BarterItOnline.com today announced the launch of an equity trade feature in its e-marketplace that brings businesses and entrepreneurs together to barter products, services, and skills. What cash-strapped startups typically do have is potential of great earnings at some future date; at the same time, however, there is an immediate need for resources—professional skills and services, office products, hardware, and the like—that can most painlessly be paid for, in the form of stock, based on the future value of a company.

"Barter has always been used by business as an efficient way of increasing sales and decreasing cash expenditures," said Richard L. Cravatts, CEO and Founder of BarterItOnline.com.

"And now doing business in the New Economy has itself opened up new opportunities for strategic bartering," said Cravatts. "Dot com startups can effectively use barter to minimize cash outlays for web site development, marketing and public relations expertise, advertising, banner and other new media services, as well as legal, financial, and other personnel costs–all of which are normally paid for with expensive, borrowed cash in the early years of a business."

"In fact," Cravatts said, "the very nature of launching an Internet business, with its rapid and steep upfront marketing costs for acquiring visitors, means that barter is an especially necessary tool for dot com startups. BarterItOnline.com is convinced that by enabling startups to trade part of their equity and future earnings for what normally would be current cash outlays, we offer great flexibility to entrepreneurs, as well as a comfort level for the venture capital community who find so much of its early-stage investment being consumed by expensive marketing and advertising costs."

BarterItOnline facilitates trading between businesses and professionals by creating a virtual currency, 'E-dollars,' which members use to buy and sell at the site. The great benefit of using a common currency, of course, is that, unlike the case with online 'swap' sites, it offers great flexibility to users by enabling them to trade fluidly with any member of the BarterItOnline community. Purchases and sales are recorded by the site, which receives a cash transaction fee from the buyer at the time of the purchase.

BarterItOnline takes the unique step of creating a user-friendly business 'portal,' with tools and resources for doing business more effectively–in this case, however, all the tools are related to strengthening one’s business through barter.

"In a time when a whole new industry is being creating online, it seemed logical that options for bartering be applied to the New Economy," said Cravatts. "For that reason we’ve included some innovative services on BarterItOnline.com to help businesses ramp up quickly, competitively, and in a way that conserves the sometimes limited infusions of venture capital."

The Barter Talent feature makes a broad range of professional expertise–web designers, copywriters, business plan consultants, lawyers, accountants– available on trade to entrepreneurs launching their new enterprises or businesses expanding their activities.

The Barter RFP feature enables users to broadcast to a whole universe of sellers a specific project need they have that they would like to fulfill by bartering. Sellers can respond anonymously and choose to enter the transaction on a barter basis just once, as opposed to registering permanently on a barter site.

The Barter Rewards program enables companies to trade surplus or excess product or services for non-cash incentives with which to reward key employees, vendors, and clients.

The Online Learning and Executive Education feature of the site will allow companies to improve the quality of their workforces with a broad range of professional skills and development courses. BarterItOnline members can purchase the courses on barter, either for their personal use or as part of a company-wide benefits program.

The Media Buyer department of the site facilitates the buying and selling of advertising space, including banner ads, portal advertising, and co-branded marketing programs between web sites.