Questions funders ask before the first order

What do funders ask before the first order?

These 13 questions are answered in full on this page rather than behind a click.

Where do PayPerMerchant's MCA leads come from?

PayPerMerchant generates every merchant cash advance lead through its own advertising. We run the ads with our own money, on TikTok, Facebook, Google, Reddit and more. The ads are already running, so a new buyer is plugged into a system that is already live. Business owners apply for capital on BusinessLoan.io, a marketplace for business loan products that PayPerMerchant is the company behind, and on our other funding brands. Nothing is purchased from a list broker, scraped from a UCC filing, bought from an aggregator, or acquired from another vendor upstream. That matters for two reasons a funder can check. First, a merchant who filled out our form knows they asked about capital, and knows the brand they asked on, so the first dial is not a cold call to someone who never opted in. Second, because there is nobody upstream, there is nobody else holding a copy of the record to sell later. We own every step from the ad to the lead, which is what makes the exclusivity claim something we can enforce rather than promise.

What has to be true before a merchant becomes a PayPerMerchant lead?

Every PayPerMerchant lead is qualified before the record is released. Every submission clears 7 minimum criteria: monthly revenue of $20K+, 1 year+ in business, no prior defaults (not even settled ones), a business bank account, looking to get started within 2 weeks max, a verified phone and a verified email. A merchant who does not qualify never becomes a lead, so nothing is invoiced. A merchant who does qualify becomes a 15-field record rather than a name and a phone number, delivered live instead of dialled cold. Buyers who work these leads reorder at 80% across PayPerMerchant's book of business, which is the number that actually reflects what clears the process, not a page's own description of it.

How much does an exclusive MCA lead cost in 2026?

A PayPerMerchant lead costs $60. That is flat at every volume, so a funder ordering 10 and a funder ordering 500 pay the same figure per lead. There is no setup fee, no monthly platform fee, no per-seat charge and no ad budget on the buyer's side, because the advertising spend sits with us. The reason the price is published at all is that almost nothing in this category is. Most MCA lead vendors quote on a call, which makes the buyer's job of comparing two vendors nearly impossible and is a large part of why funders in this market get burned. A published number is also checkable, which is the point: a funder can hold $60 against whatever they are paying now and against what it costs them to run their own ads, without booking a call to find out.

Does PayPerMerchant sell business loan or SBA leads?

No. PayPerMerchant sells merchant cash advance leads only. Not leads for business loans, not SBA, not equipment finance, not lines of credit. PayPerMerchant is the company behind BusinessLoan.io, a marketplace for business loan products. Business owners apply for capital there and on our other funding brands. What PayPerMerchant sells from those applications is merchant cash advance leads, nothing else. The specialisation is the product rather than a limitation on it: every lead is qualified against a standard built for merchant cash advance specifically, not a generic standard that happens to also fit an SBA file or an equipment lease. A shop buying for a term loan product should buy from somebody who qualifies merchants for that product, because a lead qualified against one set of facts and dialled for another is a wasted call at both ends. It also answers the question funders ask second, which is what else we sell. Nothing else.

Are PayPerMerchant leads exclusive, or sold to more than one funder?

Every PayPerMerchant lead goes to exactly one buyer. One merchant, one buyer, one time. The record is never shared with a second funder, and never resold later as aged data at a lower price, which is the part most exclusivity claims quietly leave open. The match is the proof. The second a merchant applies, they're matched to you on what you want, like industry or language, and they see your company's name on their screen. Their screen says your company, and only yours. That's how you know nobody else got the lead, and when you call, they know who you are. The delivery log shows the single buyer every lead went to. If a funder wants exclusivity written into the agreement rather than stated on a page, that is a reasonable thing to ask for and we will put it in writing.

What if nobody picks up?

Every merchant states the window they will pick up in, 1 to 8 hours, and sees your company name before you call.

How fast does a lead reach my CRM?

PayPerMerchant delivers live. The second the merchant submits, the record is in your CRM by API, or by email, SMS or Google Sheets, any or all. There is no nightly CSV to import, no portal you have to check and no daily batch. Speed is the point rather than a feature: a merchant who has just asked about capital is comparing options in the same session, and the funder who calls first is talking to someone whose problem is still in front of them. Every hour a record waits is an hour a competitor spends. The trigger is the submission itself: every lead lands the second the merchant submits, verified, consented and logged to the second. It also arrives where the work already happens, entering the same routing, the same dial list and the same reporting as everything else in the CRM.

Is PayPerMerchant a lender or a funder?

No. PayPerMerchant is a lead generation company. It is not a lender, not a funder, not a broker and not an ISO, and it does not originate, underwrite or fund financing. It sells merchant cash advance applications to established business brokerages which have a sales process. The distinction matters more than it looks, because the word merchant collides with merchant services and payment processing, and a funder who assumes we compete with them for the deal would reasonably not buy from us. We never take a position in a deal, never earn a share of an advance, and never make a credit decision. The only thing we are paid for is the lead itself. That alignment is worth stating plainly: because our revenue comes from selling one record to one buyer rather than from the size of any advance, we have no reason to push a merchant toward a bigger deal than they asked for, and no reason to care which funder ends up writing it.

Who is PayPerMerchant for, and who is it not for?

PayPerMerchant works with established business brokerages which have a sales process. We cater to companies already buying leads and selling to cold traffic. 30K+ leads delivered, 50+ funders served, and an 80% reorder rate. It is a fit for a shop that already has a dialer and a CRM, and that is currently buying merchant cash advance leads from someone else or generating its own. It is not a fit for a shop buying business loan, SBA or equipment finance leads, because we sell merchant cash advance leads and nothing else. It is not a fit for a merchant looking for capital: we do not lend, and a business owner who has landed here should go to a funder directly. And it is not a fit for a shop with no capacity to call, because a lead nobody dials is a lead nobody should have bought. Being specific about the misfit is deliberate. A vendor who tells every shop it is a fit will sell to someone with no capacity to work the records, and both sides lose.

What is actually in an MCA lead from PayPerMerchant?

A PayPerMerchant lead carries all 15 fields: monthly revenue, time in business, prior defaults, business bank account, how soon they want to get started, verified phone, verified email, funding amount needed, industry, credit score, exact monthly sales, the window they will pick up a call in, first and last name, business name, and proof of consent to calls and texts. Every one of those is a real answer the owner gave, not a blank the buyer has to chase on the first call. Every submission clears 7 minimum criteria and carries 8 more fields, and a merchant who does not qualify never becomes a billable lead at all. About 30% of leads also opt in to complete the full application on the spot. When they finish it, it lands on the same lead, at no extra charge: signed, with the SSN, EIN and bank statements, shown in your client portal. Not every lead has one. Every field above ships for the same $60, flat at every volume.

How does PayPerMerchant verify a lead's phone and email?

Every lead goes through a verification system before it reaches you. Phone and email are both checked before the lead is released: PayPerMerchant checks each phone number against a live API to confirm it is a real, reachable mobile, not a mistyped or disconnected one. No code is sent and none is typed, so the merchant never sees a verification step at all, and the whole check runs in the background between submission and delivery. What this does not do is prove the owner picks up on your first call. A validated number is a format and carrier check, not a promise that a human answers, and saying otherwise would be the easiest claim on this page to make and the hardest to keep. PayPerMerchant has delivered more than 30,000 of these records to date, every one carrying a number that cleared this check before release.

What does PayPerMerchant do with a merchant's data after the lead is sold?

PayPerMerchant sells each merchant record to exactly one funder and does not sell it again. The record is not shared with a second buyer at any point, not offered later as aged data, and not sold into a list. Under California law, selling a lead is a sale of personal information, which is why this site carries a privacy policy and a do not sell page rather than boilerplate, and why a merchant can ask us to delete or stop selling their information. Lead generation is one of the few businesses where the privacy page is a working document rather than a formality, and treating it as one is a reasonable thing for a funder to check before buying. A vendor that cannot say clearly what happens to a record after it is sold is a vendor whose exclusivity claim has nothing behind it, because the two questions are the same question asked from different ends.

How does a funder start with PayPerMerchant?

Start with a 30 minute call. Sign, pay, and you are live the same day. There is no setup time, no setup fee, no lock-in, no ad accounts and no websites on your side. The ads are already running; we just plug you into the system. The call sets the delivery destination and confirms the buy box: where the records should land, which states and deal sizes a shop wants, and what it will and will not work, so the first records that arrive are already filtered rather than a generic sample. Our minimum package is $3,000, which is 50 leads. Leads arrive 1 to 3 a day. The first 50 usually take about 4 weeks. Reorder any amount, any time. Pause any time. One short agreement, no lock-in, and nothing in it that ties a shop to a second order.