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In this tight lending climate, entrepreneurs may be tempted by an investor's offer of cash, even if it comes with strings attached. Vlad Shmunis, the founder of RingCentral, an Internet company that serves small business owners, has an answer to that offer: Think carefully before you accept it. Mr. Shmunis said that when he was trying to rai Read More

A payroll tax credit and breaks for business are among the tax cuts Congress will pass as part of the big economic stimulus package coming soon. Read More

The federal government thinks many small-business owners under-report their income, and thus has been cracking down on them to help shore up its own budgetary problems. The message for you: The tax auditor might want to take a look at your books. So how can you avoid that? Though it's unlikely you can dodge an audit forever — the IRS tries Read More

As the credit freeze continues and the recession deepens, many community banks, generally defined as having less than $10 billion in assets, are reporting an uptick in loans and credit lines to small businesses. At a congressional hearing on small business and the economic recovery earlier this month, economist Paul Merski, of the Independent Comm Read More

Credit card volume share from online purchases is predicted to fall nearly 50% by 2013. One would think in tight times that consumers might use more credit. What's going on? Read More

Much of the writing on angel investing suggests that angels fill the gap between the low amounts invested by friends-and-family, and the large amounts invested by venture capitalists. But is that true? The story goes something like this: that business angels fill the financing gap between the $100,000 maximum seed stage investment that friends Read More

When it comes to word-of-mouth communications about personal finance, a small group comprising 11.5% of the US adult population is the key influencer for the majority of other people. Though people in this segment of approximately 25.4 million mirror the typical American adult in terms of average age (45.4) and have only a 4% higher annual inc Read More

Small businesses finally are getting their own little piece of the federal government's ballooning bailout package. U.S. officials announced the federal government as part of a broader package will lend up to $200 billion to institutions that originate consumer loans and business loans backed by the Small Business Administration. The rationale Read More

Lay-a-way? Doesn't that involve some kind of a system where you pay for the merchandise BEFORE you take it home? A reasonable lay-a-way program would be a great option, allowing the customer to pay a little each week and walk out of the store with the item full paid for in 8 weeks. And yes, it usually closed the sale. It looks like some modern- Read More

About a week ago, I put out the statistic that the typical, or median, size of an angel investment is $10,000. Many people have responded that they don't believe the number because they see companies receiving $250,000 to $500,000 from angels. But these numbers aren't inconsistent. Read More