30A – Final Reflection

Final moments in this class is bitter sweet. I’ve had a lot of good moments and a lot of dread on different assignments, Mostly good moments though. A few that I can recall is the first assignment when we had to write about 20 things in our life that annoy us and we can’t change through easy means. It allowed me my first taste at an entrepreneurial mindset. I remeber just walking around the house thinking of things I didn’t like that I could try and make better in my everyday life. It was actually pretty fun. My low I felt like was all the interviews. I really felt like I was pushed to get random people or people I know to help participate in my assignments. Which I understand now as an entreprenuer you need to have people you can throw your ideas with but for me then I felt like it was such an inconvenience for them. 


I think the most formative experience for me was doing all the elevator pitches. I had to do one previously for another class and I remember it being awful. I wasn’t great at it and I was very awkward in front of the camera but after doing it and rehearsing it a thousand times I felt pretty comfortable doing my pitch and even did it in less than 3 takes at one point. I feel pretty proud of that experience and I look forward to giving more now that I feel more comfortable at it. 

When I first heard that I’d develop an entrepreneurial mindset I didn’t believe the proffessor but now as I am nearing the end of the class I do feel like I’ve had a change of thinking. I definitely look for opportunities more than I used to. It amazes me that I have thought up my own ideas into businesses and that through working them them through each process I can see them being successful. I do not think I can call myself an entrepreneur yet. I think there a few things I’ll need to work on as well as actually starting a business before I truly feel like an entrepreneur but I can resolutely say I have gained the mindset.

If I could recommend to students in the future to do well in this course I would say buckle down and get ready to do a ton of work. It isn’t hard work but it requires a good bit of thinking before attacking each assignment. Therefore, take a bit of time each week preferably before the last day you turn in your assignment to prepare and not have to rush to get your assignments. I’ve seen plenty of good assignments and plenty of rushed assignments (I am guilty of the rushed assignments too.)  and taking the proper amount of time to complete makes your blog look a lot cleaner. I also recomend on your blogs to make them look as clean as possible and having your paragraphs spaced out because nobody wants to read huge blocks of text like this assignment.  I enjoyed taking this class and getting to know everybody in my discussion group, good luck to everybody in future classes! 

29A – Venture Concept No. 2

Quick Bite - Venture Concept

My business venture that I would like to jump into would be to answer one of the biggest questions couples and friends might ask each other. That question would be “What should we get to eat?”

Opportunity:
   1. Who has the need?
I think the need is for people that may want to grab something super quick because they are on break at work or for people that are traveling to find out what’s close to them and for the highest quality food.
   2. Nature of the need
  People will always have the need to eat but I think this will help up the competitiveness of restaurants making whoever the fastest and most high quality restaurant more prevalent in the market. This wouldn’t be a need that could be satisfied once and could build a good following with “foodies”  
   3. Forces to create this opportunity
I think a major force in my community is that there are a lot of places that are newly being built. So the options for food is growing rapidly and it’s getting harder to weed out what is good and what is not. Making my app a good place to go to and easily accessible on your phone when you want to see what kind of food is around you. 

   4. How is this market defined geographically and demographically?
I don’t expect this app to blow up with older people I would say my average user would be a college student in a new place with a plethora of options and no idea what to eat. Also, just because technologically younger people are more likely to trend set up and coming apps to see if it is any good. Geographically it would be more for cities and areas with high populations to weed out all the places that are packed and wait times being in the extreme.

   5. What are my consumers alternatives?
Consumers of my app could use the app called “Around me” which is fine! I use it all the time to know what’s available in my area. But, My app offers the alternative of ranking whats around you and making it more personalized to fit your criteria of satisfaction. People I know like me are very loyal to the “Around Me” app because it is provided by Apple.

   6. How big is the opportunity and how long is the window of it?
Technically the window has always been there and it is slowly closing. There are many people who have had the idea of mobile ordering but I don’t think they have ever considered having places rated. This opportunity could be huge due to the sheer mass of people who have smartphones

Innovation:
My Product would be an app that offers full functionality allowing access to see food in genres. By clicking on a genre of food it will go in detail and show you what is offered around you in a 20 mile radius and rate each place in a system that will tell you what is the best place to eat at due to quality of food, cleanliness, how fast the wait time is, and service in general. It will also include reviews along with graphs of their busy hours and price points compared to other places. For it to be fully functional you will have to make an account with our app that is a one time login on your phone. By making an account you will be able to personalize that account by saying what you like food wise and ask you a series of questions that could help us personalize the rankings of restaurants to you. Our app will not be taking money to endorse about certain food places to get it higher rankings. Instead we will be offering our service to members for a $5 monthly fee and for free members of our service we won’t be using personalized services and just give general rankings. All members of this service will be able to place orders online and be able to see rankings around them. Subscribed members will be allowed to use this service to set where they plan to go like for example Atlanta allowing them to plan out what kind of food is in that area along with graphs of wait time and other personalized features. Adding onto this feature through personalization you will have the ability to limit the amount of time on the app through quick actions you can click on when starting the app. 

Venture Concept:
My app would be beneficial for businesses that have high quality goods but are having a hard time getting off the ground. This would allow them a bit of spotlight if they make the rating list. Consumers would potentially buy into this app because of the ability to use one app to do all for their food concerns. Right now people only have access to apps like “around me” that just tell you very general details. It might be hard to get people into this app at first because around me tells you not just about food but this will be the essential app you would need to have as a traveling person or newcomer in town trying to figure what’s good without locals telling you.  Like I have been saying there are competitors but with the growing trend of subscription based content and personalized service this could go into the vulnerabilities of other apps giving only general details and not a fully detailed list of rated restaurants. If I were to organize this as a business I would have a building of 30-40 people that splits into different teams. I would have 4 different roles for the group of employees. customer service branch, marketing, research and development, and a App quality group. Each playing into making sure the app has the most functionality while maintaining high quality standards.

My unfair advantage:
My skills are that I fully understand how to market to consumers and through having a mentor to help with my ideas and by using clever twitter following builders and getting up recognition of the brand I can bring people to the app.

What’s next for me and my venture?
Eventually I want my app to be able to become compatible with major food industries allowing the access to place orders with say pizza places instead of having to go through their own website. That way you don’t have to enter information in a ton of different websites and you can just use your phone to place those orders. This app would help me start of the venture of trying out other ideas. Through subscription based content I can have a steady flow of money that could allow me to try new Ideas with my team and eventually tackle owning my own International foods store that could receive quality goods from all over.

Feedback:
I received wonderful feedback from both my whats next and responses from my original venture concept post. I pushed in more easy accessibility from what others are saying through the use of icons to make locating different categories easier to find and even a mile radius icon so that you can easily have a radius of places to go to in your area. I think accessibility is important and I appreciate that there is the ability to incorporate it into my business.

28A – Your Exit Strategy

Every person should eventually be thinking about their exit strategy in any place in their career or at any job. it's a lot tougher to think of an exit strategy when it is considering your own business. If I were to think of an exit strategy for my food service app I would genuinely think about selling it off when it got a big following.

I decided this because it would kick me off for my next venture with a hefty check and it would allow the employees under me to either join me for my next venture or stay with the company I sold to. I love the idea of having a family bond and staying with something til I retire but I fear I would get bored at some point and want to try something different. Apps are an ever changing thing and sometimes it's better to let other people take over and try something new with your ideas.

This exit strategy actually came up in my prior thoughts for making an app. I thought about how other apps are made like for example a mobile scanning service app that got bought by Snapchat for 54 million. I thought like that thinking about how my app could eventually be bought out by Apple or any big name company and be integrated with their systems like that one app. This definitely could go into the category of how I identified an opportunity because I wondered why something like that wasn't already made. I want this app to grow through Facebook or word of mouth so that eventually I could attract the attention of big competitors.

26A – Celebrating Failure

We all hate failure. Failure can sting, it can damage our pride, failure isn't something many people want to talk about.

Ever since I was a kid I always watched people create content on Youtube. I would say that is my one of my big addictions is to just get lost on Youtube. So one day I decided to try my hand at making Youtube videos when I was younger. It was an ongoing battle for a year where I would make one video and get discouraged because I wouldn't get very many views even if I pushed it out to all my friends and on my social media.

 Here recently during the spring and fall semester I did album reviews on my channel where I wouldn't leave my room all night when an artist that I liked put out an album and I would take notes. I really liked doing that type of content just because of how much I love music and have my own personal opinions about everything. Again throughout the semester I never got any views. It was very discouraging but looking back I got really good at using video editing software and I really enjoyed sitting in the library working on content or just brainstorming and making scripts on what to say in the video. Although I got discouraged and haven't made anything this summer this class has really made me rethink getting back into it just because it's something I love to do and even if I fail I should just keep trying and changing up my formula until I succeed. Failure can really hurt. I spent a lot of sleepless nights just coming up with crazy ideas of how to succeed on Youtube and a lot of nights doubting if I could do it. I think the biggest thing about being an entrepreneur is just trying. You have to put yourself out there on what you want to do because if you don't you might ask the question what if later on in life and I definitely don't want that to be me.

25A – What’s Next?

Existing Market:

What is potentially next in my service is allowing you to be able to set reservations at restaraunts through the use of the rate foods app. This would allow you to see what is at the top of the list and book throug the app.

I interviewed three different people all in my ideal customer market. My first interviewee was a college girl at my work who frequently looks for new places to eat with friends. Second was my neighbor who has said he likes to frequently tries new foods. Lastly was my brother who orders take out on a weekly basis.

Suprisingly, my idea for the ability to set reservations wasn't in high demand. Because all of my interviwees were younger as in just getting out of college or still in high school many of them didn't see when they would use that feature very often with the app. Even though what I assumed was important ended up not being held in high regard, I recieved very awesome feedback instead.

One of the major ideas that someone offered was allowing the abilty to see coupons and potential specialty days of fast food like for example Chickfila's Cow Appreciation days so they know to attend. I like this idea a lot because it can kind of show what's going on in the community and allow you to get free or discounted food depending on the event. This was totally out of what I was thinking about and extermly valuable to me.


New Market:

I decided with my new market to dive into a different demographic. My ideal demographic has always been younger college students looking to experience new foods but now I will be diving more into expanding my usage for married couples and older less active people with technology.

I interviewed two different people. A married mom and my grandma.

After getting through my pitch and my concept of my app I was extremely suprised at their answers. I was feeling purely against my idea of making reservations at restaruants because of lack of support but the married mother was totally into the idea of setting up reservations for a date night with her husband and the access of seeing what kind of fancy highly rated restaraunt was appealing to her because of the usage of the app. My grandma too said she would use the app because of the abilty to travel and see what is around her. She frequently is in new areas and having the ability to order food before getting to where she wants to go makes her fast paced lifestyle much easier.

I was overwhelmed that people I had said where out of my demographic showing interest in my app. Also it shows a lot about making personalization very important with the app because younger people wanted more of the ability to see fast food and cheap places to eat whereas my mom interviewee wanted more of the abilty to plan out date nights with her husband. This suprisingly makes this market more appealing as well. I think there could be a lot to improve on and even though I thought I had lost it with my exisitng market due to them disagreeing with my idea my new market found it to be very useful. Because of what was said in New markets I think it is important to focus on your exisiting market because you want them to stay with you and loyal but also branching out will be a secondary point for the service. 

24A – Venture Concept No. 1 - Quick Bite

Quick Bite - Venture Concept

My new business venture that I would like to get into would be to answer one of the biggest questions couples and friends might ask each other. That question would be “What should we get to eat?”

Opportunity:
   1. Who has the need?
I think the need is very big for people that may want to grab something super quick because they are on break at work or for people that are traveling to find out what’s close to them and for the highest quality food.
   2. Nature of the need
  People will always have the need to eat but I think this will help up the competitiveness of restaurants making whoever the fastest and most high quality restaurant more prevalent in the market. This wouldn’t be a need that could be satisfied once and could build a good following with “foodies” 
   3. Forces to create this opportunity
I think a major force in my community is that there are a lot of places that are newly being built. So the options for food is growing rapidly and it’s getting harder to weed out what is good and what is not. Making my app a good place to go to and easily accessible on your phone when you want to see what kind of food is around you.

   4. How is this market defined geographically and demographically?
I don’t expect this app to blow up with older people I would say my average user would be a college student in a new place with a plethora of options and no idea what to eat. Also, just because technologically younger people are more likely to trend set up and coming apps to see if it is any good. Geographically it would be more for cities and areas with high populations to weed out all the places that are packed and wait times being in the extreme.

   5. What are my consumers alternatives?
Consumers of my app could use the app called “Around me” which is fine! I use it all the time to know what’s available in my area. But, My app offers the alternative of ranking whats around you and making it more personalized to fit your criteria of satisfaction. People I know like me are very loyal to the “Around Me” app because it is provided by Apple.

   6. How big is the opportunity and how long is the window of it?
Technically the window has always been there and it is slowly closing. There are many people who have had the idea of mobile ordering but I don’t think they have ever considered having places rated. This opportunity could be huge due to the sheer mass of people who have smartphones

Innovation:
My Product would be an app that offers full functionality allowing access to see food in genres. By clicking on a genre of food it will go in detail and show you what is offered around you in a 20 mile radius and rate each place in a system that will tell you what is the best place to eat at due to quality of food, cleanliness, how fast the wait time is, and service in general. It will also include reviews along with graphs of their busy hours and price points compared to other places. For it to be fully functional you will have to make an account with our app that is a one time login on your phone. By making an account you will be able to personalize that account by saying what you like food wise and ask you a series of questions that could help us personalize the rankings of restaurants to you. Our app will not be taking money to endorse about certain food places to get it higher rankings. Instead we will be offering our service to members for a $5 monthly fee and for free members of our service we won’t be using personalized services and just give general rankings. All members of this service will be able to place orders online and be able to see rankings around them. Subscribed members will be allowed to use this service to set where they plan to go like for example Atlanta allowing them to plan out what kind of food is in that area along with graphs of wait time and other personalized features.

Venture Concept:
My app would be beneficial for businesses that have high quality goods but are having a hard time getting off the ground. This would allow them a bit of spotlight if they make the rating list. Consumers would potentially buy into this app because of the ability to use one app to do all for their food concerns. Right now people only have access to apps like “around me” that just tell you very general details. It might be hard to get people into this app at first because around me tells you not just about food but this will be the essential app you would need to have as a traveling person or newcomer in town trying to figure what’s good without locals telling you.  Like I have been saying there are competitors but with the growing trend of subscription based content and personalized service this could go into the vulnerabilities of other apps giving only general details and not a fully detailed list of rated restaurants. If I were to organize this as a business I would have a building of 30-40 people that splits into different teams. I would have 4 different roles for the group of employees. customer service branch, marketing, research and development, and a App quality group. Each playing into making sure the app has the most functionality while maintaining high quality standards.


My unfair advantage:
My skills are that I fully understand how to market to consumers and through having a mentor to help with my ideas and by using clever twitter following builders and getting up recognition of the brand I can bring people to the app.

What’s next for me and my venture?
Eventually I want my app to be able to become compatible with major food industries allowing the access to place orders with say pizza places instead of having to go through their own website. That way you don’t have to enter information in a ton of different websites and you can just use your phone to place those orders. This app would help me start of the venture of trying out other ideas. Through subscription based content I can have a steady flow of money that could allow me to try new Ideas with my team and eventually tackle owning my own International foods store that could receive quality goods from all over.

 

23A – Your Venture’s Unfair Advantage

1. I am technologically proficient.

• I gained this skill when I built my first computer when I was 15 and learned photoshop and premiere. I don't think this skill is super rare in this day and age since everyone uses their phones for everything. It's a very valuable resource none the less. Anybody can learn how to become tech savvy if they took classes or used a computer often. 

2. Innovative Website along with Server Maintenance team

• I know Adrian is replaceable but I find his ability to make a website and maintain the servers and problems on the internet side of the company making him very valuable. There are plenty of web designers out there. 

3. Marketing Consultant

•  Janelle Dennis's advice is very valuable to me and the on going processes of starting a business. I think it is very rare to have someone know so much and know how to resolve problems before they become problems like her. I could potentially replace her if I needed to but her advice and ideas are a genuine asset to the growth of the business. 

4. Supply chain for overseas

• Having a supply and person to ship to you is very important. Luckily through my connections with Mrs. Dennis I was able to find Derick. I don't think he is irreplaceable as I could just find someone with better rates eventually. I think it is rare to find someone that could get everything to you. None the less his help is very valuable. 

5. Innovative Ideas

• Personally I find my brain overactive. I think of the stupidest things sometimes but then sometimes it just clicks and I think why hasn't that been made yet. This is something I find rare. Not everyone has a creative mind and I think to be entreprenaurs in this class you have to be able to come up with ideas.  It's valuable to be able to come up with new ways to do something ro improve a service. Not something you are able to copy. 

6. Family enviroment

• What I really want is for people who join in on my business venture to feel at home. To be able to come talk to me about their concerns or if anything is going on. This isn't something I have now but this is something I will push for in my company. Too many companies get lost in the money aspect and forget about their employees. 

7. Excellent communications skills

• Being able to communicate well with others is most certainly valuable. This however is a skill that many people have so I don't see it as extremely rare. Many people can potentially copy this skill.    

8. Financial Capital and Investors

• Finding people to invest into your product is not impossible. It is rare to find people that give fully into your ideas and through well practiced elevator pitches and napkin ideas we could potentially find a handful. It can be easily copied by others but being financially able to run a company is a must. 

9. I am very motivated when I am invested in something

• Motivation isn't something you can fake you have to be all in something or nothing. I am huge about being motivated and for a company I can find that to be a very valuable thing. It is rare for someone to want to work at something even when he should be relaxing. This can be attempted to copy but hard to master. 

10. I have a large network of friends

• I have made a lot of friends in college, everyone I have met has been ultra talented and they themselves have a web of friends. Through their networks and my network there isn't really anyone I couldn't potentially find. This is very valuable but could be copied if someone to have social skills. 

My unfair advantage would definitely have to be my motivation. It truly is valued over all else because even if I fail I can just find the motivation to try something else. Everything that I have listed is very valuable and needed but having the motivation to run a business and push yourself towards success is truly special.