Funding for a business

[slomodan]

How does one get funding to start a business? Simply applying for a business loan at a bank?

Assuming one person wanted to start an online business, what sort of steps are necessary? Getting a business license and then what? Does one build a presentation of your business goals, expectations, implementation and then present your idea to the bank?

Sort of inspired about the thread about YouTube, Zipper said:

@ZipperJJ

Yeah but I figure you’ve got to have funding to even consider getting the kind of server setup they must have. And to get funding you’ve got to have a plan that says to the financer “yes this will yeild me money.” What is that plan?

World dominance?

So really, how does a place like YouTube start up from nothing to so big so quickly? Are these people independently wealthy, or did they get the money, and then hire people to build the business? Certainly it wasn’t two guys in a garage programing for two months straight. There is more to it to that, certainly.

[friedo]

In the case of YouTube, the founders were former engineers at PayPal, and convinced a number of PayPal execs to sit on their board. They were able to develop the business plan and secure venture capital from Sequoia and others.

If you don’t have a strong business plan or access to people in the venture capital business, then getting funding via that route is unlikely.

On the other hand, small business loans are readily available from your local bank as well as the Small Business Administration. But you’ll still need a convincing business plan that demonstrates you will be reasonably able to pay back the loan.