Small Business Spark

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Congratulations! If you’ve made it this far, you’re probably well on your way to either starting or growing your dream business. The truth is; though, whether your business is big, small, booming or just puttering along, every entrepreneur experiences the inevitable lull. A period where you don’t have quite the same amount of “get up and go” as you did when the idea of starting your business was first born. When moments like these arise, it’s important to not dwell on it, but instead, to stay energized and motivated. We hope this list from entrepreneurs, who have been in your same position, helps revive you to push through to work for your dream.

  • “Quality is more important than quantity. One home run is much better than two doubles.” –Steve Jobs
  • “It is human nature, as we get older, to look for stability in our lives. But if you want to be a successful entrepreneur, you have to fight against that somewhat. Starting a business requires movement. You cannot stay still.” –Robert Herjavec
  • “If people like you, they will listen to you, but if they trust you, they’ll do business with you.” –Zig Ziglar
  • “A brilliant idea doesn’t guarantee a successful invention. Real magic comes from a brilliant idea combined with willpower, tenacity, and a willingness to make mistakes.” –Lori Greiner
  • “Don’t be afraid to give your best to seemingly small jobs. Every time you conquer one it makes you that much stronger. If you do the little jobs well, the big ones will tend to take care of themselves.” –Dale Carnegie
  • “Negativity is a blood-sucking, poisonous, good-for-nothing weed that kills any creative spark you have in business and life. Keep an optimistic attitude no matter what.” –Barbara Corcoran
  • “Move out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new.” –Brian Tracy
  • “If people haven’t laughed at your dreams, then you aren’t dreaming big enough. Just keep pushing forward!” –Daymond John
  • “It’s very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better.” –Jonathan Ive
  • “Whatever the problem, be part of the solution. Don’t just sit around raising questions and pointing out obstacles. We’ve all worked with that person. That person is a drag.” –Tina Fey
  • “Great entrepreneurs are not just passionate about their idea, but have enough passion to weather all the obstacles and see things through to the finish line.” –Barbara Corcoran

The Do’s and Don’ts of Perfecting Your Pitch

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In this world of instant gratification, making business connections has to be quick. That’s why now, more than ever, perfecting your elevator pitch should be at the top of your career “To Do” list. Use our list of Do’s and Don’ts to make a big impact in a small amount of time.

Be Brief & Don’t Ramble

It’s called an “elevator pitch” for a reason. Respect your audience’s time by keeping your pitch short and sweet— between 10-30 seconds— no more time than a ride from floor 1 to floor 9 would take.

Be Relatable- Not Robotic

It’s true that practice makes perfect (we encourage practicing too!), but remember that you’re talking to a real person. Lose the industry jargon and “keywords” that you sprinkle throughout your resume.

Keep it Conversational

This point is twofold. First, don’t ramble off your laundry list of what you can do and how your company would be a great fit to work alongside theirs. Remember this is intended to be a dialogue not a monologue.

Also keep it conversational in tone. Think about your pitch the way you’d tell your best friend about your dinner last night. You wouldn’t say, “The exquisite appetizers and rustic, yet chic, décor made for a charming evening.” You’d say, “I ordered cheese dip at dinner last night, and it was so delicious that I licked the bowl then ordered a second round.” See the difference?

Be Persuasive, but Humble

You’ve got a reason to be pitching. You clearly bring something to the table. Don’t be afraid to share about your skills, specialties and background! That being said, don’t overshare by reciting all of your awards and accreditations.

Always Be Ready

You never know when an opportunity might arise. Yes, it could be at your monthly networking meeting, but there’s a good chance it could also be in the check-out line at your local grocery store.

Don’t Forget Business Cards

Your elevator pitch is a conversation, not a close. The whole purpose of the interaction is to start a relationship with the person you’re speaking with, so don’t forget to leave them with contact information to remember you.

Three Reasons Why Businesses Fail

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If someone walked up to the front door of your business giving away “success in a bottle,” would you take it? You may laugh or roll your eyes, but I’d assume that you might give it a go. What’s there to lose, right?

According to Bloomberg.com, 80% of businesses crash and burn within the first year and a half. We use frightening statistics like this to motivate ourselves — what can we learn from these companies? Sure, a percentage probably just runs out of money, that’s understandable. But we think there are more issues that arise before the finances collapse. Here are our top 3 reasons businesses fail, and what you can do to keep your business from being a statistic.

Reason #1: You Put Your Dreams Above Your Customers

The secret to a successful business is the same as that of a marriage — listening! Your customers hold the key to your business’ success, so listen to what they like and dislike. What makes them tick? What are their hobbies, dreams and values? Talk to your customers. Nathan Furr and Paul Ahlstrom say it best in their book, Nail It, Then Scale It, “Which would you rather do — talk to customers now and find out you were wrong or talk to customers a year and thousands of dollars down the road and still find out you were wrong?”

Reason #2: You Don’t Stand Out

We live in a busy, go-getter world that gets busier by the second. There are plenty of distractions and competitors all fighting for the same thing that you are — your potential customer’s business. In this dog-eat-dog world, it’s your job to make your company stand out. What sets you apart from the other businesses? What makes you unique? Figure out the true value you bring to your market.

Reason #3: Take a Look in the Mirror

It may be hard to read — but consider your leadership techniques. Think about sports headlines each week. We’ve all heard about amazing talent like Lance Armstrong, Barry Bonds or Mike Tyson making poor decisions that derail their success. Entrepreneurs’ names may not be plastered on every HD television across the country, but it’s the same, self-sabotaging decision-making in question.

As the founder of your company, it’s your job to lead it. Recognize where your weaknesses are, and build those up. Are you a poor communicator? Do some research on interpersonal communications classes. Anger issues? Take an anger management class.

Now for the good news— you can avoid these mistakes! It doesn’t take but a quick look down the main street in your city to realize that businesses succeed. With the right attitude and business-minded actions, you can not only avoid that expected first-year failure, you can find yourself leading a quickly-growing company with a bright future.

Financing Your Expanding Small Business

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To be a successful small business, it takes tremendous passion and incredible work ethic. Nothing comes easy. And nothing is given to you.  504 GROW Loans reward the efforts of small business owners by providing access to more affordable funding that can be applied to a wide range of commercial growth needs.

  • Up to 90% commercial financing (50% lender first mortgage, up to 40% SBA 504 funding)
  • Below market, fixed interest rates (SBA 504 portion)
  • Long amortization terms (up to 20 years)
  • Loans are assumable by qualified, acquiring businesses
  • Large project sizes (SBA 504 portion up to $5.5MM)
  • First mortgage rate set by participating lender
  • $5.5MM for manufactures and loans that qualify under energy efficiency criteria (all others up to $5.0MM for the SBA 504 portion)

If your business needs major fixed assets such as equipment or real estate, you should consider a 504 GROW Loan. Eligible use of 504 Loan proceeds includes:

  • Buy land and construct new building
  • Buy land with an existing building
  • Remodel, convert, expand or renovate existing building
  • Green initiative projects
  • Purchase of long-life machinery and equipment
  • Associated fees and soft costs

“504 Grow Loans are absolutely the best way for small businesses to finance land, buildings and equipment with its higher advance rates, lower down payments and 20-year fixed interest rates. Additionally, it is a great refinance loan product,” says Al Hodge, Executive Vice President, Arkansas Capital.

 

If you’re ready to apply for a business loan now, click here to contact us. To receive more information on small business loans and to find the one right for your business, visit the loan products page.

 

Youth Entrepreneurship Showcase Winners Announced

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Boone, Pulaski, and Van Buren County Students Top Winners at Youth Entrepreneurship Showcase (Y.E.S.) 5th – 8th Grade Business Plan Competition

“Sweet Feet,” “Mac Magic,” and “Sports Boards,” were named this afternoon as first place winners in the Arkansas Capital’s 12th annual “Y.E.S. for Arkansas” business plan competition for elementary, middle, and junior high school students.

The winners were announced this afternoon by Rush Deacon, CEO of Arkansas Capital, in an awards ceremony that followed “Y.E.S. for Arkansas Expo Day” at Park Plaza in Little Rock. Twenty-five teams from 15 Arkansas counties beat out 127 other teams to be invited to Expo Day for the opportunity to compete for cash and other prizes in four divisions, pitching their business ideas to judges and making their products or services available for sale to mall patrons.

The winners are:

Most Innovative Division:

  • Sweet Feet, Omaha School, Omaha – First Place
  • Mac Magic, Pinnacle View Middle School, Little Rock – Second Place
  • Sal de la Vida, Omaha School, Omaha – Third Place
  • Pape-R-Us, Forest Heights STEM Academy, Little Rock, – Fourth Place

Best Marketing Piece Division:

  • Mac Magic, Pinnacle View Middle School, Little Rock – First Place
  • JK’s Mystical Lights, Cutter Morning Star Elementary, Hot Springs – Second Place
  • The Giving Girls, Pangburn School District – Third Place
  • Dog Deli, Sheridan Intermediate School – Fourth Place

Best Retail Booth Division:

  • Sweet Feet, Omaha School, Omaha – First Place
  • The Natural State V.O.V. Bracelets, Lakeside Middle School, Second Place
  • JK’s Mystical Lights, Cutter Morning Star Elementary, Hot Springs – Third Place
  • Flower of Life Gourmet Chocolates, Omaha School, Omaha – Fourth Place

Best Business Plan Division:

  • Sports Boards, Southside Bee Branch School District, Bee Branch – First Place
  • Trendy T-Shirt Tribe, Cotter Public Schools, Cotter – Second Place
  • The Compact Case, Don Tyson School of Innovation, Springdale – Third Place
  • Sal de la Vida, Omaha School, Omaha – Fourth Place

In addition to winning cash prizes totaling more than $6,400, each team member received a commemorative medal and their schools were presented a 3-D-printed trophy, produced by the Innovation Hub in North Little Rock.

The Y.E.S. for Arkansas competition is managed by Arkansas Capital’s 501(c)(3) affiliate, the Arkansas Economic Acceleration Foundation (AEAF). AEAF’s mission is to nurture people and ideas to generate future Arkansas entrepreneurs.

Since AEAF launched Y.E.S. in 2006, 7,436 elementary, middle, and junior high students have been impacted by the competition by creating and submitting 2,210 business plans. Arkansas Capital has provided nearly $73,100 in cash prizes awards to teachers and students.

In addition to Y.E.S., AEAF also manages and produces the Y.E.S. for Arkansas 2.0 High School Business Plan Competition established in 2011, and the Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Collegiate Business Plan Competition, established in 2001.

Arkansas Capital is a certified financial development institution with five affiliate and subsidiary companies – Six Bridges Capital Corporation, Arkansas Capital Relending Corporation, AEAF, Heartland Renaissance Fund, and Pine State Regional Center.

Start the New Year Right: Bookkeeping Tips for Entrepreneurs

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Start the New Year Right: Bookkeeping Tips for Entrepreneurs

Keep your business running smoothly

Ugghhh! Bookkeeping. It is often one of the most neglected elements of business for entrepreneurs. It isn’t sexy. It isn’t fun. Calculating income and outgo. Projecting quarterly taxes estimates. Reporting. Entrepreneurs want to be out there doing. Fixing. Selling.
[Read more…]

Startups to Watch in 2017

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startups

Across the country, millions of entrepreneurs are gearing up for the new year, finding ways to be better, faster, stronger, and make 2017 “their” year. While there’s surefire way to tell who will succeed and who will fail, there are a few companies we can see making huge strides over the next 12 months. Here are the startups we think are on the brink of greatness in 2017.

Slack

Slack has been taking the tech world by storm since it was founded in 2013, and is poised to explode over the next year. Originally created to be an internal program for tech company Tiny Speck, Slack makes communication among groups and teams much more streamlined by creating a chat room in which users can also share files and collaborate on projects.

World View Enterprises

This startup is “Radically Rethinking Access to Space” by sending balloons up into the stratosphere to take photos and collect data more efficiently and economically than any other company on the market. The company is also exploring stratosphere tourism, where they will take people on the edge of space.

Exabeam

Cybersecurity is an increasing important and profitable market, and Exabeam is capitalizing on this opportunity through its security product that tracks human behavior on subscribing networks and identifies people who are attempting to sabotage or hack it. In addition to preventing cyber attacks, it can also work forensically to discover who hacked into a network and how they did it after an attack has been conducted.

Classy

Nonprofits and charitable organizations often struggle with attaining the business operating system necessary to efficiently achieve their important goal of helping people and communities. Classy remedies this problem through an accessible, high-level fundraising platform.

What startups do think we’ll see expontential growth from in 2017? Let us know on Facebook @ArkansasCapitalCorporation or Twitter @ArkCapitalCorp.

Arkansas Capital Year in Review

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2016 year in review

The final weeks of December are upon us, and we at Arkansas Capital can’t help but look back on the past year and be thankful for all the excitement, success and advancement of Arkansas entrepreneurship brought by 2016. While we couldn’t possibly list all of the highlights that took place this year, we’re sharing a few of the most memorable below.

David’s Burgers

David’s Burgers is widely-known in central Arkansas for its freshly-pattied, Grade A beef burgers, creamy shakes and endless amount of hot French fries. When they needed support from Arkansas Capital to open their Maumelle location, we jumped on the chance to work with this outstanding establishment.

Uncle T’s Deli-Market

Uncle T’s Deli-Market has been serving delicious sandwiches, freshly cut deli meats and cheeses, as well as common grocery items, in the same location on Martin Luther King Drive for almost 40 years. A respected and loved establishment in their Little Rock community, Uncle T’s Deli-Market is an ideal Arkansas Capital client, and we were thrilled to help them open their upcoming Conway location. Be on the lookout for their grand opening in January!

Shared Services Center Fort Smith Expansion

Shared Services Center is one of the largest employers in the Fort Smith area, as well as one of the fastest growing. When we were approached to help expand this outstanding company, we were thrilled to help them improve and extend their space to accommodate new employees.

Veteran’s Day at Flyway

We at Arkansas Capital love supporting our clients and celebrating those who have made sacrifices to protect the freedoms we enjoy in the United States of America – and we particularly enjoy combining the two. For Veteran’s Day 2016, we hosted an event at Flyway Brewing (one of our outstanding clients) where we bought all veterans a free beer, as well as a beer for civilians that made a donation to Veterans Villages of America. More than $700 was raised to support local veterans in need that night, and fun was had by all in attendance!

Heartland Renaissance Fund

Heartland Renaissance Fund, LLC, – and Arkansas Capital CDE – was awarded a $65 million allocation in New Markets Tax Credits, the second-largest amount ever awarded to Heartland. These funds will help increase investment in businesses and economic activities in low income and underserved communities throughout Arkansas. Learn more about the allocation here.

Heartland Renaissance Q & A with Christa Clark

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Heartland Renaissance Q & A with Christa Clark

Arkansas Capital is proud to announce that its CDE, Heartland Renaissance Fund, LLC, has been awarded a $65 million allocation in New Markets Tax Credits to foster investment in businesses and economic activities in low income and underserved communities throughout Arkansas. This allocation is the second-largest amount Heartland has ever been awarded. To learn more about this momentous occasion, we enlisted Christa Clark, Vice President of Heartland Renaissance Fund, to answer a few questions about the allocation, and give some insight on what how this money will change Arkansas communities for the better.

Q: What was your process for receiving the allocation?

A: New Market allocations are awarded by the Dept. of Treasury’s Community Development Institutions Funds in a competitive process each year. Heartland staff spends several weeks completing the application and analyzing the impacts from our prior investments when submitting the application. The applications are reviewed by third parties and by U.S. Treasury staff and scored.  Historically, only about 28% of applicants are awarded allocation in a given year in this highly competitive process. We are always honored when we are selected, as there are always over 200 other CDEs in the applicant pool with us. We are especially thrilled this year that this is our fifth award of allocation.

Q: What areas of Arkansas has Heartland worked most with in the past? What areas do you foresee benefiting from these funds?

A: Heartland focuses almost exclusively on investing in Arkansas’ low-income communities throughout the state.  We focus on areas that are underserved by traditional financing sources and direct our investments in the projects that have the most community and economic impacts to that area. As with prior allocations, Heartland will make investments statewide with at least half of its transactions in rural areas.

Q: What industries typically see the most benefit from these allocations?

A: That is one of the benefits of a flexible lending product like New Markets Tax Credits – we can use the funds to finance a variety of projects.  We have financed a wide range of projects with New Markets, everything from educational facilities to non-profits and large rural manufacturing. We will continue to focus on our three core areas of education, health care, and economic development projects throughout the state.

Q: What has been one of your most rewarding experiences working with Heartland?

A: It is hard to narrow that down to one. We have so many projects that I have been blessed to work with that are improving their communities. There was one manufacturing project that we worked several months to bring to financial closing that was located in a town in the Arkansas Delta with very high unemployment and had several large employers that had closed down in recent years.  When the project was about to open, I was doing a site visit and the company brought in BBQ and we ate with the newly hired plant workers in the cafeteria. The plant manager stood and thanked me, and explained how grateful they all were that they had jobs again and were able to provide for their families.

Q: How have you seen Heartland’s work positively impact the underserved businesses, the communities of underserved businesses and the entire state? 

A: There have been so many benefits to underserved areas from our investments.  Our New Markets financing was used to build a state-of-the-art life skills and work training facility for disabled adults in northwest Arkansas.  We have seen hundreds of first generation students attend college for the first time. There has been thousands of quality jobs created in Arkansas’ manufacturing sector that are located in some of the most economically disadvantaged areas throughout the state. Our investments have enabled environmentally-sustainable products to be produced here in Arkansas and have revitalized Main Streets transforming once shuttered properties into vibrant city centers.We continue to see positive impacts for years after we close a transaction as these investments serve as catalysts for economic growth in these communities.

4 Myths About Startups Everyone Thinks Are True (But Aren’t)

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arkansas startupsFor those who have spent their careers working for companies in traditional 9 to 5 roles, startups are shrouded in mystery. This often leads to the general public painting their own (and at times misinformed) pictures of what startup life must be like. While some of these common ideals may be accurate, a few couldn’t be further from the truth. Here, we’ve listed out 5 of the most common misconceptions about startups, and why they’re not true. [Read more…]