The Twenty Percent

1. Interview with an business owner:
• Who do they think their target customers are?
• "I think that they are everybody.  We don't have a specific target in range because we are a painting company.  With that we typically specialize in painting for businesses or major companies."
• Where do they find their customers?
• "Everywhere.  Most of the time it is through recommendations, but it can also be from bidding lists from contractors or even Angie's List."
• What are their customer's demographics?
• "Typically they are people in their 20's to 40's.  But since most of the time we deal with major companies, we don't typically know the exact age."
• What kinds of media do their customers consume?
• "I do not really know.  Based on their age group I would say the common social media apps and television and internet."
2. Interview with three "target customers":

3.  Reflection:

• I found that the entrepreneur I interviewed does accurately understand the customer.  With the typical people he deals with (companies) it was difficult to talk to them about their issues, so I just targeted people within that age group that he told me about.  I was not able to find any differences between what the entrepreneur thought and what the target customers thought.  I think that the entrepreneur I interviewed did a great job at marketing his service to the correct audience and accurately satisfies their needs.

Week 8 Reading Reflection

I found this weeks reading to be very enlightening.  What surprised me the most was how almost twenty five percent of all small ventures start with less than $500.  I'm just amazed that companies are even able to start with that little.  One thing that I found confusing was raising capital through private placements.  I think its because of the different rules that apply to it and how you have to follow them.  I agreed with everything the author said.  Overall, I thought this was a good chapter to read for this week.

Some questions I have for the author:

• In your opinion, what is the best method for raising capital for your company to start up?
• I think this could help future entrepreneurs with the best way to raise capital so that they can start their business successfully.
• How much capital do you think would be needed for your average company to successfully start up?
• I think this could be useful for future entrepreneurs to get a ballpark range of how much capital they need to successfully start up.

Half-way Reflection

1. Some of the behaviors that I have used to keep up with the requirements of this class are being able to reflect on my assignments, take as well as give constructive criticism, and being timely in doing my assignments.
2. One time when I thought about giving up was with my Chemistry 1 class freshman year.  I was not doing well in it and I was just not enjoying the class.  I was able to pull through by spending even more time studying and preparing as well as getting help from tutors and by the end of the semester I was able to pass it with a good grade.  I do feel like I have developed a tenacious attitude during these past two months.  I think just learning what it takes to be an entrepreneur and doing the assignments for this class have helped me develop the tenacious attitude.
3. Three tips I have for next semester's students regarding tenacity are:
1. Keep up to date with your assignments and look at the calendar on Canvas because that's where you can find all the assignments.
2. Don't get discouraged if you get constructive criticism.  It's meant to help you and allow you to learn from and do better next time.
3. Try to take time to reflect on your assignments rather than just going straight into them.  It might be helpful to think about it for a little and you might think of something that you might not have if you didn't take the time out.

Free Money

For this assignment, I am going to walk around my apartment complex and talk to people that are there.  I will approach whoever I see there.  I will say something along the lines of "Hey you look like you could use a dollar".  I plan on just saying my opening line, hopefully handing them the dollar, and then seeing what their response is.  Out of five attempts I expect to get three out of five people to take the dollar.

I found this assignment to be pretty easy.  After having to do three rounds of interviews with random people in the previous weeks, I did not find this to be difficult to do.  Giving the dollar away was not too difficult.  I was able to give it away to four of the five people I went up to.  Some assumptions I made about the people I planned on talking to were that they would be weirded out when I walked up to them to give them free money.  This was not a wrong assumption.  People were definitely a little caught off guard when I walked up to them.  Other than that I did not make any other assumptions and kept an open mind about the people I would go up to.  In all , I found this assignment to be a good assignment that did help me practice deliver customer value as well as convey a compelling vision.

Week 7 Reading Reflection

I found this weeks reading to be interesting. What surprised me the most when reading this article was how much information goes into to have market segmentation work effectively for your business. I have been learning about this in my marketing class I am currently taking, but I thought it was cool how they provided examples of how it is used for various companies. Something I found confusing was how you could better reach your target market, yet have no gain in profits. I guess that notion just confuses me when I try to think about it.  I agreed with everything the author said. I thought this was a good article to read for this week.

Some questions I have for the author are:

• What do you think is the best way to get information when deciding how to segment your market?
• I think this could be very useful for business starting up and could help them reach the audience they want for their product.
• How would you go about segmenting your market if you were an entrepreneur creating a tech product?
• I think this could be very helpful, because most companies that start up nowadays are tech companies and they might want people's perspectives on how to market tech products.

Elevator Pitch No. 2

The feedback I received was overwhelmingly positive.  What stood out to me was that the people that gave the feedback thought that my idea would be great and would love to see it implemented.  With that, I didn't find any of the feedback to be wrong because it was so positive.  Something that I thought was important in the feedback that I received was the support I received from those that watched the video and commented on the blog post.  It was a great to see that people were so enthusiastic over my opportunity!

I did not change anything with this elevator pitch.  With the overwhelming support I received with the last one, I felt that nothing needed to be changed.  With that, I hope this elevator pitch blog post continues to receive the same positive feedback that I received with the last one.

Interviewing Customers No. 3

This time around I asked people to read my opportunity on a note card and give me their opinion on it.  I again asked random people for their responses.  I asked them only one question, which was "What is your reaction?"  Here is what they said:

I learned that people like my idea and would like to see it implemented.  Nothing surprised me during these interviews.  The responses that I have gotten throughout these three weeks have been largely positive.  The only thing I expect to change as an outcome is to further refine the idea and work on the specifics of how this could be implemented.  With that I am looking forward to moving forward with this opportunity and seeing it grow.

Week 6 Reading Reflection

I found this weeks reading to be very interesting.  The most surprising thing in this article was his discussion on how competition plays a part on business.  I thought he did a great job with breaking it down and proving that there is much more to it than just businesses competing against each other.  Something that I found confusing was how even when companies merge, they can lose money.  I would have thought that they would only increase profits due to their combined work.  Overall, I thought the article was pretty straightforward and engaging.  I agreed with everything the author said.  I thought this was a good article to read for this week!

Some questions I have for the author are:

• Do you think there could more than just those five competitive forces that you mentioned in your article?
• I think this could open up the discussion on whether these are the only five competitive forces or if there are more that we have just not identified yet.
• Which of the five competitive forces is the most important as well as which one is the least important?
• This is important information that could greatly help a business in figuring out its strategy to compete with other businesses.

Idea Napkin No. 1

1. I feel that I am an outgoing person that likes to take the initiative on things.  I like taking leadership roles as well as being there to see things transform from just an idea all the way to actual implementation.  I aspire one day to eventually run my own firm and be there to ensure that it operates as intended.  If I were to start a business from my opportunity I would think that it would take up a major part in my life.  I think this because it would be essentially my "baby" and I would want to see it grow from just an idea I had for a class into something that people everywhere could use and appreciate.
2. I would be offering a way for customers to use a cab service for an amount of times, whether that be unlimited or a set number, by having them prepay in monthly or yearly increments.
3. The demographic I would specifically target would be the 18 to 30 range of young adults.  This group is known to be the most common users of cab services, especially when they are on college campuses.
4. This service would allow for them to prepay in monthly or yearly increments for the service.  When compared to if the customer were to just pay per ride, they would be saving a lot of money with my service because of the bulk purchase in the increments specified above.
5. This would set me apart from the rest because I would be the only company offering this service to customers.  This would allow for me to be the sole company in this area of the economy.

I feel that these elements fit together really well.  They all connect to each other to cohesively create a service that has not been seen before.  This would allow for great profits for the company and greater customer happiness.  I feel that if I were to continue with this idea and see it all the way through to implementation, I would be amazed at how fantastic it would turn out as well as make a positive impact on the economy and society as a whole.

Interviewing Customers No. 2

After last weeks interviews with random students, I found the general opinion to be of people in favor of my opportunity.  With that, this week I interviewed another five people with more specific questions to my opportunity for entrepreneurship.  I changed my questions to cover the areas needed if my opportunity was going to become a reality.  With that, here are the new set of questions:

1. How many rides do you think the average person should use to receive value from this service?
2. Do you think there should be multiple levels of this service?
3. How quickly do you expect them to be there to pick you up with this paid subscription service?
4. Would you like it to be linked to other cab services, such as Uber or Lyft?

Here are the students responses:

Now that I have ten interviews under my belt I can say that I feel very confident with my opportunity.  At first I thought this would just be some simple idea, but now I feel that it is something that could generate great feedback and usage.  With how many people like to use taxi services, it seems like a great venture to explore!  Some tips I have for interviewing customers are:

• Be happy when asking the questions about your opportunity!  It makes things awkward if you cant even be excited about your opportunity.
• Be confident asking the questions about your opportunity!  Make sure you know the stuff you're talking about otherwise there's no point in doing these interviews.
• Be and active listener when asking the questions about your opportunity!  Take note of what people say.  They just might have a response that you had not thought of or did not expect.

Week 5 Reading Reflection

I found this weeks reading to be very interesting.  Something that stood out to me in this chapter was how they discussed the common ways entrepreneurial ventures can fail.  I found this to be cool, because it showed that these aren't only problems that happen to one person, but rather happen to many.  One thing that confused me in this chapter wasn't anything with the material covered.  Instead, it was the length of the chapter.  I feel that the author made the chapter longer than it should have been.  I felt as though I'd already things multiple times during the chapter and I think this can make it confusing since it doesn't move on to other ideas.  Other than that, I thought the chapter was pretty straightforward.  Lastly, I agreed with everything the author said.  Altogether, I thought this was a good chapter to read for this week!

Some questions I have for the author are:

• Do you think that there are other common reasons why new ventures can fail?
• I think that there could be other common reasons, and I would like the authors opinion on this.
• Have you ever experienced firsthand one of the common reasons why new ventures fail?
• I think this question would be good because it could show other people that everyone fails at times.

Elevator Pitch No. 1

While many people use these forms of transportation, especially on college campuses, there is a problem with them. Many times people unknowingly use these services so frequently that at the end of the month their credit card bill is insane. This is something that affects us all. We need a new way to provide cab rides from one place to another at a cost that is affordable for all.  My solution to this problem is to create a monthly or yearly subscription service to these modes of transportation. This would allow for the company, Matt's Cab Package, to collect a prepayment for a certain time period and in exchange offer the buyer access to the transportation free of charge as part of the service. This could allow discounts to happen because of bulk time period purchases that would save the buyer money as well as help the company collect payment ahead of time.