Every business needs a certain amount of money to start. The success of a small business depends on the funding it is able to arrange to ensure a smooth cash flow. Different Business Life Cycle Stages will help determine the type of financing available and timing of receiving the financing. These life cycle stages are:

Startup: You develop the business model and financial planning for small business owners infrastructure and start early operations.
Growth: Generally a business has an initial time of negative profit until it breaks even and begins to show increased revenues that allow it to grow.
Expansion: This is the point at which a business gets to the point where there is sufficient revenue being brought in so that there are no doubts of its survival and it can expand its horizons.
Mature: The business is now stable enough to survive most unforeseen circumstances. It has enough backing, capital and support to ensure that even if the market becomes unstable, it can pull through.
While many small businesses may choose to get funding in the early stages to start the business, many need access to financial resources even for a running business especially with those that have seasonal patterns. Finding adequate funding for small ventures can be tough and time consuming. Often entrepreneurs end up utilizing their entire savings to keep the business afloat until other financing is available.

These are some of the financial planning for small business owners options available:

Self financing
Bank Loan
Friends and Family Loans
Cash Advance
Equipment Financing
Unsecured Loan
Accounts Receivable Factoring
Line of Credit
Home Equity Lines
Credit Cards
Inventory Loan
Vendor Financing
Working Capital Loan
Franchise Loan
Grants
Equity Investment

Brand mission can be fun and it really shows you what your company is all about. What type of products are you marketing and what is your key demographic that you are selling them to? It is absolutely imperative to become familiar with your key demographic, also referred to as target market, before you start off with your brand mission. You can perform a simple brand market analysis to achieve this crucial information. Gather all of the data that you will need to create a successful branding debut.

Branding can come in the form of a logo, tagline, great one of a kind service that only you can provide your customers with, it really is all about what you are comfortable with. How you go about achieving the next steps in your branding plan will most likely depend on how much you can afford financially to make those dreams come true. Having a budget before you start playing around branding is crucial for your business success. Remember, there are low cost and high cost options and the choice will really depend on where you currently are with your business and how fast you want to move forward.

If you are a starting business owner with a tight budget, you will want to start on the web and do as much as you can for free to begin with. Look at how other companies have been successful with their own unique style of branding. Check them out and aim to do the same for yours (I mean creating your unique style, not copying exactly what they're doing - lol). Give out something free if your company can afford it. Studies have shown that people trust businesses that award something free more than the ones that don't give away anything to their clients

Several of these options are more appropriate and easier to secure in the later life cycle stages. Small business financing comes at a price and also increases the element of risk involved. However, financing becomes necessary to ensure cash flow, purchase assets like property, expansion of business, equipment or inventory purchase, or simply to have adequate working capital. Utilizing financing makes sense versus using up all of your personal assets and resources. But getting a small business financing approved requires that the owner/borrower is able to provide the following:

A sound business plan
Personal profile with qualifications and experience
Personal financial status statement
Credit rating of the business if already in operation, or credit history
Track record of taxes paid in previous years
Collateral that can be used to secure the loan
There are a lot of considerations that go into small business financing. Subsequent articles will expand on each of these options and points.