Instruction Site
Get small-business help online.
Bank One has created a new Web site to
help small businesses. The site offers assistance in four areas:
management, insurance, online banking and retirement planning.
Under "Business Tools," the management area features
Web-based software applications that help with such tasks as
creating a business plan, incorporating a business, writing
business letters and creating employee manuals. Users can store
their documents in secure virtual filing cabinets and allow others
to access them. They can also find demographic market data and an
e-communications center with a personal e-mail box, an online
calendar and an electronic Rolodex. The site also offers an online
reference library as well as access to small-business experts.
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In the "Insurance" area, users can evaluate and buy
health insurance online courtesy of eHealthInsurance.com.
The "Online Banking" section allows users to open
accounts, review account status, transfer funds, confirm check
clearance and pay bills.
The "Retirement Planning" section provides info on
pension plans and SIMPLE IRAs, which can reduce your income taxes
and provide the potential for tax-deferred growth of your
money.
While the resources are free, some require registration, and
some are only available to Bank One customers.
Movie Money
Need cash for your Citizen Kane?
Independent filmmakers have two new resources to tap for film
financing.
- The first, CreativePlanet, offers an online forum at www.creativeplanet.com where experts answer your
questions on film financing, managing contracts, licensing and more
in bulletin-board-like discussions. To read the ongoing questions
and answers, click on "Discussion," and scroll down to
"Film Financing" and "Co-Productions."
- The SBA has expanded its 7(a) loan guarantee program to include
financing of entrepreneurial film companies.
Although the program is available nationwide, right now the Los
Angeles regional office is the most knowledgeable. Still,
filmmakers outside Southern California who know of an interested
lender can approach their local SBA district offices to initiate
discussions.
While the program is just now unfolding and each potential
borrower will be dealt with individually, there are some basic
criteria: The film company's management team must demonstrate
movie-making experience, and everyone who will substantially
benefit from the production must be prepared to personally
guarantee the loan.
The new loan program coincides with changes in the SBA's
7(a) program, which include increasing the loan size guaranteed to
$1 million and capping the gross size of a loan at $2 million.
Girl Power
Young women entrepreneurs get down to business in competition.
Girls ages 13 to 21 who want to start businesses but need a
little financial boost may find what they're looking for by
entering the 2001 Business Plan Competition, presented by
Independent Means Inc., a Santa Barbara, California, provider of
products and services for girls' financial independence. The
contest will award each of five winners $2,500, an
all-expenses-paid trip to the national awards ceremony in San
Francisco in October, a scholarship to Camp $tart-Up (an
entrepreneurial camp for girls), an opportunity for a $10,000
scholarship to Babson College and more.
Business plans should include details on how the product or
service will be marketed, how the firm will operate, where
financing will come from and what it will take to succeed, as well
as information on the entrepreneur and why she thinks she'll
succeed.
One winner will be chosen from each of three age categories: 13
to 15, 16 to 18 and 19 to 21. In addition, two high-scoring plans
will be given awards. The deadline to enter is August 15; winners
will be announced September 15.
For application information, visit the Independent
Means Web site or call (800) 350-1816.