Shopping Cart Reviews

July 27, 2019

8+ Google Sites Examples for Inspiration

So you’re considering Google Sites as your website builder, and you’re looking for Google Sites website examples for inspiration and confirmation that you’re making the right choice.

Google Sites is Google’s free website builder software that it offers as part of the G Suite of Drive, Email, Hangouts, etc. It’s a template-based website builder, which means you have a set of templates that you can customize to a certain extent.

It makes nice designs incredibly accessible for DIY-ers while leaving the heavy-lifting (AKA hosting, functionality, coding) to someone else.

I wrote a full review of Google Sites here. It’s free, even for everyday users. If you are logged into your Google Account, you can start a Google Site here.

But before we dive into examples of what Google Sites look like in the wild, there is one thing to keep in mind when you’re evaluating a website platform: it’s not just about how the websites look. The functionality matters too.

Think of it like buying a car. You have a make / model in mind, and you’re probably looking to see them drive by on the road to see how they actually look. However, you also care about how they operate. Does it accelerate well? Does it have the hauling capabilities you need? How is the gas mileage?

Looking at a website platform should be done in the same way. We collected the following Google Sites examples not just to show you how they look, but how they can function so you can be sure you have a website that fits both the style you want and the functionality you need.

Disclosure – I receive customer referral fees from companies mentioned on this website. All data & opinions are based on my professional judgement as a paying customer or consultant to a paying customer.

General Website Example

Let’s start with a general round up of solid Google Site website examples. We’ve pulled these examples based on functionality, design, and usability.

Again, Google Sites works incredibly well for DIY-ers who want an easy-to-use website that they can throw up on their own without having to worry about the inner-workings, and who aren’t worried to much about adding any frills. However, be aware that with this comes trade-offs (i.e. you give up some control, functionality, customization, design capabilities etc.)

Keyingredient

Keyingredient’s website is a great example of how much content you can include on a Google Sites website, and how you can organize it. For websites that need to categorize content (like this recipe website, blogs, news sites, or portfolios) the card layout is an easy way to organize and showcase your top content without making the page overwhelming.

The website also allows visitors navigate directly to the content clicking on the image, which takes you to a full page on that specific recipe. If you’re needing a straightforward visual design with basic click-through functionality, use this example for inspiration.

Education Website Example

Education websites are a great way to provide course information, have a live syllabus, or even create a community for your class. Here’s a great example of what you can do with a Google Site education website:

Mr. Rees’ Social Studies Classes

This social studies website is a great example of how you can use Google Sites to organize information for students.

Check out the detailed menu on the side that breaks down lessons. Students have access to notes, instructions, and assignments all in one place for each lesson for each class. It’s an organized and efficient way to keep resources all in one place.

Photography Website Example

Photography websites are all about the portfolio of work. When looking for a Google Site example to serve as inspiration for your photography, pay special attention to the layout options for your work. You want to be sure you’re showing off your photos in a creative way without sacrificing the user experience (AKA fast photo load speed, easy to navigate, high quality images, etc).

JSVFOTO

When you have multiple segments in your photography portfolio, organization is key. This Google Sites photography website example is a great example of a clean, organized way to display your portfolio categories while also implementing an overall navigation that encompasses other areas of your work (i.e. reviews, novels, etc.). If you’re looking for a simple design that has a lot of versatility in showcasing your work, this website is a good one to follow.

Church Website Example

Church websites are all about telling people about your congregation, beliefs, and helping visitors feel welcome before they ever step in the door. Here’s a great example of a Church website build with Google Sites.

Morton Park Hall

What stands out about Morton Park Hall’s website is how clear the navigation is. It’s incredible easy to find information about what they believe, how to find them, and even to contact them. This site hits on all of the core functionality a church website should have, and organizes it intuitively, making it easy for newcomers and current congregation members to find exactly what they’re looking for.

Here’s a related post covering *only* church websites.

Business Website Examples

A strong business website showcases your services, gives customers the opportunity to contact you, and builds social proof. Visitors should be able to know exactly who you are and what you do when they land on their site, and should be able to easily navigate to what they’re looking for from your homepage.

PCS

What stands out about PCS’s website is that while it uses a typical grid-style layout that most Google Sites use, the brand colors and icons make this website look and feel completely unique. This site is a great example of how to take a simple website layout and make it look polished and professional without having to create something entirely from scratch.

Flanders Hotel Bruges

Flanders Hotel Bruges’ website is another great example of a business website that uses a simple design to look polished and professional. Notice how they use their awards to build credibility as soon as you arrive on the homepage. This, combined with high quality photography of the hotel and Bruges helps the hotel position itself as trustworthy and the right choice for visitors in the area.

Petits Gâteaux

Petits Gâteaux is a great example of a Google Sites website for a local business. Notice how the header image includes the logo and a scalloped design, giving the overall site a unique and fun feel without having to create and entire custom or complex site. We also loved how this local business included high quality photos of their pastries right on the homepage, giving customers an idea of what to expect right off the bat.

Personal Website Example

Personal websites are exactly what they sound like… personal! Whether it’s a resume / portfolio website you use to get booked or a blog you use to create content, this type of site is all about getting your personal brand online and owning your space on the Internet. Personal website should be easy to edit, manage, and customize.

Andy Wolber

With personal websites, it’s easy to get caught up in showcasing your personality and creativity. And while adding in some flair is fine, you don’t want to sacrifice clarity in the name of creativity. Andy’s website is a great combination of both. Featuring his tweets on the homepage is unique, and the clean layout makes the site easy to navigate. If you’re looking for an easy way to put your work, experience, and thoughts out into the world, this layout does the trick.

Next Steps

At the end of the day, choosing your website platform goes far beyond design. Why? Because all web pages are made of HTML & CSS with a few scripts thrown in. This means that any website template can exist on any good web platform.

What YOU want to focus on is the design elements and functionality that are available on the platform you’re choosing.

If you feel like Google Sites fits the design and functionality needs you have for your website, you can get started with Google Sites here.

Not sure if Google Sites is a right fit? Explore other good website builders here.

The post 8+ Google Sites Examples for Inspiration appeared first on ShivarWeb.

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July 26, 2019

Namesilo Review: Pros, Cons, and Alternatives

Namesilo is an ICANN-accredited domain registrar who boasts cheap, easy, and secure domain registration and management. They have been around since 2009.

See Namesilo’s Current Plans & Pricing.

Does Namesilo hold up to their mission of being a cheap and easy-to-use domain registrar? We recently tried them out. Here’s our full Namesilo review with pros, cons, and alternatives.

Disclosure – I receive customer referral fees from companies mentioned on this website. All data & opinions are based on my professional experience as a paying customer or consultant to a paying customer.

Pros of Namesilo

Here are some of the advantages that I found using Namesilo over their direct competitors in the domain registration industry.

Variety of TLDs

Now that ICANN allows more top level domains (TLDs) outside of generic .com/.net/.org, website owners have to make sure their domain registrar has all of the variations they need (especially if you’re buying in bulk). Namesilo offers a ton of TLD options that go beyond generic domains.

Transparent Pricing

There’s nothing more frustrating than going to a domain registrar and having to hunt for pricing information. Namesilo is 100% transparent with their pricing. Their domain page as an extensive list of pricing for all of their available top level domains (TLDs), and has it broken down by discount levels (you save when buying in bulk).

Namesilo also stands behind its promise of no hidden fees, service upsells (features like WHOIS Privacy are included), and no renewal upcharges.

In a space where pricing policies can be, well, less straightforward than website owners may want, Namesilo’s clarity and transparency is refreshing.

Namesilo also competes well with other registrars in terms of value. Their domains are on the slightly more expensive end across most TLDs, but their renewals are on par with most providers like NameCheap or Hover.

Upsells

Upsells aren’t inherently annoying or bad. But so many domain registrars make the mistake of bombarding customers with direct sales tactics that they do become annoying.

Namesilo is not one of these domain registrars. They do have some complementary products available, such as hosting, but they’re kept in the background. You can add them from your account homepage, but at no point are you bombarded with pop-ups or forced to navigate through upsells while trying to buy a domain.

Cons of Namesilo

There are a lot of Namesilo reviews online. Most are either super-negative or super-sunny and wonderful. I try to balance and find the actual disadvantages of a company… and who those disadvantages would apply to.

Everyone has different needs & goals. Your goal as a customer is to be aware of those and find a company that matches your goals. Here’s some of Namesilo’s downsides.

Design & Branding

Trust is a huge factor when buying a domain (or any other website product). You want to know that whoever you’re doing business with (and giving your credit card to) is a legitimate company who is going to stand by their offer.

Trust comes in many forms — word of mouth, reviews, years of existence, etc. — but it also comes via design and branding. If a business doesn’t look particularly trustworthy based on their website design, it leaves you wondering.

While we didn’t have any issues with Namesilo in terms of purchasing a domain, their website design and branding does leave something to be desired. They haven’t quite kept up with the times, which makes the company almost look fake.

There’s also no About Page, which makes actually learning about the company difficult. We dug around a good bit, but couldn’t find information on how they were founded / where they’re based without doing additional research online. If someone is going to be holding the online keys to my business – I want to know that they are legit.

Additionally, not only does the design look outdated (which inherently gives the website an untrustworthy feeling), but it also makes the site difficult to use.

The information is cluttered, which makes it hard to find exactly what you’re looking for and navigate to a best next step.

Again, the design doesn’t need to be full of bells and whistles. It does need to be up-to-date and useable, however. And in these two areas, Namesilo leaves much to be desired.

Onboarding / Domain Management

With all software, there comes a part in the registration process where you wonder what’s next. How the provider guides you through that set up process is called “onboarding” — and it’s something Namesilo is lacking.

There’s no real outline of how to set up your domain or website. During the checkout process, you’re given configuration options… but if you don’t know what those are / how to set that up… it’s confusing.

This confusion is only further exacerbated when you actually log in to manage your domain. Check out the account homepage:

There’s so much clutter that it’s difficult to tell where to go to actually manage your domain. How do I actually set it up? Where do I go to find that information?

If you’re experience in buying and setting up domains, this probably doesn’t matter to you too much. You can poke around enough to figure it out. However, if you have no domain management experience and are looking for more guidance or even a platform that’s more intuitive, Namesilo doesn’t deliver.

Complementary Products

It’s important to remember that a domain is not a website. It’s not email or any other service. It’s merely your address online. It helps people locate where your property is by telling browsers/email/etc where to go to get whatever it wants (website files, emails, images, data, etc).

If you want to setup a website, you’ll still need to get hosting or a website builder / ecommerce provider that provides hosting.

While Namesilo offers some complementary products (like hosting), they do not take an all-in-one approach like other domain registrars who include hosting, website builders, ecommerce, etc.

And while I personally prefer to separate my hosting and domains to provide an extra layer of control & reliability in addition to cost savings, many website owners prefer to have them bundled for convenience.

If you’re looking to have everything in one place, Namesilo might not be for you.

Next Steps

If you…

Want discounted domains for bulk registration
Don’t need a ton guidance on how to set up / manage your domain or can manage it yourself with an intuitive platform
Want to save on domain registration renewals

…. NameSilo could be a good choice for you. Go sign up for NameSilo here.

However, if you’re…

Have no experience getting online
Need detailed steps on how to set up / manage your domain
Want to keep your hosting separate from your domain
Want a smoother domain regsitration proess

… there are better options out there for you (I use NameCheap). You can take my domain registrar quiz to help you narrow down which might be best for your needs.

The post Namesilo Review: Pros, Cons, and Alternatives appeared first on ShivarWeb.

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July 23, 2019

Credit Sesame Review: Free VantageScores From TransUnion

It should come as no surprise that, as the stratospheric rise in the cost of housing, health care, and education exceeds wage growth, interest in managing one’s credit health would soar as well. After all, our credit scores play a huge role in determining our access to the credit we need just to keep ourselves afloat. Of course, we’d prefer not to have to pay money just to keep track of our own credit score.

This is where services like Credit Sesame come in.

Describing itself as “a fast-growing credit and loan management platform,” Credit Sesame offers four primary credit management services. When you sign up for a free Credit Sesame account, you’ll get access to the following:

Your credit score
Your credit report
Credit monitoring
Identity theft protection

How does Credit Sesame work? Is it safe? And is it genuinely free? Read on to discover the answer to these questions and more!

What Is Credit Sesame?

Credit Sesame was founded by Adrian Nazari in 2010. Since then, the company has grown to the point where it now employs 119 people. Millions of users now subscribe to Credit Sesame, though the company doesn’t give an exact number. Some sources claim the site has six million members, others say eight million, while others say 12 million.

A free Credit Sesame account offers the following:

Access to your TransUnion (one of the big three credit bureaus) credit score once per month
Daily credit monitoring with an alerting system that alerts you when your TransUnion credit score changes
Up to $50,000 in identity theft insurance

Is Credit Sesame Always Free?

If you’re satisfied with the services you get access to with a free Credit Sesame membership, you can use Credit Sesame forever without having to pay a cent. However, Credit Sesame does offer paid services in addition to the free services. These services are offered in the form of three different subscription plans: Advanced Credit, Pro Credit, and Platinum Protection. Here’s what you’ll get with each of these plans:

Advanced Credit

$9.95/month
Daily credit score updates from TransUnion
Monthly credit score updates from all three major credit bureaus
Full credit reports each month from all three credit bureaus

Pro Credit

$15.95/month
All of the above, plus:
Full identity protection
Credit monitoring with alerts for all three credit bureaus
24/7 access to live experts to help solve credit report inaccuracies

Platinum Protection

$19.95/month
All of the above, plus:
24/7 access to live experts for stolen/lost wallet protection
Black market website monitoring
Public records monitoring
Social Security Number monitoring

Is Credit Sesame Safe?

I have seen nothing to indicate that Credit Sesame is unsafe at all. You don’t need to give them any credit card information, and you only have to enter the last four digits of your SSN to establish an account.

No data breaches or any other loss of private user information associated with Credit Sesame have ever been reported. If you sign up with Credit Sesame, I wouldn’t worry about the safety of your personal information.

Credit Scores & Reports Offered By Credit Sesame

Credit Sesame shows you your credit score from TransUnion, one of the three major consumer credit bureaus. This score is calculated using the VantageScore formula, which means that the score you’ll see is not your FICO credit score. VantageScore is a different, newer credit-scoring model than FICO, and while your creditors may be assessing you based on your FICO score, your VantageScore shouldn’t be that far removed from your FICO score (learn about the differences in our complete guide to VantageScore VS FICO scores). Additionally, as VantageScore is the newer scoring model, it has become increasingly utilized by potential creditors with time. Your score will be updated by Credit Sesame once a month.

Your VantageScore credit score from TransUnion takes your credit information and history into account, giving you a picture of your overall credit health. It’s a nice feature to have for free, though I will note that competitor Credit Karma gives you free access to your VantageScore from both TransUnion and Equifax (another one of the big three credit bureaus).

Along with your credit score, Credit Sesame will show you five data points from your TransUnion credit report to show you how these factors affect your score: Payment history, credit usage, credit age, account mix (this refers to how many different types of open accounts you have — credit cards, auto loans, etc.), and the number of recent credit inquiries you’ve had.

You’ll also get access to information about any debts you have (including what percentage of your monthly income goes toward debt payments), along with credit monitoring, which means you’ll be alerted to any new activity that appears on your TransUnion credit report.

Note that while you’ll see selected data pulled from your credit report, you won’t have access to your full credit report with just a free site membership. You’ll need an Advanced Credit subscription ($9.95/month) for that. With an Advanced Credit subscription, you can get your full credit report each month from all three credit bureaus, not just TransUnion. Alternately, you can make a single standalone purchase of your TransUnion credit report for a one-time payment of $9.95.

With an Advanced Credit subscription, your TransUnion credit score will be updated daily, not just monthly. You’ll get monthly credit score updates from the other two major credit bureaus (Experian and Equifax) as well — something you can’t see for free.

Other Services Offered By Credit Sesame

I’ve touched on Credit Sesame’s other services, but let’s now delve into what the site has to offer beyond credit scores and reports.

Credit Monitoring

A free Credit Sesame account will get you credit monitoring for your TransUnion credit report. You’ll get alerts whenever new activity appears on your TransUnion report. However, to get credit monitoring/alerts for all three of your credit reports — TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax — you’ll need a Pro subscription ($15.95/month)

Identity Theft Insurance

Most credit score sites don’t give you free access to identity theft insurance, so Credit Sesame stands out in this regard. You’ll get $50K in insurance coverage for identity theft, fraud, and other financial crimes. Hey, it’s free insurance! And if you want more coverage, sign up for a Pro Credit subscription and get $1 million in identity insurance.

Along with identity theft insurance, you’ll get some identity restoration tools. These come in the form of documents showing you how to report fraud to government agencies, sample letters to credit bureaus, and the like.

Credit Card Recommendations

Credit Sesame will recommend credit cards to you according to your likelihood of approval (based on your credit score). These offers also show you how much credit you’re likely to gain access to in the event that you’re approved. You can also check to see if you pre-qualify for any personal loans. You can even search for mortgage lenders.

Final Verdict

Credit Sesame’s free tools let you check and monitor your credit score as well as determine just what aspects of your credit profile are dragging down your score (or boosting it, as the case may be). What’s more, $50K of free identity theft insurance is nothing to scoff at!

However, if you want full access to your credit reports, full identity protection, and such bonuses as full Social Security Number monitoring, you’ll need a paid subscription. What you get for free is of considerable value, though.

Should you use Credit Sesameâs credit score services?

This service might be a good option ifâ¦

You want to know your TransUnion credit score for free
You want free identity theft insurance
You want free credit monitoring
You’re willing to pay for a higher degree of credit management help

You might want to use a different service ifâ¦

You specifically want to know your FICO score
You want free access to both your TransUnion and Equifax credit scores (Credit Karma has this)
You want to use debt/loan calculators to help you formulate your credit building strategy (some competitors have this)

Want more tools to help you boost your credit score? Check out these articles!

Guide to credit bureaus
Guide to credit scoring models
How to improve personal credit score
How to dispute errors on your report

The post Credit Sesame Review: Free VantageScores From TransUnion appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 23, 2019

What Is An Issuing Bank?

If you have a Visa or Mastercard, then you already have an intuitive understanding of what an issuing bank is. It is the bank whose name is on the card, alongside the Visa or Mastercard brand. It is the bank where you applied for the card, the bank that sends you a bill each month, and the bank that you (hopefully) pay each month. As a cardholder, the issuing bank is the only entity you work with, and you probably donât care how the money you charged eventually ends up with the merchant.

If you are also a business owner, however, you do indeed care about how the money gets to you, and the issuing bank plays an important role in the process. Read on to find out what an issuing bank is, and why it is important to a merchant.

Defining An Issuing Bank

The credit card business can be complicated. Its technical terms can make a personâs head spin, and one of these terms is issuing bank or, sometimes, issuer.

The issuing bank is the entity that owns the relationship with the cardholder. The issuing bank finds the consumer it wants to do business with, investigates the creditworthiness of the consumer, issues the consumer a revolving line of credit in the form of a credit card, fronts the money for the consumerâs purchases, and then collects all or some of the money in one invoice to the consumer every month. They assume some of the risk if the consumer is unable to pay back the credit card debt.

There are four major credit cards brands in the US: Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover. Each card has a slightly different relationship with its issuing banks.

Visa and Mastercard

With Visa and Mastercard, it is easy to identify the issuing bank of each cardâthe bankâs name is always on the card. The reason this is so has a lot to do with how the modern-day credit card got started.

Visa was formerly called BankAmericard. It was the first successful consumer credit card, and it was started by Bank of America in 1958. Mastercard came along soon after. It was formed by a consortium of banks who wanted to compete with Bank of America in the credit card business.

In the beginning, BankAmericard was only available in California because that was where Bank of America did business. As the card became more successful, Bank of America wanted to expand the card into other states. However, at that time, a bank from one state could not operate in another state, so Bank of America had to license the cardâs name to individual banks authorized to operate in specific states.

BankAmericard became a franchising business and the licensee banks found their own consumers and issued their own cards, but all under the BankAmericard name. They used the payment infrastructure from Bank of America to move money from the cardholders to the merchants to pay for the goods and services.

Mastercard grew in a similar way with a similar business structure. It started out as a consortium, so it had always been a licensing business.

The BankAmericard continued to belong to Bank of America until 1970, when it became an independent company. In 1976, it changed the cardâs name to Visa, and became the company we know today.

Because of this history, with Visa and Mastercard, the name of the issuing bank always appears on every card along with the cardâs brand. Because each individual bank had the responsibility of finding new cardholders, the cardholders worked with the issuing banks whenever a payment or purchase issue arises.

American Express

The American Express card originally started as a charge card instead of a credit card, and only the American Express company issued the card.

Charge cards are slightly different than credit cards. There is no stated limit on a charge chard–it changes as the creditworthiness of the cardholder changes, so it can change on a month-to-month basis. Charge cards must be repaid in full at the end of every month. In contrast, a credit card is a line of credit with a stated limit that can be paid back over a longer period of time.

American Express still issues charge cards, and the issuing bank for these charge cards is American Express itself (it became a bank holding company in 2008). However, American Express also offers a line of credit cards, and the credit cards can be issued by third-party banks such as Bank of Hawaii (actually owned by Bank of America), MBNA, Citibank, Wells Fargo, and quite a few others.

So American Express is sometimes its own issuing bank, but it also works with other banks to issue credit cards. When an American Express credit card is issued through a third-party bank, the issuing bankâs name is on the card, along with the American Express logo.

Discover

Discover works a little bit like American Express because it functions as the issuing bank. That bank is called the Discover Bank, but its name does not appear on the card. It is the only issuing bank of Discover cards in the US. (There are international arrangements, so a few banks outside the US do issue Discover cards in their respective countries.)

Discover began its life in 1985 at Sears, when Sears wanted a general-purpose credit card in addition to its own store card. When the card started, it was issued by The Greenwood Trust Company located in Delaware, which Discover bought in the same year. Even to this date, the trust has one physical location, in Delaware. Discover changed the trustâs name to Discover Bank and the bank continues to issue Discover cards as well as offer a suite of traditional financial products like checking accounts. You can explore its traditional banking services online on Discoverâs website.

Now that we understand how to identify an issuing bank for each card, letâs look at the issuing bankâs role in payment processing.

The Issuing Bank’s Role In Payment Processing

As mentioned above, the issuing bank owns the relationship with the cardholder. The issuing bank is the entity that investigates the creditworthiness of the cardholder, grants the line of credit to the cardholder, and fronts the money for purchases made with the card to send to the merchant.

A highly simplified flow of the process is as follows:

Cardholder presents the card to pay.
Merchant takes the information and contacts its own credit card processing entity, which, for the sake of simplification here, is a bank (called the acquiring bank).
Acquiring bank contacts the issuing bank.
Issuing bank verifies the cardholder’s funds and sends the purchase amount to the acquiring bank.
Acquiring bank pays the merchant.
Issuing bank recoups the money from the cardholder based on a regular billing cycle.

As can be seen above, as a merchant, you do not have to deal with the issuing bank in this normal process flow. However, sometimes the cardholder disputes the charges, maybe because of buyerâs regret, maybe because they never got the goods/services, or maybe because the charge is fraudulent in some way.

The cardholderâs relationship is with the issuing bank, so they file a complaint with the issuing bank. The issuing bank then works with the acquiring bank and the acquiring bank might come back to you and ask you about the disputed charge. Note that the issuing bank has a direct business relationship with the cardholder while you have no direct business relationship with the issuing bank–your relationship is with the acquiring bank.

Unfortunately, it is the issuing bank who has the final say on disputed charges, and it often decides in the cardholderâs favor. This results in a chargeback and you end up not only having to pay the money back, but also pay a fee for the investigation. Even if you do win the dispute, you may still not get the investigation fee back.

Issuing Bank VS Acquiring Bank

There are a few things to note about the acquiring bank or acquirer. First, this is the bank that owns the relationship with the merchant. It fronts the credit card payment to the merchant and then shares some risk with the issuing bank on not being able to eventually recoup the money from the cardholder. Some acquiring banks work directly with a merchant, others farm out the work to another specialized entity called the payment processor (who then owns the direct working relationship with the merchant), yet other acquiring banks do both.

In the above simplified flow, the acquiring bank is a bank different from the issuing bank. Real life, however, is never this simple. As discussed above, the first widely accepted credit card was started by Bank of America. They had to build an entire backend infrastructure to pay the merchants, so they were their own issuing bank as well as the acquiring bank. Even to this date, Bank of America continues to be both an issuing bank and an acquiring bank. Many other big banks work the same way.

As a merchant, the most important bank for taking credit card payments is the acquiring bank, so it is worth your time to get a deeper understanding of what they are and how they work. We have a terrific in-depth article on acquiring banks, so be sure to check the article out.

How Important Is The Issuing Bank To Merchants?

If you have a business credit card, then, of course, the issuing bank is important to you because you work with the issuing bank on your businessâs purchases. As a merchant who accepts credit card payments, however, the issuing bank is only important when a chargeback occurs.

If your business experiences very few chargebacks, then you would have to deal with the issuing bank only occasionally. If you have a lot of chargebacks, you would have to deal with issuing banks often, but only indirectly. Because you do not have direct contact with issuing banks on chargebacks, it could handicap your ability to dispute a chargeback. It is, therefore, not the actual issuing bank that is important to a merchant, but the role of the issuing bank in the credit card processing that is important to the merchant.

How often do you have to deal with issuing banks? Is there an issuing bank you found particularly difficult or easy to work with? Leave us a comment below.

The post What Is An Issuing Bank? appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 23, 2019

The Best Alternatives To Fundbox

When small business owners need a flexible option for funding business expenses, a line of credit fits the bill. Unlike traditional loans that provide a lump sum of capital, lines of credit allow borrowers to draw money as needed up to the credit limit set by the lender. If the line of credit is revolving, funds are replenished as the borrower pays down the balance, giving the borrower consistent access to the capital they need to grow their business.

While banks offer lines of credit, these are typically difficult to qualify for, and the application processes can be lengthy and confusing. More small business owners are bypassing traditional lenders in favor of alternative lenders that offer quick approvals and easy applications — lenders like Fundbox.

What Is Fundbox?

Over 100,000 small businesses have used Fundbox to boost their business capital. Unlike banks, Fundbox has an easy application process. Fundbox provides credit decisions in just minutes, and if approved, you can immediately initiate your first draw and have cash in your bank account in as little as one business day.Â Fundbox has a transparent fee structure, and you only pay when you make a draw. Pay your balance back early and Fundbox waives all remaining fees, helping you lower your cost of borrowing.

One of the best things about Fundbox is the lender’s relaxed borrower qualifications. Approval is based on the performance of your business, so businesses that have trouble qualifying elsewhere may have success in obtaining a Fundbox line of credit. During the application process, you’ll sync your business bank account so Fundbox can analyze the performance of your business. If you have outstanding invoices, you can qualify for a line of credit through Fundbox’s invoice financing service by syncing your supported accounting software. Learn more by checking out our full review of Fundbox.

Although there are many benefits to using Fundbox, this lender isn’t the right choice for every business. With a maximum borrowing amount of $100,000, Fundbox may not offer enough capital for larger businesses. Maybe Fundbox’s weekly payment schedule doesn’t work for your business, or you want longer than the maximum repayment terms of 24 weeks. If you have an established business and a high personal credit score, you may qualify for other options with more affordable terms than what is offered through Fundbox.

Whether Fundbox doesn’t quite fit your needs or you’re just shopping around, there are similar lenders that may work better for your financial situation. In this post, we’ll explore alternatives to Fundbox to help you make the wisest financial choice for your business.

OnDeck

	Review Visit Site

Time in business: 12 months Business revenue: $100,000 per year Business industry: Must not be in aÂ restricted industry Personal credit score: 600 Borrower requirements (click to expand) Hide

OnDeck is similar to Fundbox in many ways. This alternative lender offers a quick and simple online application that doesn’t require piles of paperwork. In fact, all you need in most cases is some basic business and personal information, your business tax ID and social security number, and business bank account statements. After submitting your application, you can receive a decision in just a few minutes.

OnDeck offers lines of credit up to $100,000. If you need more money, you may qualify for OnDeck’s term loans with maximum borrowing limits of $500,000 and terms up to 36 months. OnDeck has just one financing application and will determine which product best fits the needs of your business. Repayments are made on a daily or weekly schedule.

One thing that stands apart about OnDeck’s lines of credit is Instant Advance. With Instant Advance, approved borrowers with eligible debit cards can receive their funds in just minutes. Automated Clearinghouse (ACH) transfers are also available, and borrowers will receive funds typically in 1 to 2 business days.

OnDeck has low borrower requirements, but personal credit score is a factor for approval. All applicants must have a score of at least 600 to qualify for OnDeck’s term loans or lines of credit. Borrowers must also be in business for at least a year and have at least $100,000 in annual revenue.

StreetShares

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Time in business: 1 year Business revenue: $100,000 per year Personal credit score: 620 Borrower requirements (click to expand) Hide

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StreetShares is a veteran-founded small business lender that once focused on other veteran-owned business. Today, any business owner can apply to receive funds through one of StreetShares’ three financial products: lines of credit, term loans, and contract financing.

If you need a line of credit larger than the maximum $100,000 offered through Fundbox, StreetShares might be a good option for you. This lender provides lines of credit with limits up to $250,000 for qualified borrowers. This option allows you to draw funds as needed and only pay interest on what you’ve borrowed. If you want your money as one lump sum, you may qualify for up to $250,000 with a term loan. StreetShares’ loans and lines of credit each have terms up to 36 months for businesses that want longer repayment terms.

StreetShares also offers contract financing — a product that’s similar to invoice financing. You can receive up to 90% of your invoices upfront with no limitations on the contract amount. This could be an ideal solution for borrowers that want to borrow money now against their unpaid contracts.

Like Fundbox and other lenders on this list, StreetShares has a simple online application process. You can be pre-approved in just minutes with minimal information. However, you may be required to provide additional documentation during the underwriting process, including financial statements and tax returns. All borrowers must have a time in business of at least one year, annual revenue of at least $100,000, and a credit score of at least 600. One last thing to note is that StreetShares only allows you to borrow up to 20% of your annual revenue.

Kabbage

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Time in business: 12 months Business revenue: $50,000 annually (or $4,500 for the last 3 months) No specific personal credit score requirement, but Kabbage will run a credit check when you apply Borrower requirements (click to expand) Hide

Kabbage is very similar to Fundbox, offering lines of credit with very lenient borrowing requirements. Like Fundbox, Kabbage bases its approvals on the performance of a business, so Kabbage may be a good option for credit-challenged borrowers.

Despite its similarities, though, there are some key differences that could make Kabbage the more appealing option for your business. For starters, Kabbage offers higher maximum limits for its lines of credit — up to $250,000 compared to just $100,000 with Fundbox. Kabbage also offers monthly payments, which may work better for your needs than Fundbox’s weekly repayments.

Kabbage’s lines of credit can be repaid over 6, 12, or 18 months. Kabbage offers simple, transparent monthly fees only for the amount you’ve borrowed, and you can save on the cost of borrowing by repaying early. Borrowers may receive better rates and terms with Kabbage than Fundbox, but Fundbox may be the less expensive option for other borrowers. If you qualify for Kabbage, you can also receive the Kabbage Card, which allows you to instantly access your line of credit without waiting for transfers.

The application process for Kabbage is fast, and you can be approved and access your funds just minutes after applying. Minimal information is required to apply, and there are no minimum credit score requirements. You must, however, have a time in business of at least one year and at least $50,000 in annual revenue.

Lendio

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Time in business: 6 months Business revenue: $10,000 per month Personal credit score: 550 Borrower requirements (click to expand) Hide

Shopping your options? Give Lendio a try. With just one application, you can receive offers from over 75 lenders, making it easy to find the best loan for your situation. Lendio’s network of lenders offer many different types of funding, including lines of credit.

You can receive up to $500,000 through Lendio’s network as a line of credit, which is significantly more than the limits of Fundbox’s financial product. Interest rates start at 8%, although some borrowers may receive interest rates as high as 24% based on a number of factors including, but not limited to, credit profile. Typical loan maturity for a line of credit obtained through Lendio is one to two years.

Qualifying for a line of credit through Lendio’s network is simple. Minimum borrower requirements include at least $50,000 in annual revenue, a time in business of at least six months, and a personal credit score of at least 560. However, to get the highest borrowing amount and lowest interest rates, you must have a higher credit score and a solid business performance.

Applying through Lendio is free and doesn’t have an impact on your credit, so it’s ideal for comparing your options. You may also decide that a line of credit isn’t right for your business, and you can get offers from lenders for other types of funding including Small Business Administration loans, accounts receivable loans, and business credit cards.

BlueVine

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For invoice factoring: Time in business: 3 months Business revenue: $100,000 per year Business type: Business-to-business Personal credit score: 530 For 6-month business lines of credit: Time in business: 6 months Business revenue: $120,000 per year Personal credit score: 600 For business term loans: Time in business: 6 months Business revenue: $100,000 per year Personal credit score: 600 Borrower requirements (click to expand) Hide

Like Fundbox, BlueVine offers a business line of credit. One of the main differences, however, is that you can borrow up to $250,000 through BlueVine. BlueVine also offers longer repayment terms of six or 12 months. Repayments are made on a weekly or monthly schedule.

However, it is more difficult to qualify for a BlueVine line of credit. The minimum requirements include a personal credit score of at least 600, minimum annual revenue of at least $100,000, and a time in business of at least six months.

In addition to its lines of credit, BlueVine also offers an invoice factoring service. This is ideal if you have outstanding invoices and need more money than is offered through a line of credit. You can receive up to 90% of your outstanding invoices, with lines up to $5 million. Once the invoice is paid, you’ll receive the remaining balance, minus BlueVine’s fees, which start at 0.25% per week. To qualify, you must have a B2B business that has been in business for at least three months. You must also have annual revenue of at least $100,000 and a personal credit score of at least 530.

Finally, you can also receive a term loan through BlueVine. You can borrow up to $250,000 as one lump sum that is repaid weekly over a period of up to 12 months. There are no origination fees, and you can receive your funds in as little as a few hours.

Final Thoughts

While there are some benefits to using Fundbox — think low borrower requirements and fast funding — this lender may not be the best choice for your business. Before you put your name on any agreement, make sure to compare your options to find the best rates and terms based on the needs of your business. Take the time to do your research, shop around, and make sure you understand the full cost of borrowing no matter what lender you select.

The post The Best Alternatives To Fundbox appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 22, 2019

What You Should Know About Giving Credit Cards To Your Employees

If your company is growing and you find that reimbursing employees for their business purchases is becoming a hassle, it may be time to look into getting your employees business credit cards.

These bits of plastic can help streamline your employees’ workflows when it comes to making business purchases. Plus, you may find it’s easier to track your business’s spending habits via a card issuer’s money-tracking tools.

Of course, it’s not going to be all smooth sailing if you do end up adding employee cards to your spending arsenal. There are plenty of nitty-gritty details to go over when it comes to this type of credit card.

Are you ready to get an in-depth look at what employee cards are and how they work? Let’s delve on in!

How Employee Credit Cards Work

Employee credit cards are often offered in conjunction with business credit cards. Many issuers include employee cards as a free benefit. However, some may limit the number of employee cards you can request, or you may incur charges when requesting employee cards.

Once youâve been approved for a credit card with employee cards as a benefit, youâll be able to contact your issuer to receive additional cards.

When an employee uses their employee credit card to make a purchase, their purchase will go on a primary account. This primary account will then need to be paid off every month. Additionally, if your card has a rewards program, youâll earn rewards whenever your employees make purchases.

In many cases, employees can take advantage of the additional benefits a credit card provides. These benefits could include features such as car rental insurance, roadside assistance, Global Entry/TSA PreCheck waivers, and extended warranty on purchases. Some more premium cards even include benefits such as hotel credits, complimentary access to airport lounges, and free hotel or flight upgrades.

If you run a larger company, corporate cards may be a better option than a basic business card. These cards are designed to work with a large number of users and are often customized to best fit a company’s needs. To learn the differences between corporate cards and business cards, take a deep dive with the Merchant Maverick comparison.

The Benefits (& Pitfalls) Of Giving Credit Cards To Your Employees

There are plenty of reasons to hand out employee cards. Here are a few of the top benefits to doling out plastic to your employees:

Management Tools: With a business credit card that offers employee cards, you can often manage spending through your issuer’s website or app. These tools usually include spending limits, ability to control which categories are available for purchases, and quarterly/year-end spending summaries.
Simplified Spending: Because employees can just put purchases on their credit cards, they wonât need to waste time filling out expense reports or requesting reimbursement.
Rewards Programs: Many business credit cards have excellent reward schemes. By matching your businessâs spending profile with the right card, youâll be able to save money every time an employee buys something.
Extra Benefits: The numerous benefits that come with business credit cards could help your employees with purchases, travel, and more. From car rental coverage to purchase protection to travel waivers, credit card benefits can make many points of an employee’s work life easier.

Of course, there are a couple of cons to watch out for. Here are a few things to consider before giving employees credit cards:

Increased Fraud: If you donât properly keep tabs on what employees are buying, itâs possible they may use their cards for personal purchases. Additionally, the more cards you hand out, the greater the chance someone outside the company will steal a card or data associated with a card.
Extra Fees: When using credit cards, itâs important to stay on top of your monthly payments. If you donât, you may be hit with late payment fees and interest.

How To Get Credit Cards For Your Employees

To hand out employee credit cards, you’ll need to find a business credit card that offers employee cards as an option. Plenty of issuers deliver cards that include free employee credit cards. If employee cards are a primary concern for your business, it may be in your best interest to look for a card with complimentary employee cards.

Issuers that offer free employee credit cards include:

American Express
Bank of America
Barclays
Capital One
Chase
Wells Fargo

Note that in some cases, issuers will charge extra fees for each employee card you request. Additionally, there may be instances where you can only request a limited number of employee cards. Amex, for example, only allows 99 employee cards to be issued, while Wells Fargo places their limit at 100 for the Business Platinum Card and 200 for the Business Elite Card.

How To Manage Employee Use Of Credit Cards

Creating clear outlines is an important step to giving your employees credit cards operated by the business. This means they should understand that the cards are only to be used on business-related purchases (and not on that 65-inch 4k TV they’ve been eyeing). On top of this, make sure guidelines on what is and isn’t a business expense are clearly articulated.

For your part, as an owner, plan to review charges employees place on their cards on a frequent basis. Every time you give an employee a credit card, the chance of fraud increases. By regularly monitoring where those within your business are placing charges, you may be able to catch fraud before it gets out of hand.

Many cards also offer spending limits. This means you can limit employees to a set allowance every month. This is helpful in cases where employees make consistent monthly purchases. It will also help prevent potential fraud because employees won’t be able to go on crazy spending sprees.

Some cards additionally will notify you when a purchase is made outside of certain set categories. If your card has this tool, you may be able to spot a spend-happy employee more easily.

Finally, recommend that employees save their receipts. This way they (and you) can have a written record in case anything goes amiss.

Final Thoughts

Employee cards can help your company function more smoothly when it comes to making purchases. By adding them to your business’s purchasing arsenal, you’ll be able to streamline spending, track employee purchases, and take advantage of credit card benefits.

To get started finding your business’s next credit card, visit our complete rundown of the best business cards out there. Or, you can check out the dos and don’ts of business credit cards to kick-start your credit card journey.

The post What You Should Know About Giving Credit Cards To Your Employees appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 22, 2019

Credit Karma Review: Free VantageScores From TransUnion And Equifax

In the age of precarious living, we’re all swimming upstream. Dealing with the ever-escalating expenses of life — housing, education, health care, etc. — can put a serious strain on your credit. Because our credit score so heavily influences what we are able to do with our lives, interest in free credit score services has never been higher.

One of the most prominent websites offering free credit scores and reports is Credit Karma. While over 85 million people are already Credit Karma members (as of January 2019), others may (justifiably) be concerned about the privacy of their data, the accuracy of the credit scores given, and whether or not Credit Karma is genuinely free to use.

Let’s tackle these questions and find out whether or not Credit Karma is a good choice when it comes to keeping an eye on your credit score. I’ll assume the role of the Karma Police!

Sorry — for a minute there, I lost myself. (Do people still get Radiohead references in 2019?)

Note: While Credit Karma also offers tax services, this review will be focused on Credit Karma’s credit management services.

What Is Credit Karma?

Credit Karma was founded on March 8th, 2007 by Kenneth Lin, Ryan Graciano, and Nichole Mustard. While the platform was founded in order to provide users with free information about their credit, the company has steadily expanded its offerings over the years, offering full credit reports, personalized offers for credit cards and personal loans, and a tax planning service. The company now employs over 800 people.

Is Credit Karma Really Free?

The short answer: Yes. The credit scores and reports given by Credit Karma are completely free. All you need is a free Credit Karma account. This begs the question: How does Credit Karma make money?

Advertising!

Credit Karma uses your personal credit data to send you targeted ads based on your individual financial situation. If you ultimately take an offer from one of Credit Karma’s advertising partners, the company makes money off the sale. This way, Credit Karma doesn’t have to charge users a fee to use the company’s services.

Is Credit Karma Safe?

Naturally, when people hear that a company is using customers’ financial information to send them targeted ads, they may be concerned with what else Credit Karma could be doing with that information. Additionally, Credit Karma requires you to give your social security number in order to verify your identity when pulling your credit. Having to enter my SSN online, for any reason, makes me feel a bit uneasy, and it probably does for you as well.

Despite all this, Credit Karma is as safe as a site like this can be and has a strong track record in this regard. The site uses 128-bit encryption to protect the information you type in, and your social security number is not stored with Credit Karma. Additionally, the site has a DigiCert EV SSL certificate (the highest degree of authentication). And while Credit Karma uses your financial information to match you with ads, the company has a policy of not sharing that information with third parties. I’ve yet to see any evidence that the company has breached this policy.

Credit Scores & Reports Offered By Credit Karma

Credit Karma provides free credit scores from TransUnion and Equifax, two of the three major credit bureaus (the third is Experian). These scores are calculated using the VantageScore formula and are updated on a weekly basis. Note that your VantageScore credit score is different than your FICO score, as FICO is an entirely different (and older) credit-scoring model.

Learn all about the differences between VantageScore and FICO in our complete guide, but suffice to say, the two models weigh various aspects of your credit data differently than one another, therefore your VantageScore credit scores may differ from your FICO scores. If your creditor is looking at your FICO score, it won’t be the same TransUnion or Equifax score you get from Credit Karma. However, VantageScore — the newer scoring model — has been gaining acceptance with time.

In addition to your TransUnion and Equifax credit scores, you’ll also have access to your full TransUnion and Equifax credit reports. Credit Karma will highlight the most important items in the reports for you to help you make sense of what your reports mean, as they can be hard to decipher in their raw form. These reports are updated each week and you can check them as often as you like with no penalty.

Other Services Offered By Credit Karma

Free credit scores and reports aren’t the only services offered by Credit Karma. Let’s go through the company’s other offerings.

Credit Monitoring

Credit Karma provides free credit monitoring along with free credit scores and reports. According to Credit Karma, “If we notice important changes on your TransUnion or Equifax credit reports, we’ll send you an alert so you can check for suspicious activity.”

A related service provided by Credit Karma is Direct Dispute. If you notice an error on your TransUnion credit report, you can submit a dispute without leaving Credit Karma. Unfortunately, this does not apply to errors on your Equifax credit report — for those, you’ll have to submit a dispute directly to Equifax.

Financial Tools/Calculators

As you can see, Credit Karma gives you some free tools to help you manage your finances. Let’s go through them.

Credit Score Simulator: This handy tool lets you calculate how actions you might take can affect your credit score. For example, you can see what effect opening a new credit card account or closing an existing account would have on your credit score. It’s certainly better than taking a financial action without knowing how it will impact your score and hoping for the best!
Debt Repayment Calculator: With this tool, you can see how long it will take to pay off your credit card debt. First, you enter your balance owed and your interest rate. You then either a) enter your expected monthly payment and have the calculator tell you when your debt will be repaid given the information you put in, or b) enter the time frame by which you want to have your balance paid off and have the calculator give you the amount you’ll have to pay per month in order to pay off your debt in your desired time frame.
Simple Loan Calculator: This tool determines your estimated payments for different loan amounts, interest rates, and terms. Just enter the loan amount, interest rate, and term length (in years) and the calculator will estimate your monthly payments.
Amortization Calculator: This tool shows how your debt will go down over time with your payments. It shows your payment breakdown of interest paid, principal paid, and loan balance over the life of the loan. Essentially, this is a tool that shows you how much of your payments will go towards paying down interest and how much will go towards paying down the actual principal, and it will show you how this balance changes over time.

Home & Auto Insurance Scores

Credit Karma will estimate your home insurance score and your auto insurance score for you by taking into account your active accounts, payment history, credit card utilization, and age of credit history. These scores exist to estimate the likelihood that you will file a claim. Many states use these scores to determine your monthly premiums, though this practice is banned in other states.

Offers For Credit Cards, Personal Loans, And Automobile Loans

Credit Karma uses your personal financial data to send you offers for the credit cards, personal loans, and automobile loans you are most likely to qualify for based on your credit profile. When you choose one of these options, you can see reviews of the credit card or loan by Credit Karma members who have experience with using the card or lender in question.

Search For Unclaimed Money

Credit Karma recently introduced this new feature. It identifies any unclaimed money that may be owed to you by your state. This money may have originally been owed to you by a business, but when a business can’t figure out how to send you the money it owes you, it may turn the money over to the state.

This feature lets you search by state to show you if the state in question owes you any money. If it does, you’ll be directed to state-specific resources that can help you claim what you are owed.

Tax Services

Along with Credit Karma’s other services, the company also offers Credit Karma Tax, offering free filing for federal and state tax returns.

Final Verdict

For better or worse, your credit score is vitally important in determining the opportunities you’ll be able to access throughout your life. Credit Karma’s services help you understand what goes into determining your credit score, identify what you can do to improve it, monitor your credit, and more — all without charging you a penny. It’s not a scam. It’s free information — information that would be extremely difficult and time-consuming (and in some cases downright impossible) to gather by yourself. Information is one of the few means by which you can empower yourself to make good financial decisions, so it’s hard to find fault with Credit Karma making money by selling financial products on its website, as the alternative would be to charge users a subscription fee.

Should you use Credit Karmaâs credit score services?

This service might be a good option ifâ¦

You want to know your credit score without paying a fee
You want free credit monitoring
You want to get offers for financial products that you would be likely to qualify for
You want to simulate how various actions you might take (opening a new credit card account etc.) would impact your credit score

You might want to use a different service ifâ¦

You specifically want to know your FICO score
You want to see your credit report from Experian, not just from TransUnion and Equifax

The post Credit Karma Review: Free VantageScores From TransUnion And Equifax appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 19, 2019

The Complete Guide To Home Equity Loans For Business Purposes

Are you ready to launch a new business, but don’t know to fund your idea? Or are you a small business owner ready for expansion who lacks the capital you need to grow?

Sure, small business loans are an option, but simply owning a business — or hoping to start your own business — doesn’t automatically qualify you for this type of financing. A lack of business credit history, a short time in business, or low revenue may prevent you from getting a small business loan. Even if you do qualify, you might get stuck with short terms and high fees and interest rates.

Don’t give up hope just yet, though. If you own your own home, there could be another funding option you’ve not yet considered: obtaining a home equity loan for business purposes. You can leverage the equity in your home to get lower rates, longer repayment terms, and higher borrowing limits than you might with small business lenders.

Sounds great, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, not everyone will qualify for a home equity loan. Others may find that a small business loan, personal line of credit, or another form of funding is better suited for their capital needs. However, if you’re looking for a creative way to finance your startup or expansion plans, read on to learn more about home equity loans and if one is right for you.

What Is A Home Equity Loan?

A home equity loan is also known as a second mortgage. To understand a home equity loan, let’s first take a look at equity. As you pay down the balance of your mortgage, you build up equity. Equity is the difference between what is owed on the home and the value of the property. For example, let’s say your home is valued at $500,000. If your first mortgage has a remaining balance of $200,000, then the equity in your home would be $300,000.

Another way to look at equity is that it is the portion of the home that you own. With a home equity loan, you can use your equity as collateral for an additional loan. If you don’t have equity in your home — that is, the value of your home doesn’t surpass the amount owed on your first mortgage — you will not qualify for this type of loan. Generally, you can expect to receive about 80% to 85% of the value of your home as a lump sum, less the amount still owed on your first mortgage. This money can be used to fund large purchases for your business, including startup costs, new equipment, facility upgrades, or purchasing commercial property.

After receiving your funds, you’ll repay the loan over a longer period of time — usually 5 to 15 years. Home equity loans come with fixed rates and are repaid on a monthly basis.

Equity Loans VS HELOCs

Another type of funding that uses the equity in your home is a home equity line of credit, or HELOC. Similar to an equity loan, a HELOC uses the equity in your home as collateral. However, instead of receiving a lump sum, you get access to a line of credit that you can use for business purposes.

After being approved for a HELOC, you’ll be able to withdraw funds up to and including the credit limit set by your lender for a set period of time — typically a year. When this draw period is over, you’ll enter the repayment phase. At that time, you’ll begin to repay the amount of money borrowed (plus interest). Once you’ve repaid borrowed funds, you’ll be able to borrow funds again.

Most HELOCs come with variable interest rates, whereas most home equity loans have fixed rates. While this provides stability, often you’ll find that home equity loans have a higher interest rate than HELOCs.

If you have a larger purchase to make, such as buying equipment or purchasing real estate, the lump sum offered through a home equity loan is the wiser choice. If you want a more flexible funding option for working capital, hiring new employees, or purchasing inventory, a HELOC may be the better option for your business.

Equity Loans VS Business Loans

A home equity loan is similar to a business loan in a few ways. With both types of funding, you receive a lump sum that can be used to fund your business purchases. Many small business lenders also offer low, fixed rates, long repayment terms, and monthly repayment schedules.

However, there are also a few distinct differences. With a home equity loan, the equity in your home serves as the collateral for the loan. For business loans, other forms of collateral may be used, including business equipment or real estate. You may also be required to sign a personal guarantee or agree to a blanket lien.

Borrower requirements also differ. When you apply for an equity loan, the lender will consider factors including your personal credit profile, your debt-to-income ratio, and the amount of equity in your home. Small business lenders may consider factors including personal credit, business credit, annual revenues, and time in business.

When Should Merchants Use A Home Equity Loan?

Each business is unique, which is why one source of funding doesn’t work for everyone. However, there are many small business owners that will find that a home equity loan is a viable way to access capital.

If you haven’t yet opened the doors to your business because of startup costs, a home equity loan may work for you. No time in business, business revenue, or business credit history is required to qualify.

A home equity loan may be a good choice for you if you want a low-cost loan option. If you’ve shopped around for other financial products and aren’t satisfied with short terms, high interest rates, excessive fees, or repayment schedules, a home equity loan could give you the affordable capital you’re looking for. You’ll receive a low fixed rate and a longer period of time to repay your loan. You may even qualify for additional savings if you work with the lender of your first mortgage.

However, there are also times when maybe a home equity loan isn’t the best fit. If you have an established business and a solid personal credit profile, you could qualify for other types of funding such as Small Business Administration loans. These loans come with low interest rates, repayment terms up to 25 years, and are easier to qualify for than traditional bank loans.

You may also explore additional funding options if you need more specialized financing. For example, if your business needs new equipment, equipment financing may be a better option. You could potentially qualify for low rates and favorable terms without putting your personal assets on the line. With equipment leases, you can even turn in your equipment and enter another lease for new equipment — a smart idea if you need to upgrade frequently.

Finally, a home equity loan won’t work for borrowers with a poor credit score or a spotty credit history. Most lenders look for a good credit score in the 700s, although some may work with fair credit borrowers. However, borrowers with lower scores frequently need more equity, a lower DTI, and must meet other requirements to qualify. Your application may also be declined if you have a recent bankruptcy or foreclosure, defaults on past loans, or other negative items on your credit report.

Home Equity Loans For Business: Pros & Cons

By now, you should have a good understanding of what a home equity loan is, how it can help your business, and what you need to qualify. If you’re still on the fence about submitting an application, consider these pros and cons before making your decision.

Pros

Low Interest Rates: Low interest rates mean that your cost of borrowing is lower. You could save thousands of dollars in interest by taking out a home equity loan versus other types of funding.
Long Repayment Terms: Most home equity loans have repayment terms of 5 to 15 years, although this varies by lender. With a longer repayment term, you can stretch out the cost of your business expenses through easy, manageable payments.
Startup-Friendly: Since factors like time in business aren’t a consideration for approval, startups and new business owners may qualify when other lenders turn them down.
Flexibility: You aren’t restricted in how you use the funds from your home equity loan.
High Borrowing Amount: Depending on the amount of equity you’ve built up in your home, you could qualify for a larger sum of money than other lenders offer you.

Cons

Risk Of Losing Your Home: If you pay your home equity loan as agreed, you won’t have any problems. However, if you default on your loan, you risk losing your home.
Fees: There are associated costs and fees with taking out a home equity loan, so be prepared. This may include application fees, closing costs, and prepayment penalties for paying your loan off early.
Going “Upside Down”: If the value of your property drops after taking out a home equity loan, you risk being “upside-down” on your loan. This means that you owe more than the property is worth.

Alternatives To Home Equity Loans

Still undecided if a home equity loan is right for you? This funding certainly isn’t for everyone, and you may find that another financial product is better suited for your needs. Before taking the leap into a home equity loan, consider these alternatives and whether one may be right for you.

Business Lines Of Credit

With a business line of credit, you’ll have access to funds that you can use as needed. Your lender will set a credit limit, and you can make draws up to this credit limit. As a form of revolving credit, your funds become available to use as you pay off the borrowed amount, giving you continuous access to cash when you need it.

If you need access to cash on-demand, a business line of credit may be a more suitable choice than the lump sum offered through a home equity loan. You may also consider a business line of credit if you don’t own your own home or don’t have enough equity.

This may also be an option for borrowers with a poor credit profile, as some lenders may consider the performance of your business when approving your application. However, if you don’t meet time in business or revenue requirements, your application will be declined. You’ll also find that many business lines of credit have higher rates and fees and shorter terms than home equity loans.

Invoice Financing

If unpaid invoices are causing cash flow issues, consider invoice financing. With this service, you’ll receive a portion of the outstanding funds upfront — usually 80% to 90% of the invoice total. Once the invoice is paid, you’ll receive the remaining funds, less any fees charged by the lender. Your invoices serve as the collateral.

This is an option typically available to B2B and B2G businesses. You may also have to meet other requirements in terms of revenue, time in business, and the quality and quantity of invoices. Invoice financing is a great way to get access to cash. However, be aware that this can be an expensive form of borrowing depending on the factor rate assigned by your lender. This is also a short-term solution, so if you need longer repayment terms, consider applying for a home equity loan or another financial product.

Business Credit Cards

If you have recurring expenses that require a more flexible form of funding, consider applying for a business credit card. With a business credit card, you can make as many purchases as you need up to your assigned credit limit. Qualifying for a business credit card is fast, and you can begin using your card immediately without waiting for further approval from the lender.

You may even consider applying for a rewards card, which scores you cash back or points to apply toward rewards like travel, shopping, and more.

High interest rates are a drawback of some business credit cards. For larger purchases, another form of funding may be more affordable.

Small Business Administration (SBA) Loans

Small Business Administration (SBA) loans offer high borrowing limits and low interest rates to fund business expenses. SBA loans have similar rates and terms to traditional bank term loans. However, these loans are backed by the government, making it easier for small business owners to qualify.

There are many different types of SBA loans, from smaller microloans to the popular SBA 7(a) loans that provide up to $5 million repaid over a period of up to 25 years.

In order to receive an SBA loan, factors including time in business and personal credit history will be considered. The process for receiving an SBA loan is lengthy and can take 30 days or longer from application to funding. However, this may be a great alternative if you don’t own your own home or don’t have enough equity to qualify for a home equity loan.

Final Thoughts

A home equity loan certainly has its benefits — startups can qualify, interest rates are low, and terms are favorable. However, there may be other options that make sense for your business. As with any other loan, shop around your options, compare lenders, and understand the terms of your loan before signing a contract.

The post The Complete Guide To Home Equity Loans For Business Purposes appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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July 19, 2019

How Much a Website Costs Per Year Explained

So, how much does a website cost per year?

Wait for it…. it depends. 🙂

But yes – “it depends” is not helpful at all.

The Short Answer to Website Costs Per Year

Annual website cost = domain + hosting + software + labor + annualized upfront costs

Domain costs range from $9 to $15 per year for a .com or .org
Hosting costs range from $60 to $240 per year for shared web hosting
Software costs range from free to $100 per year for backups & security to much higher
Labor costs range from free to thousands of dollars
Annualized upfront costs are how you want to budget upfront costs like design & themes

I highly recommend “annualizing” your upfront costs because that is a big consideration in how you want to approach actually building a website.

If you use a “hosted website builder” like Wix, Weebly or WordPress.com, then you’ll be paying all these costs in a single bundled subscription price. Your annual costs are elevated, but predictable.

If you build your website a la carte with self-hosted WordPress (even if it’s with a “builder“), then you can control a lot of your costs and get access to a lot of features that a hosted website builder might take away (e.g., actually having a custom domain or SEO features).

The Long Answer to Website Costs Per Year

But here’s the thing, your annual website costs really do depend on your choices & goals. I’ll break down how much a website should cost, and what variables you can play with to make sure your costs fit what you want to get out of it.

Consider a few websites that I have personally been involved with.

Website #1 cost $0 upfront and now costs $8 per year to maintain. It is a single page and written in HTML/CSS that I wrote. It lives on a Google Cloud account with a $300 promo credit with my low-traffic website generating all of pennies worth of traffic every year. It runs on a custom domain name that is $8/yr to renew. That’s it.

Website #2 cost $20 upfront and now costs $0 per year to maintain. It is a personal photo blog that lives on WordPress.com. I bought a nice premium theme at the beginning for $20. Now I keep it on a free *wordpress.com subdomain with limited ads & links to WordPress.com in lieu of annual fees. That’s it.

Website #3 cost $120 upfront and now costs more than $1500 per year to operate. It started with a free WordPress theme and a year of shared hosting plus a custom domain. Now, it requires a VPS server with secondary backup & security software in addition to premium software plugins and a small budget for a few hours of developer / designer time.

Website #4 cost $300,000 upfront and now costs $30,000 per year to operate. It started with custom branding & design in addition to extensive custom development and deployment to dedicated hosting (now moved to cloud hosting). It also requires monthly staging for software updates, in addition to technical maintenance, and a extensive suite of 3rd party plugins for email, A/B testing, etc.

So there’s a lot of factors involved in website costs. But that’s not a reason to throw up your hands and just say that “it costs what it costs” – or worse, get started on a project and have to quit after a year because it’s more expensive than you wanted the project to be.

Let’s look at the factors individually, how they work, and how they add up.

And while we look at each factor, I’m going to use an analogy that has worked well for readers in my other post about ecommerce. I’m going to compare building a website to building a house since most people are somewhat familiar with what goes into living in a place.

To start, begin imagining a hosted website builder like a townhome in a gated development. You have more control & say over your house than a Facebook page (a hotel room in the analogy), but a lot of things are taken care of with a Homeowner’s Association or Condo fee. A self-hosted website will be a detached single-family home in a neighborhood. There’s no recurring HOA or condo fee, but you are responsible for everything.

Domain Costs

Unless you want your website as a subdomain on someone else’s domain, then a custom domain name is the one critical cost variable for your website.

In our real estate analogy, a domain name is like your street address. You technically don’t need it…unless you want people to be able to find your house / website.

Thankfully, an annual domain does not cost that much. Even if you maintain a WHOIS privacy add-on, a .com domain should not cost more than $12 per year from somewhere like NameCheap which specializes in cheap long-term renewals.

In fact, many hosting companies will usually bundle a free domain for a year with the purchase of a hosting package. And other domain companies like GoDaddy will do very deep discounting (though will be more expensive at renewal). Some hosted website builders will bundle a domain name as well.

Either way, you really only need one, unless you have strong reasons to buy extras.

I’d budget $12 per year for this annual cost.

Hosting Costs

Hosting is where your actual website files live. Whether you are bundling with a website builder or self-hosting on your own hosting account, it’s a cost that you can’t really get away from.

In our real estate analogy, your hosting account is like your land / property. You not only need it, but it can dramatically affect how much of a headache / cost your website is.

Think about land in the real world, sure, there is plenty of super-cheap or even free land…but it usually has some tradeoffs. The land might be distant from highways or it might not have the best neighbors or it might not come with water or electricity.

Hosting is the same way. You can get super-cheap hosting for your website. But you will generally get what you pay for. In fact, paying for a good host can make a lot of your other costs much, much cheaper.

Many hosting companies include domain names, drag & drop tools, high-touch customer-support, and security / backups that take pressure off your domain, software, and labor costs.

For example, the host that runs this site (InMotion Hosting) has WordPress plans that are a bit more expensive than typical web hosting plans. But they come with a subscription to JetPack (speed, security & backups) in addition to high-touch support and a drag & drop design tool.

And plenty of other hosts offer similar setups (like SiteGround, Bluehost, and others). But, of course, the extras can only go so far since hosting costs will likely be your single largest annual cost. Thankfully, it’s also a cost that will generally only rise as your number of visitors rises (and so, presumably, your ability to pay for it).

For a good shared hosting plan, I’d budget $120 per year.*

*Note that many self-hosting plans allow multiple websites on a single account. If you have several websites, then self-hosting makes your per website costs even less. And again, for a hosted website builder, this cost is bundled, but is per website no matter what.

Software Costs

Software is what you’ll use to actually build & operate your website. Now, technically, you don’t need software to build a website.

In our real estate analogy, your software is what makes your actual house. It’s the framing, plumbing, electricity, roofing, drywall – the actual pieces that make the house.

You can hand-code HTML / CSS files and upload to your hosting account for no costs. I’ve done that before. It can be useful. But…almost all website owners (and visitors) want the interactivity, ease of use, versatility, and management functions of modern website software (just like you could cut down trees to make a log cabin…or you could have a house).

There are also a lot of 3rd party software that you might want in addition to your actual website. Think about the costs for email marketing software or design costs / themes or specific plugins (like ecommerce). Sometimes these costs are even greater if you go the hosted website builder route, since sometimes they won’t have native features. You’ll have to add them via a premium app.

For software, you could do $0 per year…but I’d recommend adding in at least $100 per year for backup & marketing software.

Labor Costs

Every website requires time, thought & expertise to actually build & operate. This factor is where you’ll encounter a massive range of costs that is totally up to you.

In our real estate analogy, labor is literally who builds & maintains your property. Do you want to hire an architect or build off pre-made blueprints? Do you want to hire as things come up or have someone in charge of everything? Do you want to outsource cutting the grass or just electrical issues?

If you are self-hosting your website, your software will take care of most of the “bones” of the website, but you’ll still be in charge of choosing an off-the-shelf design / theme. You’ll need to run software updates. You will have access to support via your hosting company, but some things will be out of their scope & expertise.

If you go the hosted route, you’ll have labor pre-paid for that will take care of all the maintenance…but a lot of the design choices will still be up to you. Think of it like an interior designer – most everyone does it DIY…but you can also tell who has spent the money to hire everything out.

I’ve written a guide to hiring a web designer and a marketing consultant, but I also have a guide to building a minimally viable website. There’s a lot of way to budget – all depending on your goals & expertise. I personally do most everything DIY, and spend very little on labor to maintain my website.

But last year I also paid $100 for someone to remove a hack from a client site. I paid $50 for a few image designs. I’ve also paid $500 for a custom plugin. The costs can widely vary, but it’s important to think through your ideal budget and the “what if X happens” budget”.

Annualized Costs

Annualized costs are upfront costs that you smooth out over the course of a project to get a sense of true annual cost.

In our real estate analogy, there are going to be a lot of things that you purchase upfront for a house…that you use but don’t pay for year after year even though they will need to be replaced at some point. Think about your appliances, your roof, your HVAC, etc.

With a website, your annualized costs will mainly be things like a prepaid hosting bill (most hosting companies give big discounts for multi-year commitments), a premium web design or theme, a premium plugin purchase, setup costs, course subscription, etc.

Whatever you have budgeted to spend upfront, I’d recommend smoothing that out and combining it with your annual costs so that you have a good sense of the true cost of your website project.

Sticking with a commitment is usually a mix of good habits and good expectations. I’ve seen too many good website projects start and fizzle because expectations were set too low or too high.

Adding your total website costs will help you back into what your commitment will actually require.

Adding up Total Website Costs per Year

Now, let’s talk about adding it all up. The formula is pretty straightforward. Take all your costs and add them up.

For a small blog project that is self-hosted on WordPress, you’d likely end up with –

Domains = $10
Hosting = $100
Software = $100
Labor = $0
Annualized = $10 (for 5 years)
Total Annual Costs = $220 per year

For a small ecommerce store on Shopify, you’d likely end up with –

Domains = $15
Hosting = $0
Software = $400
Labor = $200
Annualized = $35 (for 5 years)
Total Annual Costs = $650 per year

But here’s the thing. Your costs won’t just vary based on your plans, but also based on what happens.

In large organizations (like the US Army), they refer to “scenario planning”. It’s where you map out several scenarios, determine what costs go with each scenario, and assign probabilities.

It sounds complex, but it doesn’t have to be. It just means that you need to come up with a range of costs depending on what actually happens.

For the small blog project, there’s a scenario where you find out that theme editing is quite easy and you don’t need a premium theme upfront. There’s also one where your site gets hacked and you need to pay Sucuri to clean it for $100.

For the small ecommerce store, there’s a scenario where you really need custom shipping rates and have to upgrade from Basic Shopify, thus increasing your software costs. In another scenario, you get the ropes of installing apps & editing designs, so you don’t need to hire anyone to setup the store.

Add up your range of website costs – you’ll be able to figure out what the project is worth. And what you want to get out of it.

Next Steps

So the true answer to “how much does a website cost per year?” really is… “it depends.”

But there is a way to breakdown your costs with your goals and your resources.

Thinking through your own costs can set the right expectations and set you up for success.

Learn how to find the best web host here and how to find the best website builder here and the best ecommerce hosting here.

Explore my other explainers here. If you found this post useful – do please share 🙂

The post How Much a Website Costs Per Year Explained appeared first on ShivarWeb.

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July 19, 2019

What Is A Convenience Fee?

If your business takes credit cards, then you know that you are charged a fee for each payment made with a card. You would not have to pay these fees if the customer paid in cash or by check, but given that we are moving towards a cashless society, you might feel forced to take credit card payments.

There a few ways for merchants can recoup credit card charges…by passing the cost down to their customers. One way is through surcharges and another is through convenience fees. We already have an article explaining surcharges, so this article focuses on convenience fees.

What Is A Convenience Fee?

A convenience fee is an amount you add to the purchase price; the customer pays this fee in return for being able to use a more convenient way to pay. The customer will always have the choice to use another standard method of payment that does not require the added convenience fee. The fee isnât technically related to taking credit cards. It is meant to help the merchant recoup the added cost for setting up a new payment channel.

As an example, movie theaters usually sell tickets at the box office. Customers can pay by credit card and that cost is absorbed as a cost of doing business. But the movie theater owner can offer an alternate way to buy tickets — via online sales — and require customers to pay with a credit card. The theater can then charge a convenience fee for online purchases because those who do not wish to pay the convenience fee can always buy in person at the box office.

As a practical matter, convenience fees seem to be most commonly applied to payments such as utilities, rent, tuition, government fees (e.g., motor vehicle registration fees), and even taxes. All these fees tend to be traditionally payable by check or in person, so payment online by a credit card is very obviously an added convenience.

There are rules on how you can charge a convenience fee, and they differ with every card. Visa has the most thorough policy on the subject, while Discover and American Express are rather vague and rely on broader rules that apply to how merchants accept card payments, period. We will explain these rules below and show you how to properly charge a convenience fee.

First, though, let’s clarify the difference between convenience fees and surcharges.

Convenience Fee VS Surcharges

As mentioned in the introduction, adding a credit card surcharge is another way to offset credit card fees. A surcharge is not the same as a convenience fee, though they are often confused with each other.

Generally, a surcharge is added to a product or serviceâs regular price when a customer pays with a credit card. It can be applied to all credit card payments for a specific card or to specific categories of products. You do not need primary or secondary payment channels to institute surcharges, which makes it a bit simpler. However, not every state allows surcharges. The rules related to surcharges are complex, so be sure to speak to your credit card acquirer to make sure you follow all the rules before you start charging this fee.

We have a good article on surcharges–what they are and how to implement them–so be sure to check the article out as you consider your options.

How To (Correctly) Charge Convenience Fees

If you wish to charge a convenience fee, make sure you do it the correct way. Each credit card company has its own rules, and they all encourage merchants to speak to their card acquirer when considering adding a convenience fee. In fact, it seems you canât find out the precise amount you can charge without working with your processor. Below, we will go through the rules implemented by Visa, Mastercard, Discover, and American Express so you can have a better idea of what you might have to do to charge a convenience fee.

Visa

According to Visaâs website:

In certain countries, for example Russia, the U.S., and some countries in Asia, a merchant is permitted to charge a convenience fee to the customer. The fee must be a flat fee (not a percentage of the transaction amount), clearly disclosed, and represent payment for the convenience of paying through an alternate payment channel (such as online) that is different than the merchantâs normal payment channel (for example sending a check through the mail or paying in person).

The details of Visaâs convenience fee rules can be found in the Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules on Visaâs website. Section 5.6.2 addresses convenience fees, and it was last modified in 2016.

If your business is in the US, here are some major items of note when implementing a convenience fee for Visa cards:

Can only be charged online.
Cannot be charged if you are solely an online merchant (if you are, then consider a surcharge).
Must disclose clearly and give the cardholder a chance to cancel the payment before paying.
Fee must be included in the total amount of the transaction and not charged separately.
Cannot charge for recurring transactions or installment transactions.
Cannot charge both a convenience fee and a surcharge.

If you wish to implement a convenience fee for Visa cards, we encourage you to read Section 5.6.2 of the Visa rules and work with your processor.

Mastercard

Mastercardâs rules for convenience fees are a little difficult to find. It seems that Mastercard does allow convenience fees, but only for government and education entities. Specifically, convenience fees are allowed only in connection with these types of payments:

Tuition and school-sponsored room and board for elementary schools, secondary schools, colleges, universities, and professional schools.
Government and court fees, costs, and fines, including alimony and child support payments.
Local, state, and federal taxes.

There are some additional rules under the Mastercard Convenience Fee Program. They include:

If you charge a convenience fee for American Express, Discover, and Visa, then you must treat Mastercard in the same way you treat these other cards.
There are additional electronic data security standards that you may have to adhere to.
The cardholder must be notified of the additional convenience fee and be given a chance to back out of paying this way.

Finally, Mastercard recommends that the convenience fee be charged separately from the actual payment. This is the opposite of the Visa requirement. Fortunately, it is not a mandatory rule.

If you are a government or education entity and wish to charge a convenience fee for Mastercard payments, contact your acquirer and work with them on the details.

American Express

American Express does not seem to have a policy on convenience fees, but it does not prohibit its merchants from charging them either (see Section 3.3 of the American Express Merchant Reference Guide–U.S., last updated in April 2019). It seems that you can charge a convenience fee as long as:

The fee fits the definition of convenience fee (as opposed to a surcharge),
You do not discriminate against the use of the American Express card (Section 2.3, fifth bullet point), and
You disclose the fee to the cardholder and give the cardholder a chance to back out.

The safest approach for adding American Express to your convenience fee program is to speak to your credit card acquirer. But as long as you meet Visa’s requirements, you should also satisfy American Express’s.

Discover

Like American Express, Discover does not seem to have a rule on convenience fees. There is an undated article on Discoverâs website about paying taxes with a credit card, and it touches on convenience fees. The article suggests that you can pay your taxes with a Discover card but you typically will have to pay a convenience fee in a percentage form or a flat rate form.

Because there are no clear, stated rules on convenience fees, the only other consideration is Section 2.4 of Discover’s Merchant Operating Regulations R11.1. This rule requires the merchant to not discriminate against the use of the Discover card, similar to American Express’s policy. If you don’t charge a convenience fee for Visa but assess one for Discover, you would be in violation of this rule. From a practical standpoint, if you use the Visa rules and just add Discover card as a payment option, you should be satisfying Discover’s requirements for convenience fees.

Are Convenience Fees The Right Choice For Your Business?

Let’s review: Accepting credit card payments means more costs for merchants. However, you can sometimes pass credit card fees to a customer instead of having to absorb them as a cost of doing business. One such way is to use a convenience fee, but this method can only be used when there is another âstandardâ way for the customer to pay. If you wish to impose a convenience fee, contact your credit card acquirer. They can help you follow all the rules from the credit card companies as well as tell you how much you can charge for the fee.

Will customers pay extra just to have a non-standard way to pay for goods and services? It depends! Many people might be willing to pay extra to skip the line to renew a driverâs license but might not care about the time savings when they can just drop a check in the mail for their electric bill. Before you charge convenience fees, be sure there is a demand for them, or you might end up with an alternate payment method that no one uses.

Do you charge a convenience fee? Have you happily paid a convenience fee before? Let us know about your experiences in the comments section!

The post What Is A Convenience Fee? appeared first on Merchant Maverick.

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General Website Example

Keyingredient

Education Website Example

Mr. Rees’ Social Studies Classes

Photography Website Example

JSVFOTO

Church Website Example

Morton Park Hall

Business Website Examples

PCS

Flanders Hotel Bruges

Petits Gâteaux

Personal Website Example

Andy Wolber

Next Steps

Pros of Namesilo

Variety of TLDs

Transparent Pricing

Upsells

Cons of Namesilo

Design & Branding

Onboarding / Domain Management

Complementary Products

Next Steps

What Is Credit Sesame?

Is Credit Sesame Always Free?

Is Credit Sesame Safe?

Credit Scores & Reports Offered By Credit Sesame

Other Services Offered By Credit Sesame

Credit Monitoring

Identity Theft Insurance

Credit Card Recommendations

Final Verdict

Defining An Issuing Bank

The Issuing Bank’s Role In Payment Processing

Issuing Bank VS Acquiring Bank

How Important Is The Issuing Bank To Merchants?

What Is Fundbox?

OnDeck

StreetShares

Kabbage

Lendio

BlueVine

Final Thoughts

How Employee Credit Cards Work

The Benefits (& Pitfalls) Of Giving Credit Cards To Your Employees

How To Get Credit Cards For Your Employees

How To Manage Employee Use Of Credit Cards

Final Thoughts

What Is Credit Karma?

Is Credit Karma Really Free?

Is Credit Karma Safe?

Credit Scores & Reports Offered By Credit Karma

Other Services Offered By Credit Karma

Credit Monitoring

Financial Tools/Calculators

Home & Auto Insurance Scores

Offers For Credit Cards, Personal Loans, And Automobile Loans

Search For Unclaimed Money

Tax Services

Final Verdict

Should you use Credit Karmaâs credit score services?

What Is A Home Equity Loan?

Equity Loans VS HELOCs

Equity Loans VS Business Loans

When Should Merchants Use A Home Equity Loan?

Home Equity Loans For Business: Pros & Cons

Alternatives To Home Equity Loans

Business Lines Of Credit

Invoice Financing

Business Credit Cards

Small Business Administration (SBA) Loans

Final Thoughts

The Short Answer to Website Costs Per Year

The Long Answer to Website Costs Per Year

Domain Costs

Hosting Costs

Software Costs

Labor Costs

Annualized Costs

Should you use Credit Karmaâs credit score services?