In this transcript, business coach Clay Clark (US SBA Entrepreneur of the Year) shows you 14 ways to get capital to start or grow a business on Thrive15.com, one of the top business schools in Michigan!
Caleb: You’re saying use one card and make a big purchase. You wait six months usually? In this method as a business coach?
Clay: I’m a business coach, and I know this stuff. If you go into CreditCards.com …
Caleb: CreditCards.com.
Clay: … you can find the cards that have no balance transfers. They don’t talk about this at college, because I don’t understand what they’re teaching there. They should be teaching this. That’s why I built a business coach platform.
A no balance transfer fee, what it means is you can transfer the payment, the amount of money you owe from one card to the other. The key is you want to get your credit score up high. How do you get your credit score high?
What you need to do is you need to have … There’s a thing called “Chase Freedom Card.” A Chase Freedom Card is basically anybody on the plant almost can qualify for that. Get yourself a cellphone bill if you’re a young entrepreneur, get it in your own name, pay your utility bills, pay your business coach fee.
Here’s what the real talk. If you don’t pay your utilities on time, you don’t hurt your credit score? If you have all your cards maxed out, you don’t hurt your credit score?
What you’re going to want to do is you’re going to want to have credit cards where you never spend more than about 50% of the limit, and you pay it off every single month.
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What’s awesome is you’ll start to … You’ll call them about every three months and say … Again, this is a process. Every three months, just call your credit card company and say, “I’d like to request a credit line increase.” They say, “How much?” Say, “I’d like to double it.” Dude puts in the machine … He says, “You’re approved.” All of a sudden you have 2,000.
Let’s just say you have 10 dudes working on in a company, because it’s a startup, or three dudes. If you guys are trying to embrace money, what you do is you all go on CreditCards.com, you all apply for a card. You get a no balance transfer fee card, and you go up there, and then you each get like a $2,000 limit.
My advice as a business coach is to spend. Buy it all. Then have a second card that you already have. Once you get time where you owe money on it, transfer the balance from one card to the next. Then make sure you never get caught where you have a balance, too, and you earn your money.
You should have a business model … I knew that no matter what I was going to pay it off, because that’s how I roll. Now, if you’re somebody like, “Well, I might pay it off,” well, then don’t do it.
This is a great and very valid method. Sara Blakely who started the billion-dollar company “Spanks” did this. People that … I have three guys who very, very successful millionaires who actually own a homebuilding companies started her companies with this. This is the move.
Caleb: I love it. It’s very practical. Tell me about the pros and cons of this credit card method.
Clay: The pros that you can use the balance transfer, to move money over. The credit card’s fast. You know why? Because you’re dealing with a non-government entity. Sweet.
What you do is you apply. They tell you right now, “No. You’re not accepted.” Yes, you are. You get a card sent to you overnight, 24 hours. 24 hours later, dude, you are spending money. Bam. That’s sick.
I got this awesome Master Card. It’s a silver card. That beast, I get some cash back on that, so I’m going to take my wife on trip to Miami all paid for with my rewards points, not a dollar out of pocket. Super cool.
Caleb: A lot of your Christmas gifts.
Clay: For free. Yeah. I do that. That’s cool. For free. That’s nice. It’s fast. You get cash back rewards. You can transfer money. It’s a great, great … Bad deal.
Here’s the cons. If you do not pay the payment in full each money, your interest will be so sky high, you will believe that you are in Colorado at the top of some mountainous resort smoking pot.
Caleb: Wow.
Clay: Yes.
Caleb: That’s super high.
Clay: That’s high.
Caleb: That’s a good warning. Pros and cons there.
Clay: Very high.
Caleb: Now, the number five, the venture capital method for raising capital.
Clay: Sure.
Caleb: That’s something you’ve been doing most recently, I believe. Talk just a little bit about this.
Clay: I have done ventured capital to raise money for other people in the past, not on a scale that we’re doing for Thrive, because Thrive is designed to be a global worldwide overhaul of entrepreneurial education, but I have the ventured capital on smaller scale. I think a lot of people when they read venture capital they say, “Silicon Valley.” True.
There’s only about between to 400 and 600 active meaning companies that actually lend the money on a consistent basis through a called “institutional investments.”
It’s like a company that actually lends money. That’s what they do. They have analyst who analyze every deal. They look at every deal. Very few. There’s only between 400 and 600 of those. That’s what ventured capital is usually people are referring to when they think about it.
Venture capital could also be somebody who’s crazy enough to invest in your business or believes in it enough to put money in it, and it’s not secured. You’re putting money in, but it’s not guaranteed by … When you lend money to someone to buy a house, you’re not that crazy, because you’re saying, “I will lend you money to buy this house if you do not pay for the house back. I will take the house.”
Caleb: Right.