Post about "Loans"

Credit Crisis – SBA Commercial Loans

Business owners that need a commercial mortgage should be thinking of government sponsored programs first, as they remain the most reliable programs out there. Borrowers may not like some of the features, but bottom line, if they need a new commercial real estate loan this maybe their only option, besides commercial hard money.Why do the SBA loan programs have a sour reputation? First of all, some of it is warranted and a lot of it is not. The SBA does have some outstanding features and many commercial borrowers would have never gotten a shot at commercial real estate ownership without the benefit of the SBA. A huge example of this is 90% financing… Conventional source go to 75%. That 15% difference can be a big chunk of capital for a small business. Another is the ability to use projections and or work with borrowers that have little cash flow – most conventional sources just say no to these commercial loan requests.One of the biggest complaints that is for the most part avoidable is the length of time to close and coupled with the amount of documentation needed. In essence the complaint boils down to that the process is just too cumbersome.However, much of this “brain damage” can be avoided by sticking with PLP lenders – i.e. preferred SBA lenders. The important point here is that PLP lender only has to have their deals underwritten once. Non PLP lenders, have to underwrite their files themselves, than the SBA gets their hands on the file and underwrites it a second time. As you can imagine, this second underwriting puts another month or longer onto the file. This is exactly where those horror stories come from of closings that take 6 months come from.The other main complaint is the expense to close. For example on the famous SBA 7a program the SBA (NOT THE BANK) charges a “guarantee fee”, i.e. points on the front of the loan that they add into the loan balance. The fee is 2.75% of 75% of the loan balance. As a comparison most conventional banks only charge 1%. There are only a few ways to avoid this. For example we work with a bank that pays this SBA fee themselves, but 99% of the time the borrower has to swallow this fee.Due to the credit crisis, the SBA is definitely the most reliable loan program out there for owner occupied loans. If you are in need of financing give this option some serous research.

Brainstorming The Ideas for Influencing Your Mobile App Audience

Once the app is downloaded, you have little time to take a sigh of relief, and then again start focusing on making things easier for the them till their goal is achieved.

According to the AppsFlyer, an app marketing company, the global uninstall rate for apps after 30 days is 28%. Entertainment apps are most frequently deleted, whereas apps based on Finance is least frequently deleted. No matter which app category you belong to, your strategy should be to remain in the mobile phones of users for a long time, and not just sit around but to fulfill your purpose as well.

If we analyze the encounters of users with an app step by step, it can help us unveil the critical factors that influence mobile app audiences, so that we can work upon those and achieve our purpose. Here are the details:

Step1. Finding Your App in Appstore

For this, we have to first find out what exactly users type to search an app. Based on a research, it has been found that 47% app users on iOS confirmed that they found the app through the App Store’s search engine and 53% app users on Android confirmed the same.

What have been their search queries? Interestingly, as the per the data provided by the TUNE research, 86% of the top 100 keywords were brands.With little scope for non-branded categories, most of the keywords were either of games of utility apps. Common keywords in the non branded category are: games, free games, VPN, calculator, music, photo editor, and weather.

Leaving brands aside, if we analyze the user-type of a Non-branded category, we will get two types of users:

1. Users are informed, and they know what they are search

2. Users are exploring possibilities, have no precise information in mind.

If you are a mobile app development company, targeting non-branded users, then your efforts must be directed to creating apps that compel these two types of users. To do so, we have to analyze once they are on an app store, what keywords they use to search. Regina Leuwer, with expertise in marketing & communications, bring some light to the subject. She reached out Sebastian Knopp, creator of app store search intelligence tool appkeywords, who shared with her the data of unique trending search phrases. And according to that data, in 2017, there were around 2,455 unique search phrases trending in the US.

Now, if we study these data to get information, we will find that name of the app is critical to attract the attention of the users.

If your app belongs to non-branded category, then make sure your app name is similar to the common search queries but also unique in comparison with your competitors. So that when your app name is flashed, they click it on to it, finding it purposeful and compelling both.

Step 2. Installation

Remember your users are on mobile devices has limited resources, from battery to storage and RAM to Internet. Everything is limited. So better create an application that is easy to download or say get downloaded with 5 minutes. One critical advice here:

1. Keep the application file size small.

If you are a developer, use APK Analyser to find out which part of the application is consuming maximum space. You can also reduce classes.dex file and res folder that contains images, raw files, and XML.

Step 3. Onboarding

After the user has successfully downloaded your mobile application, don’t leave anything on assumptions. Guide them properly. This you can do through an onboarding process, where users can learn the key functionality and where to begin with the mobile app. Below are the 3 things you need to keep in your mind when creating an onboarding process for your users.

Short and Crisp: The entire guidance of features and functions should be completed within few seconds, with easy options loud and clear option to skip.

Precise Information: Don’t introduce them to the app. They already know what they have downloaded. The objective to inform about the key functions and features.

Allow Users to Skip: Let the tech-savvy users skip the intro. Your app is to meet their requirement and not to have a friendly session.

Step 4. Purpose and UI
Here, the stage is set for your app and it is the golden chance for you to impress your users. What is needed here is the collaboration between purpose and UI of the app. It totally depends on the problem-solving capability and ease of use of the mobile app. Interface design plays the critical role, allowing the users to access features of the apps easily and quickly to perform the task for what they have downloaded the app. When it comes to interface design, make sure that the design is interactive and task-oriented. Here are some factors that you must take care off while creating mobile app interface:

1. Usability: The Mobile phone is an epitome of convenience and if your users find it difficult to use your app, then there is no way there are going to make the space for it in their mobile phones. From screen size to the color of the app, there are many factors that are equally critical and need attention.

2. Intuitive: To create an intuitive User Interface, you have to read the mind of the users, and develop a model based on that. The next should be precise, clear and ‘obvious’ in an interface.

3. Availability: Key features should be hidden in the drop down menu or even if so, it should be obvious for the user to look into the drop-down. An intricate work of design and research is required to make essential features available for the customers and they don’t need to navigate here and there.

If you need more help with the user-interface and innovative ideas for a mobile app, write to me [email protected] and I promise to get back to you with interesting mobile app designs.