a small business faces when applying for the loan, so we’ve come up with a process to help businesses get a loan with minimum efforts and maximum benefits.

Getting a small business loan with Prospa is simple

If you will look for investors and hold discussions to get funding – that takes months. What’s more, each investor or bank has its own terms for loans. So the process is not only long, but quite complicated. Getting a business loan with Prospa is convenient and far more straightforward:

• No collateral required, provided you meet eligibility criteria
• No physical bank or in person meetings required. Everything can be done within an app without leaving your home
• Transparent terms and rules of loan repayment

Getting a small business loan with Prospa is fast

Unlike weeks and even months that you could spend searching for external funding, with Prospa you can get a loan in a short period of time. The request for a loan is created  in several clicks in the Prospa App so you can do it without even leaving your home. After getting a request it is reviewed by Prospa team promptly.

You will not have to halt operations or growth plans while waiting for the funds. You get your loan quickly and can run daily operations and cover short-term expenses just when you need it.

Once the loan request is approved, Prospa usually targets to send the money within two business days.

Getting a loan with Prospa is totally under your control

It is likely that when you take a loan from an external investor, you lose total control over the decisions about what it should be spent for. This is not a case with Prospa. Prospa doesn’t interfere with how you run your business. We don’t dictate how you should use the money you borrow. You are the one to decide how much you want to borrow and what to spend your loan for. Prospa is here to help your business grow. All that is required is timely payment and sufficient credit rating.

With Prospa Small Business Loan, there is no sharing of profit

If you get money from an investor or bank, it is likely that you are expected to return on the profits your business makes. That’s not the case with a Prospa small business loan. You pay back a fixed sum no matter how well your business does as a result of the financial support. If you want to understand what monthly repayments will look like, you can just check the repayment information in Prospa App.

Request for, track and repay a loan all in one place

Prospa is all about convenience, so we’ve made sure you can request and manage your loans easily in one place. Prospa allows you to:

• Get all information about your credit score and the ways to improve it
• Request a loan and track each step of your application from review to approval
• See the repayment date and the amount you have to pay
• Set automated repayment or manage it manually from your app.

How to become eligible for Prospa Small Business Loan

The most important eligibility criteria is to be an active member of Prospa. Loans will be available for you 30 days after activating your Prospa account. You will receive a prospa credit score, based on which your loan amount and interest rate is calculated. The Prospa Credit Score is graded from A+ (a very good score) to E (the lowest score). A high Prospa credit score results in large eligible loan amounts (up to ₦1,000,000 ) while a low credit score results in lower loan amounts and higher interest rates.

As mentioned above, with Prospa you are in control of the process of getting a loan, so you can easily improve your Prospa credit rating. You can do the following:

• Use Prospa as your primary business account. 
• Increase your business inflow 
• Have a consistent inflow and outflow 
• Use Prospa invoicing 
• Add your inventory and customers to Prospa account
• Repay loans on time 

Prospa Small Business Loan: from request to repayment

With a Prospa App the application for a loan takes literally minutes. Just follow the steps described below. 

Step 1. Login to Prospa App

Step 2. Go to Loans dashboard

Step 3. Check eligibility and choose the amount you want to borrow

Step 4. Make sure to add contact info of two references

Step 5. Check the details and repayment terms. Confirm the loan request by ‘Get loan’ button click

After this your request will be sent to processing. You will be able to track the status of your loan request right in Prospa App. 

• The status ‘In review’ means Prospa team conducts a check with member / references for verification
• ‘Accepted’ – Prospa team has completed the check and notification has been sent to disburse funds
• ‘Application rejected’ means that for some reason the application did not pass the check. Additional information or verification might be required
• ‘Loan active’ – Funds have been disbursed and loan period is active

Once the loan is disbursed, you have 30 days to repay it. There are several options to repay small business loan with Prospa.

1. Auto Repayment

You can opt-in for the feature of Auto Repayment in Prospa App. It will allow you to pay a part of all the inflows in your account towards the loan automatically. It is possible to also choose what percentage of the inflow you want to allocate towards repaying a loan.

2. Repay on your own in Prospa App

At any point when the loan is active, you can go to the loans section of the Prospa app and enter the amount to repay.  You can do this multiple times during the loan period until the loan is fully repaid. 

Now you know how to scale your business with Prospa small business loans. If you have any ideas that require extra funding, wait no more. Login to your Prospa App and check your eligibility for small business loans. If you have any questions leave your comment below or contact us directly. Prospa is dedicated to helping you succeed. 

Together We Prospa 💜