The loan niche would be a tough nut to crack. Since PPC is out for now (which I would recommend getting started in for this niche asap, check out this book too: Ultimate Guide To Adwords) I would recommend article marketing to start. Not only will this help out with SEO (backlinks), but if you've got good content, people will repost it, and thus more and more traffic. Article marketing is a slow tactic though. Since PPC is out, as was said by someone else, you're just gonna have to slough it through and push the hard way. P.S. Craig's List and the like might be a good place to try in the Financial sections, make the posts non-spammy though, lots of that in there.