Conveniently, the ten yes or no question evaluation leads you to eleven steps:

Step 1: Reality Check – Candidly answer the assessment questions above and take appropriate action to address issues receiving a “no” response.

Step 2: Get Lean and Mean…

Step 3: Maximize Cash Flow…

If after the reality check you find yourself at a loss for ways to start tackling each step, the SBA also includes thirteen separate performance resources.  Most are aimed at their loan programs and business plan writing but there is a marketing guide, a website construction primer and information on government contracts in the Free Online Courses section.

The administration’s Certified Development Company (504) lending program traditionally provides long-term, fixed-rate financing for assets like real estate, heavy machinery or other improvements. But as of last Wednesday, it now permanently allows small business owners to refinance such debt, as long as it is used for expansion purposes.

“This is one more piece of the Recovery Act that is going to have a direct impact and put more money in the hands of small business owners just when they need it most,” said Karen Gordon Mills, head of the Small Business Administration, in a statement.

But the timing of such changes is a bit off, according to experts and analysts of 504 lending programs. They say that few businesses can currently afford to expand, to leave such good intentions unused.

According to Scott Shane, professor of entrepreneurial studies at Case Western Reserve University, few small business owners may also feel up to the task. In May 2009, just 5 percent of business owners felt that the following three months would be “a good time to expand.”

This is a drop of 11 percent from nearly two years ago, according to data Shane cumulated from the National Federation of Independent Business. And while positive feelings unexpectedly spiked last September, overall trends speak volumes about the confidence level of such business owners.

“Small business owners’ views of the expansion-potential of the economy may have turned the corner, but we have a long way to go to get back to the point where a lot of small business owners think it’s a good time to expand,” Shane wrote Monday for the New York Times.

As president of Mercantile Capital Corporation – a conventional, for-profit 504 lender – Christopher Hern suggests fully lifting any restriction on refinancing, to really stimulate small business lending. Bob Coleman, publisher of Small Business Administration newsletter Coleman Report, agrees.

“This is another program stymied by too much regulation and will not deliver the intended stimulus desired by Congress and the Administration,” he commented to the New York Times.

Small business owners – will you take advantage of the new 504 lending program anytime soon? Why or why not?

Do take advantage of programs offered though your state government, including the Department of Commerce and Chamber of Commerce. A quick online search for “(your state) small business grants” may also prove to be fruitful.

Do not start searching through the U.S. Small Business Administration. The agency does not offer grants to start up or expand small businesses. However, it does offer a variety of loan programs for such financing.

Do remember to search for grants provided by private and non-profit institutions, especially if you are a woman or minority business owner.

Do not completely disregard the federal government in your search. Grants.gov acts as the clearinghouse for a number of small business grant programs, Just make sure to do an advanced search for “small business” to find them.

On a final note – do make sure, regardless of where you apply, that you and your business meet the specific grant program requirements. This may include but is not limited to location, sales revenue, purposes of funding. If the program is rather extensive, then consider hiring a professional grant proposal writer to help with your application.

However, applicants must prove themselves worthy before reaping any rewards, through a rather extensive application process. Each grant program holds their own requirements, though in general, applicants can qualify if they meet these few:

• Your business is small enough. Such size requirements are typically determined by the U.S. Small Business Administration. For all wholesale trade industries, this means 100 employees or less, according to clearinghouse Grants.gov.
• Your business has big impact. Most grant applications require that you send a business plan and proposal letter with your application. With these, they want you to demonstrate how their money would be put to good use. (For help, refer to Bplans.com for a number of business plan templates, and the Small Business Administration for a basic template.)
• Your business can still hire for help. Though you can easily apply for smaller grants – ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars – yourself, bigger grants could require more help. Consider hiring a professional grant letter to write up a proposal letter, an accountant to write up your business plan, or both.
• Your business can afford to wait. Some steps of the registration process can take one day, some can take three – and then, your application may only surface after months of sifting by the grant agency.

Have you tried applying for a small business grant? If so, what was your experience like?

Sens. Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, representing the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, wrote a letter addressed to U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. It results from a March 19 hearing, where entrepreneurs discussed how credit and loan options have diminished despite perfect payment histories.

“Without our help, small businesses won’t be able to fulfill their role as the engine of economic growth at a time when our economy needs them more than ever,” Sen. Landrieu said in a statement.

Sen. Snowe raised the idea of using Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) funds at the hearing, before contributing to the letter.

“It will provide banks an assurance that their loan will be paid, but, most critically, it will enable small businesses to obtain the capital they need to keep their doors open and employees on the job,” the senators wrote in the letter.

The government has already agreed though to use $15 million in TARP funds to stand behind Small Business Administration loans.

After registering, small business owners can post threads in a number of topic categories, ranging from business regulations to government contracting. Members have already asked about the legalities of affiliate marketing and whether one can make a business out of a hobby.

This being the first government-sponsored online community discussing small businesses, the moderators are consultants from the Business Gateway, a group of 22 federal agencies which include the U.S. Small Business Administration. The Community is the end result of efforts to utilize both Web 2.0 technology and expert advice, as stated in a press release.

While taking individual questions, the moderators may also post links to detailed how-to guides that they have written themselves. Not only do they cite specific government regulations, but they may also bring to attention Business Week articles, The Global Small Business Blog, or the Kauffman Foundation.

Plus, since outside financial experts and business advisors are also joining the forum, registered small business owners can look forward to receiving quite a bit of information and advice. Such members are marked under their username as “VIP.”

Bottom line: while members can expect additional features and resources over the next few months, the Business.gov Community is already doing well in making resources and advice both abundant and accessible.

For more information, e-mail the Business.gov team or visit the Community forums.

The $300 Billion Tax Cut

Throughout his presidential campaign, Obama has supported the implementation of a middle-class tax cut, amounting to $500 for workers and $1,000 for families. But his latest economic agenda calls for far more money than anticipated and potentially more than ever requested by any president.

Provisions aimed for immediate relief include one that would allow businesses to write off huge losses of 2008 and 2009, while also removing tax obligations over the past five years. Such received broad governmental support, but they also drew skeptical responses from others.

“We do not want to see the past few months repeated, where $700 billion … in loans were provided without any quid pro quo from the recipients,” said B. Sheridan of Andover, Ma. to The New York Times. “The end result: the recipients took the money, buttressed their balance sheets and then announced drastic future layoffs. To repeat that would be unacceptable.”

Some small business owners wonder if, after making strategic budget cuts during the credit crunch, they will receive as much benefits as those that were less prudent. While the U.S. Chamber of Commerce supports this provision, it expressed wariness of others – including a one-year tax credit that made new hires over the past year – in its own stimulus plan.

Entrepreneurial Presence

Small business representation may also take new form. More than a third of the new senators and representatives were once entrepreneurs or venture capitalists, according to the Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy.

Many of them campaigned for lower taxes, plus costs in health care and energy. In addition, with their past experiences, some have campaigned for a whole new business direction. For one, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) reasons than the United States should invest time and money into the science and technology industries, rather than manufacturing sectors dominated by China and India.

In the meantime, a change in Small Business Administration leadership has raised questions regarding the wellbeing of a long-neglected agency. While Obama’s nomination, Karen Gordon Mills, has 25 years in venture capitalism, she has close to none in entrepreneurship.

Still, while serving in the president-elect’s transition team, she gained the support – and recommendation – of Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), who also called for a Small Business Administration cabinet seat. Others have since followed her lead, including the agency’s acting chief counsel for advocacy, Shawne McGibbon.

The editorial staff of Maine’s Sun Journal echoed such support: “In this sense, it is accurate to think of the government’s role going forward as the venture capitalist, putting money into endeavors with hopes of growing business and garnering returns.”

Readers, what do you think of these developments? If all of these proposals are implemented, how would they affect your small businesses?

What Snowe wants most is a Small Business Administration (SBA) seat back in the Cabinet – one that President George W. Bush did not elect, and one she and others have sorely missed. Furthermore, elevating the agency’s incoming administrator, she said, “will send a clear signal that small business will drive our nation out of this recession,” as she wrote in a letter addressed to Obama.

At the same time, Snowe has been pushing legislation in hopes of providing more immediate relief. Along with lost lending activity, her ten-step Main Street Economic Recovery Act seeks to recover Small Business Administration funding that has suffered great losses. Over the past eight years, the administration’s budget shrunk by 27 percent – the largest cut of any federal agency.

“When you consider that the SBA budget represents only about 2/100ths of a percent of the total federal budget – yet at the same time small businesses are creating about three-fourths of all new jobs – there is no question that adequately funding the Agency’s small business programs is an investment in America’s economic future,” she said to BusinessWeek.

Traditionally the Small Business Administration’s most popular loan program, 7(a), aims to be “as broad as possible” for start-ups and existing small businesses, according to its official Web site. But over the past year, lending through that program has dropped by 55 percent, as 75 percent of banks reported to the Federal Reserve that they tightened their lending practices.

To stimulate lending activity again, Snowe’s act aims to make Small Business Administration’s loaning processes more efficient. Among other actions, she wants to offer training programs for new lenders, temporarily reduce lending fees by $510 million, and increase the maximum financing that can be secured through one loan – from $2 million to $3 million, according to a press release.

And, with the credit crunch in mind, Snowe also wants to allow borrowers to refinance their 7(a) loans if more favorable terms from another lender are available. Lately, as the Wall Street Journal reported last month, banks and lenders have not been able to re-sell Small Business Administration loans, as their costs have been rising too high to appeal to buyers.

“During these challenging economic times, it is imperative that the SBA … is part of every conversation President-elect Obama has about restoring confidence in the economy,” she said in a statement.

Economists also noted as another indicator yesterday’s recorded 2.8 percent decline in wholesale prices – the biggest decline measured since over the past year.

While consumer prices are still 3.7 percent higher than they were in October 2007, experts still fear that overall business in the nation will suffer, as consumers actively seek lower prices in goods and services. As About.com writer Darrell Zahorsky wrote , deflation is “great news for holiday shoppers … but bad news for business profits in price dropping sectors.”

This year’s shoppers are already accustomed to seeing red-line prices, from even the biggest retailers. Many are waiting till the holidays draw closer for even greater discounts, which could amount to even smaller profit margins for retailers and a spiraling economic downturn.

During a deflation, any inclination toward borrowing and lending also dissipates. Consumers and business may even suffer from debt deflation – when its cost is driven up by falling interest rates and drying-up credit.

“Consumers [sic] recent reluctance to spend and borrow coupled with the banks ever tightening credit regulations are exacerbating the problem,” wrote Zachary Oxman, Wisdom Financial broker, in Seeking Alpha .

A Bloomberg News survey forecasted a 0.8 percent decline in consumer prices. Today, the news source recognizes a push from international leaders for an increase in government spending, as they observe a loss in customer spending power and a global economic downturn.

Meanwhile, The New York Times has observed increasing scrutiny of President-elect Barack Obama and his plans to stimulate the economy. For $5 billion, Obama proposes to expand the Small Business Administration’s Disaster Loan Program, by increasing the guarantee rate of private loans, in addition to temporarily eliminating fees for borrowers and lenders.

Here are a few tools that the site offers that will help you analyze where your business currently stands in terms of being prepared to start a business as well as whether you are qualified for the 8(a) Business Development Program .

These tools have only been available for 3 months now and already the SBA says over 125,000 people have used them. Hopefully you will find them helpful as well!