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econsultancy_xml

Social lending is steadily gaining popularity as an alternative to traditional methods - Zopa is already well established in the UK, and <a href="/blog/945-zopa-takes-12-4m-for-us-expansion">recently raised money to expand into the US.</a> On <a href="http://www.zopa.com/ZopaWeb/">Zopa </a>and other social lending sites, lenders are asked how much they are prepared to lend, whom they want to lend to, the period and loan rates etc. Borrowers then go to the site and choose from the range of loans on offer. The risk for borrowers is reduced by the fact that loans over a certain amount are spread across several lenders, and loan applicants are credit checked. According to <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/05/22/cmzopa21.xml">The Telegraph</a>, Zopa has 150,000 members, one third of which are lenders. A survey carried out last year by the <a href="/blog/561-internet-social-lending-may-threaten-banks">Social Futures Observatory</a> studied Zopa users and general banking customers, finding that 74% of would consider using an online social lending service for loans, rather than a high street bank, while many were unhappy with high street loan rates.

<FormattedContent xmlns="http://www.e-consultancy.com/schema/formattedContent/"> <Paragraph>Social lending is steadily gaining popularity as an alternative to traditional methods - Zopa is already well established in the UK, and <Link URL="/blog/945-zopa-takes-12-4m-for-us-expansion" Window="New">recently raised money to expand into the US.</Link></Paragraph> <Paragraph>On <Link URL="http://www.zopa.com/ZopaWeb/" Window="New">Zopa </Link>and other social lending sites, lenders are asked how much they are prepared to lend, whom they want to lend to, the period and loan rates etc. Borrowers then go to the site and choose from the range of loans on offer. </Paragraph> <Paragraph>The risk for borrowers is reduced by the fact that loans over a certain amount are spread across several lenders, and loan applicants are credit checked. </Paragraph> <Paragraph>According to <Link URL="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/05/22/cmzopa21.xml" Window="New">The Telegraph</Link>, Zopa has 150,000 members, one third of which are lenders. </Paragraph> <Paragraph>A survey carried out last year by the <Link URL="/blog/561-internet-social-lending-may-threaten-banks" Window="New">Social Futures Observatory</Link> studied Zopa users and general banking customers, finding that 74% of would consider using an online social lending service for loans, rather than a high street bank, while many were unhappy with high street loan rates. </Paragraph> </FormattedContent>

2007-06-21T08:25:00+01:00

econsultancy_xml

Lending Club, a P2P lending community on Facebook, seems to have found some early popularity among the social network's users. <a href="http://blog.lendingclub.com/">Lending Club</a> launched when <a href="/blog/1256-facebook-welcomes-third-party-developers">Facebook opened up to widgets</a> on May 24th. Since then it has approved 27 loans worth over $100,000, with $212,650 in lending due to go through in the next 12 days, according to <a href="http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/06/20/lending-club-passes-100000-mark-in-loans-to-facebook-users/">TechCrunch</a>.

<FormattedContent xmlns="http://www.e-consultancy.com/schema/formattedContent/"> <Paragraph> <Emphasis>Lending Club, a P2P lending community on Facebook, seems to have found some early popularity among the social network's users.</Emphasis> </Paragraph> <Paragraph> <Link URL="http://blog.lendingclub.com/" Window="New">Lending Club</Link> launched when <Link URL="/blog/1256-facebook-welcomes-third-party-developers" Window="New">Facebook opened up to widgets</Link> on May 24th. Since then it has approved 27 loans worth over $100,000, with $212,650 in lending due to go through in the next 12 days, according to <Link URL="http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/06/20/lending-club-passes-100000-mark-in-loans-to-facebook-users/" Window="New">TechCrunch</Link>. </Paragraph> </FormattedContent>

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For background on online PR and social media more generally, It's worth reading our (free to registered users) <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/online-pr-and-social-media-trends-briefing">Social Media Trends Briefing</a> (June 2009). Econsultancy has also published <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/social-media-and-online-pr-digital-marketing-template-files">Social Media and Online PR Template Files</a>, which you can adapt and use for your own projects. For innovation in this space, download our <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/innovation-report">Innovation Report</a>.

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Social lending finds success on Facebook false

2007-06-21T15:41:00+01:00

social-lending-finds-success-on-facebook

2009-04-30T05:18:04+01:00

2009-10-13T09:08:40+01:00

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