Business Grant Writing Tips

  by Mike Avis

The notion that millions of free money grant funds are just waiting to be claimed by the anyone wanting to start a small business is partly true and partly false.

Grant funds, in most instances are not intended for new businesses. While start up money are given to a few specialized businesses, 99.9 percent of most people wanting to start a small business are ineligible to obtain start-up support.

Millions of dollars however are obtainable to help support small existing businesses. To obtain grant funding, a lot of careful research is needed in order to find the right organization - the one with the kind of program which closely matches your business’ mission and objectives.
Here are some guidelines in writing your business grant proposal:

1. Follow the instructions given to you never write more words or pages than allowed. Supply all supporting documents, forms and cover sheets requested.

2. Include lots of reference letters in your proposal - the more, the better it looks. Make your proposal interesting so that it stands out from among the hundreds of proposals the grant agency receives everyday.

3. Include all the required data asked for and answer each question completely and clearly.

4. Charts, statistics and graphics will help support your proposal by allowing the granter to easily visualize your expenses, objectives and goals.

5. Explain your business concept clearly, using simple words. You may understand the concept of your business, but the individual reading your business proposal may not. Try to explain your concept write in a way that everybody understands. Have two individuals who have no idea about your business read your proposal and ask them what to explain the concept to you. If they can not do it, then most probably, the person in the grant organization will not understand your concept either.

6. Don't just estimate funding needs and costs for your business proposal rather. Take ample time instead to research and assess the actual costs. Find out how much exactly is the price of the computer that you will be needing for your business and write down the exact amount.

7. Grantors do not just offer grants. There should always be a mission behind each grant awarded. Make certain that clearly lay out your objectives and your goals. Instead of saying "I need this grant to help my community" which will not give you any credibility, say it this way "I need this grant so that I can buy 3 new computers and open part-time positions to help high school students where jobs for them are hard to find".

8. Your grant proposal should be in the correct style and must contain correct spelling and correct grammar.

5. Write in a way that each piece of data you include clearly demonstrates what will be done with the money, what your objectives are and how you aim to accomplish those objectives.

6. Arrange your grant proposal in keeping with the way the application guidelines arrange questions and topics. If the application itemizes sections then use those exact information when writing the titles of your sections so that the reader easily finds the information that they need.

7. Proofread

You are not alone if you think that writing a business grant proposal is very difficult. The fact is, researching grant programs that closely matches to your needs will take days and sometimes, weeks, like in the case of my Aunt Jenna. Frustrated, she came to me for help and that was when I realized that instead of searching a needle in the haystack, she should get help.

Lucky for her, we found unclesamsmoney.com that provided here with links that connected her to all funding sources enabling her to access thousands of government grant programs providing assistance for home buying and ownership, home repair, small businesses, home improvement, land purchase, site preparation for housing, health, assistance and services for the unemployed, job training, federal employment, education, and much, much more.

Moreover, unclesamsmoney.com helped her write her grant proposal with their interactive software tool that took her through every step of the grant writing process.

With the help of unclesamsmoney.com, she her cut-flower farm is now bigger, doing better and employs fifty workers!