Women busines owners need to be extra savy when it comes to financing

Did you know that only 3% of women-owned enterprises manage to top $1 million in annual revenue? I didn't. That's a staggering number, but luckily thanks to some savy business skills and clever financing that statistic will gradually change for the better.

Here's a perfect example. Denise Houseberg, owner of Market Expo, Inc, recently went over the $1 million mark thanks to some financing from OPEN (small business unit of American Express) and some advice from Austin marketing consultant Gay Gaddis.

Why do I bring this up? Because Houseberg is the first winner of the "Make Mine a $Million" program to reach that $1 million dollar goal. The program is the brain child of a nonprofit group called "Count Me In for Women's Economic Independence" (http://www.countmein.org/). It aims to improve on that 3% statistic through advice and financing options.

So if you're a female business owner hurry up and check out the site. If you're not, you still check out the site just to see what's going on out there.

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Is your company profitable? If so, invest your personal funds into it

Lately, my business partner and I have been formulating ways to invest our personal money back into our company.

The reason, investing in our own company is safer and has a higher ROI than most "traditional" investment opportunities out there. If you're company is turning a nice profit and showing steady growth you should do the same.

For now, what we plan to do is essentially loan our own money to the company and earned a fix return (probably 20%) on those loans. That way we can infuse our company with some extra cash and earn an enviable return that you just can't find at your local bank or investment firm.

We have also considered essentially splitting our existing stock (we both own 50% of the company) and selling the extra stock to ourselves at market value. Since we expect the value of our stock to increase over time this scenario seems like a win/win situation for both the company and our personal investment portfolios.

The only problem is that we do not yet know how to go about setting this up properly. If anyone out there has experience with this, or if you think this is a crazy, stupid, or otherwise unfeasible idea please post a comment.

For more small business finance advice make sure to check back often.