SmartBiz Loans, originally founded in 2009 as BillFloat by Ryan Gilbert and Sean O’Malley. I first met Ryan in 2010 when BillFloat debuted at FinovateFall 2010 and then again in 2011 at FinovateSpring (see demo video above). As the name implied, it focused on helping consumers get quick cash to cover short-term deficits to pay bills on time (i.e., the so-called payday lending space). In 2014, the company changed its name and pivoted to the small business arena with an SBA loan-focused marketplace called SmartBizLoans.com.
Since then, the company has facilitated more than $4B in loans to more than 30,000 companies (source: company website, 5 Nov 2021). That amounts to an average of about $130,000 per loan. In addition, the company assisted 200,000 small businesses obtain PPP loans in 2020 and 2021. It has maintained an excellent 4.6 rating across more than 16,000 reviews at TrustPilot.
Products
Marketplace loan options:
- SBA loans
- Bank commercial loans
- Alt-financing (for those not qualifying for the first two options)
Tools:
- SmartBiz Advisor delivers a Loan Readiness Score to help business owners understand their financing options
Company Vitals
SmartBiz Loans
FAB Score = 133
Rank: #3 on our list of Top 26 SMB Digital Lenders
– HQ: SF
– Founded: 2009 (originally as BillFloat)
– Raised: $37M (Crunchbase)
– Website visits: 140,000 (Sep 2021, SimilarWeb)
– Employees: 144 (Pitchbook)
– Citations: 13 (Crunchbase)
– Linkedin: 5,600 followers
– Twitter: 2,600 followers
– Trustpilot: 4.6 (16,300 reviews)
