3 Foolproof Tactics To Get You More Government Funding

Government funding, seems impossible to get for your small business, doesn’t it?

Before you apply for government funding, there are a few things you have to understand about it and the misconception behind it. These are the few mistake that the majority of people applying for government funding make before they even start, and fail.

#1. Government funding is not available for everyone

#2. Just because you are a Canadian, doesn’t mean you immediately should get government funding

#3. No government funding isn’t just available for immigrants and aboriginals

#4. Loans are a lot easier to obtain than government grants

#5. It’s not just “one government” that hands out government funding, but multiple across all government levels

With the above five important things to know you are already a little bit smarted when it comes to government funding and getting your small business funded. Since one of the challenges that people have is simply not understanding government funding, by following the idea behind the above five tips, you are one step closer.

In order to actually apply and get funded, we recommend doing it using these 3 foolproof tactics to get more government funding:

Tactic #1: Your Business Plan

This isn’t really a tactic, but something that every single small business owner should be doing. Creating a business plan for their business.

Why?

Well a business plan acts as your guide to your business. It is the blueprint to the success of your entire business and it allows you as a small business owner to use your plan to pitch to potential investors (in this case, the government). Your business plan should answer all of the important and critical details of your business, leaving the potential investor without questions and a decision to provide you with more government funding. 

Your business plan will also analyse all of your financials and allow you to have a better understand of what it is that you need. Meaning, what do you need government funding for, and how much!

Tactic #2: Locate the programs and agencies

The next critical step to getting more government funding is to actually be able to locate the appropriate funding agencies and the government funding programs which you can meet the criteria to and apply for. The government doesn’t potentially hide the funding program details, however due to the fact that these programs are offered by many different levels of the Canadian government (local, provincial and federal), each agency is in charge of their own programs. Which usually means, their own marketing and way of promoting those programs. That’s why you don’t see a list anywhere of all available funding programs (unless you go and use directories of funding programs such as this one).

And it’s simple, the more funding programs you find which may be right for your small business, the greater your chances are of obtaining more government funding. 

Tactic #3: Apply, apply and apply again

The third tactic of getting more government funding is another simple one, but one that is very easy, and in fact one that most people applying for government funding don’t follow.

The tactic is to apply, apply and apply again. No that doesn’t mean send in 3 applications to the same funding program, but it means that you should find more funding programs, for various purposes and apply to them. By simply applying for more, your odds of getting funded and getting more government funding increases.

At the same time, our advice is to apply to only those funding programs that are relevant, and those that you meet the funding criteria. Otherwise you are wasting your time.

Since funding programs are constantly being updated and new programs are being introduced to ensure that the billions of dollars from the Canadian government are handed out to small business owners like you, it’s important to keep checking and re-applying when you are able to do so.