Small businesses are overwhelmingly optimistic about their future growth, according to the latest Small Business Cash Flow Trend Report from OnDeck, the leading small business lending company at Enova and Ocrolus, the document AI and cash flow analytics platform for lenders.
Key findings include:
- Optimism and Growth. A large majority of small businesses remain optimistic about business growth opportunities over the next 12 months.
- Payments: The use of alternative and digital payment methods continues to grow, as 60.8% of businesses reported accepting alternative payment methods, up from 54.5% in Q1. This movement indicates an increasing level of interest from customers for more flexible and convenient payment options.
- Alternative Financing: Small businesses are becoming less reliant on traditional banks for capital – nearly 75% of small businesses reported bypassing a traditional bank loan and instead sought out alternative lenders as their primary funding option.
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“Small businesses remain confident in their near-term and future growth prospects as inflation cools,” said Cory Kampfer, Co-President of Small Business Lending at OnDeck. “It’s also very clear from our survey data that small businesses are increasingly turning to digital solutions to secure lending and facilitate payments, suggesting small business owners are becoming less reliant on traditional financial services.”
“As more small businesses seek out alternative financing, real-time cash flow data is integral to enable lenders to expand their deployment of capital to a broader set of small business borrowers across industries,” said David Snitkof, SVP of Growth at Ocrolus.
Key demographic findings include:
- 50% of accommodation and food services small businesses shared that they plan to hire/increase their headcount over the next six months, representing a higher percentage than any other industry represented in the survey.
- Retail-based small businesses appeared to be the most consistent in accepting alternative payments, as only 16% of retail small business respondents shared that they didn’t accept alternative payments, the lowest among all industry groups.
The Q2 2024 report is based on quarterly survey responses from 413 small businesses with working capital loans from OnDeck and cash flow data from over 2.3 million small business applications, and provides deeper insights into the health of small businesses across all regions.
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