Tips For Creating A Small Business Loan Platform
If you have spent time as an angel investor for businesses and now you want to launch a full business lending program, there are a lot of things to consider. One of the most important considerations as you establish the program is how you want your potential borrowers to apply. An online lending portal is a great way to do this because many small business owners don't have the time to meet with you in the office for the application. Here are some of the important features to look for in your online lending platform as you establish the program.
It Should Prioritize Security
Any time you're dealing with any kind of financial information or sensitive business details, security is a top priority. When you launch an online lending platform, make sure that you work with a cyber security professional to ensure that the data is protected. The last thing you need is a data breach that puts your client information, or even that of declined applications, at risk. The better your authentication software and your firewalls, the better protected the data will be.
Another key consideration of your security features is identity verification. You need to incorporate an authorization process that verifies the identity of the applicant as someone who is authorized under the business or who has the valid identification details for the business. That prevents a disgruntled employee from trying to access funding in the company's name without any authorization.
It Should Be Easy To Update
You don't want to have to spend a lot of time or money on repeated technician services to upload, update, or manage your applications, forms, and the back-end decision-making configuration. You can avoid some of this by investing in a platform that you can easily modify. Once the platform is up and running and you've been trained on the back-end administration, you will be able to do all of these updates and changes on your own.
It Should Automate Some Decisions
When you establish any kind of business lending program, you should clearly define what the expectations are for qualified borrowers. Anyone who clearly meets these standards can be automatically approved by your lending platform. Further, if there are certain things, like a specific revenue level or credit score, that you consider to be an automatic disqualification, your platform can deny those applications for you automatically, too. That reduces the number of applications requiring your personal intervention to just those that fall outside of those two parameters. Those are best reviewed individually so that you can make those decisions on a case-by-case basis.
It Should Be Multi-Platform Friendly
With mobile services becoming the most in-demand, designing a lending platform that's only accessible from a computer or that isn't designed to adapt to mobile browsers is going to reduce the number of potential clients you may be able to work with. When you design your platform, make sure that it is adaptive to mobile devices. In fact, if you can incorporate an app that works with mobile devices, that would open up even more possibilities.
In addition, you can even incorporate the ability to upload forms. That way, applicants can send you all of the supporting documentation, including revenue figures, income statements, and other details, straight through the application platform. This speeds up the process and makes approval much easier to complete.
These are some of the key considerations when you're implementing a new small business lending platform. If you want to help finance some local small businesses, talk with a developer to create a platform like this after you've completed your small business lending program and established your parameters. Contact a company that offers services like retail business loan program training to learn more.
