Final Reflection Week 15

There has been a lot of ups and downs for me when it came to how I felt about this class throughout the semester. There were the assignments that I loved to do and then there was the ones that I could not stand to do. But now that I look back I understand the importance of every single one that was asked of me in the class. The most formative assignment that sticks out to me would be the secret sauce assignment. it made me think and share with other people what makes me different then the rest of the population. The most joyous experience was when I did the Speech because I always have been very outgoing until someone puts a camera in my face and tells me to speak for the class or to an audience. I realized after these assignments that it is not that hard and people do not judge you while doing these assignments. The experience that I am most proud of myself for accomplishing is the interviews with another entrepreneur. At first it is intimidating asking someone their life story and how they made it successful. I often thought that people would get uptight and not answer questions fully but everyone proved my wrong and was relaxed and did it perfectly!

Honestly I never thought that there was that much work into becoming an entrepreneur, But after the time span of this class I realized that I am an entrepreneur and that I have succeeded. It is not about what I own or how much money I have that makes me an entrepreneur, It is what I have to offer and what I think of myself and what I do for myself and others that does. I think that I have came a far way closer to the mindset of one than what I was at before taking this class or even the beginning. One recommendation I would give future students that want to go down this path is that do not take this class or this lifestyle for granted. Do not think that this will be a walk in the ballpark because this class has taken a lot of time and hard work and dedication to finish with good grades. What I would recommend for future students or fellow people to do to get to this mindset is to open up. Put your guard down and let new things in, new ideas that you never thought would work. Having an open mind is very powerful and could work into everyone's favor. Until next time,

Your entrepreneur, Keith

Week 15 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? What was surprising to me was that micro financing is a thing. Every Time I have ever taken a finance class it was strictly the broad detail of it. Yes we got into detail But I did not know that there was actually a thing called Micro Financing. 

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. There was not part of the reading that was confusing to me everything in the reading was very clear and straightforward. 

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why? What did you do to understand and realize the importance to these chapters. What did you do to understand the charts throughout the book?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How? I believe there was nothing wrong with or anything that I disagree on with the author. everything was very well put out and explained in this weeks readings. 

Venture Concept No. 2 Week 15

My business idea is that there is major opportunity involved when it comes to what is going to be available and who will be using my services around major universities. When it comes to the transportation for major universities and colleges bus services just can not get the job done when it comes to time and the drop off locations. The student body is who has the need and are the potential customers with my product. The nature of the need is that bus services only have specific pickup and drop offs. Having such pick ups and drop offs can be extremely annoying and hard to work around with a busy schedule.  With my service there will be an app and or website that every student will have a find me button and we will be there in no time and it will put your location on and we will pick you up from your car in the parking lot and take you to the door of your needed destination.

 The changes in the environment is that the streets keep getting more and more clustered and with my services we will not have to wait for the lights on the crowded streets we can use the sidewalks or even designated drive throughs. My customers are satisfying this need because there will always be a huge student body for me to work with. To me this opportunity is massive because it offers me the right age group of clients and a never ending supply of them and for me to give a good service at a fair price. The window of this opportunity will always be open as long as there is a student body at these universities. My product offers students that refuse to wait for buses or refuse to walk to their designated room for school an easier opportunity to get there faster. For just a dollar per student that can be paid with tuition and then, the school will pay me. eventually we will have licences to have golf carts around the campus to make it easier on not just my drivers but the students. No one will have to wait in the line at traffic lights as long as we have sidewalks or even bike passing lanes.

Easily money will pile on and on from the more students decide to pick this service. My innovation will address the opportunity that I identified by making sure that students get the best price and the best time of arrival to their classes. I believe the customers would and will switch to my product because I offer such an easier alternative than the bus system and way more pickup and drop off spots. I feel once I get around twenty students to switch and they like it, word of mouth, word of mouth is huge in any business and that is how mostly companies get spread and customers. The only competitors are the school bus services or city bus system. Their weaknesses are that they are never on time and do not have enough pick up and drop off areas.  It can get crowded extremely easily. Customer experience is extremely important when it comes to my service because when they have a good time it will make it easier for me to connect to better business. At colleges word of mouth is the best way to market any product. Price points play a huge role in my business, because of the rate I charge, it is impossible to beat my price and not stick with my product. The business location is seriously important because if it was not with schools it would not survive because then these people can just drive themselves.

I would start with a small staff and work my way up the ladder with staff too much staff in the beginning can potentially hurt me and my business financially. The roles that are played in this venture is getting students on time to their classes and satisfying everyone that has to do with this company. My most important resource would be the amount of transporters I can gather. The more transportation systems I have the more people I can carry around. The next opportunity I want to tackle will be moving to all major universities and become a transportation system they offer from the school and they just pay me per semester to keep their students happy. In the next five years I want to be somewhere living on the coast just being the owner of the company and let everyone else run it and keep my eye on the profits and the CEO's of the company. In a decade I could see myself investing or opening up different business and trying to do the exact same thing all over again. This venture would help me with my future ones because I started from scratch. I had nothing and worked this business idea from nothing and made it a successful business and I would have the money and courage to start another one from scratch.  I would end up selling my business eventually and start a new franchise or buy into some franchises that I know would make me more profit than others.

I had some pretty positive feedback when making my venture concept one. One of the students asked if it was like an uber service and that she believed that my business idea would actually work because when she lived in Gainsville of campus and had to drive it was nearly impossible. I had feedback from others saying that the idea was interesting and that it was well thought out. One of the students that gave me feedback agreed and even had first hand experience on how unreliable the school buses or city buses really are. I had all positive feedback throughout the whole semester and on the venture concept number one it did not stop. I rarely had any negative feedback because other students understand how hard it is to start a business out of nowhere and there will be kinks in the idea. I only had one student tell me that the price is way off and that I am not charging enough per student to make enough money. I took that into consideration and tried to refine my business but my way at first is the only acceptable way to go with pricing. 

Elevator Pitch No. 4 Week 15

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuRjOdf4NoM&feature=youtu.be


The past few elevator pitches have gone pretty smooth for me and everyone had only positive things to say about it. I really enjoyed reading the comments from my last pitch because it goes to show how much growth I have made in this class since the first one. I really enjoyed doing these after the first one. I still have yet to have any negative comments. The only one that I got that still sticks with me is that someone thought my financial plan was not going to make me enough money. But a dollar a semester per 30,000 students is 30,000 a semester and there is three semesters including summer so that is 90,000 a year just starting out.

Week 14 Reading reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? This part of the reading was not surprising to me but I enjoyed it. That was about failure. I even said in a blog a week ago that failure always happens when trying to create something. If you do not fail a few times then I do not think you are trying hard enough. Failure is common when being an entrepreneur it's getting back up and coming back stronger that is important. 

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. With me it seems chapter after chapter the charts get the most confusing for me. I believe it is because I am a hands on kind of person. And seeing a chart all the way completed does not work for me. 

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why? First question would be have you failed and came back stronger before? And do you believe all of these charts are extremely necessary. 

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How? I do not believe the author was wrong about anything in this week's reading. I just need a better overview of all charts it seems like. 

Google Gold Week 14

1) A discussion of your general approach and strategy to search engine optimization (SEO). What were some of the activities you did for each blog post to pursue SEO? What I learned was just going on Bing and google and figuring out what keywords brought up certain business and companies. Some of the activities I did for the blog posts was make sure I have the keywords so when someone types it in I can potentially be up there.

2) What were your keywords. How did you select those keywords? Did you change or refine your keywords through the semester? Some of my keywords I used were ; Entrepreneur, Business owner, University of Florida. I did not change any of my keywords because it seemed to work through out the semester. 

3) How did you use social media to enhance your SEO efforts? What your your surprises or general impression of using social media to improve your blog's profile? Was social media generally receptive of your blog, or did it get ignored? I used Facebook a lot because previously with my business I started up with my brother we used facebook ads and paid five dollars a week and got over 50 likes a week and it continuously grew and grew. I already had a great understanding of what social media does when trying to make something shine so I was not very surprised. Instagram was probably the worst. Most people do not respond from Instagram. but facebook and twitter worked relatively well.

4) What was your most "viral" post? In other words, which post obtained the most traffic? Why do you think? My viral post is the 20 percent one. I had over 20 comments and I actually had a lot of views from people that did not go to the school or from this class.

5) Finally, did you make it to the first page of Google results for your keywords? If not, what page of results did you make it to? I did not make it to the first page of google from keywords. Honestly it is extremely hard to make it to the top three on google usually the top three spots are people that paid to show up top three from key words. I did show up on top five from bing though. 

Very Short Interview Part 2 Week 14

1) From where I stand now I look back on the first interview I had with my entrepreneur and I believe it was still pretty good. I could have gotten into depth a little bit more but for the most part the questions that got answered did get me the information I needed to keep. Because most of my questions had to do with what I was suppose to expect in this class and I had no idea at the time so the interview gave me kind of a heads up.

2)  My interviewee is Whitney Spence, Owning her own dance studio.

• How long did it take you to really understand how to run your business as your own boss? To be honest keith I still am learning new things each and everyday. When you own your own company it is a never ending learning process. Being an entrepreneur is fun but also takes a lot of hard work and dedication. 
• Did you use certain charts or graphs to run your business? I never really got into the whole chart thing until about five years into my business. At first I believed I did not need it because I could do all of that on my own or in my head. Once business started to grow It got harder and harder to do so. So I had to grab excel and learn how to use graphs and charts to maintain a successful business. 
• Do you ever think you would sell your business down the road for a huge number or keep it for over 10 years and potentially pass it down? I have had this business for over 14 years and all three of my daughters dance at my studio. So I believe the answer to your question is that I am going to keep the studio until my kids are old enough to want to make that choice weather to keep it going and take after me or break off and do their own thing. So until then I will keep it. 

3) I realize from looking at my first interview and this one I can see how much more elaborate I am with my questions and how much more I understand about becoming an entrepreneur. I really had no idea what I was getting myself into when I signed up for this class. I did not know how hard or how easy or how much or little work I was going to have. But after all of this time and all of the hours I have put into this class I do believe that it will help me in the near future when it comes to me running yet another one of my businesses. Whitney did believe that I have come a long way because she realized that I had a lot more knowledge about owning my own business or company than I did months ago. 

Week 13 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? What stood out the most to be is the amount of analyzing a business has to do when they are trying to do a simple check list.

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. Nothing was very confusing to me in this chapter the author did a great job describing in detail the readings and the explanations on why.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why? First question would be is having a checklist that in depth very valuable? Secondly, are charts that important as whole to running a successful business?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How? I do not believe the author was wrong about anything in this week's reading.

Celebrating Failure Week 13

1) Tell us about a time this past semester that you failed -- whether in this class, or outside of this class. Don't spare any details! It'd be even better if there was something you tried several times this semester, and failed each time. Something I failed every time this semester would have to be studying for test before the day of them. No matter the class or the occasion I never feel the drive to sit down buckle down and do my studying for the test. I always feel that it will be fine to take the test without studying. I failed every single time to sit there and study without becoming sidetracked. Before my Buisiness law exams I continued to wait till the day before and the day off to start going over 200 question problems. 

2) Tell us what you learned from it. What I learned from it is that studying for these big exams are important because this is not high school and I can potentially hurt my GPA or fail the class just because I am being lazy and do not want to study. I learned If I did it earlier I would not have to stress the test as much.

3) Reflect, in general, on what you think about failure. Failure is hard, isn't it? It's embarrassing, sure, but it also means that we have to change something about ourselves. Talk about how you handle failure (emotionally, behaviorally). Finally, talk about how this class has changed your perspective on failure -- are you more likely to take a risk now than you were four months ago? I handle failure pretty easily. My whole life never has been easy for me. I went to therapy for my writing and reading and every person I ever worked with said I would never be over a 7th grade reading lexile, Now I am here at UF trying to get into law school! I have always taken failure as a challenge. If I can not do it not now does not mean I can not do it in the future. This class has changed my perspective on failure because this class taught me that when starting something it is ok to fail at first. Some of the most successful
 businesses fail the first few times and get right back up and finish strong.

My Exit Strategy Week 13

1) I believe within the next five years depending on how the market was for my business I would end up selling my business for a large return if the price was right. I would end up investing a large amount of it into certain chains and open up other business from scratch and try to become successful through those as well.

2) Another reason why is because my company can turn really fast as well. There are people out there that can also be thinking of the next big thing for transportation. Years to come there can be bigger and better things so I feel it would be safest to say to get out and make a profit while I can't.

3) I wouldn't say it influenced my decision making or other decisions I have made because I would only sell my company if the price was right. Everything that I did or made a decision about I did for the long run. I would sell my business for the right price and at the right time. Sometimes you can sell your company and still keep a certain percentage. It has influenced my growth intentions because the bigger my company is the more money I could get or even keep.

Whats Next Week 12

After finding the radically different market from what I currently I went out and found three people to interview on the questions below.

1. What should we be doing that we are not planning to do?
2. What about my ideas of what customers might want next that I do not already have?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIm546dlXTk&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8Xm_PggFQs&feature=youtu.be

*sorry the other video will not load so I will right the Q&A of the last interview.

1. I believe you should get into even more ways to get people around not just in a bus or a trolley. But a variety of things so people can pick and choose.

2. I think what your customers might want next would be security from you and your company that will benefit them in every way to their next destination.

What I learned about this new market is that the majority of people would like to have a set and stone date and time to get to places and not just a general number. And most of the interviewees said it was a great idea and they can see it working but they said to invest into more ways to get around such as trolleys, buses, golf carts to get around faster. What surprised me most was that they said most people want exact times and dates for all of their transportation. What surprised me the most was that all three of the interviews were fairly similar when I asked the questions. Most of them described the services being on time and having more service for the customers. I would have to say that none of my assumptions or predictions were correct. I thought that no matter the market I was in that everyone would like the new service just the way it was. I did not expect for these people to want just precise times for every destination. I guess when it comes to me not just doing major universities that the majority of people want time and dates for everything. I would say that this new market is not as attractive as my existing market. The reason being is because it would be more complicated for me to charge and people become very precise with everything. I am not saying I do not want my business to be precise but no transportation system can be on time all of the time.

Week 12 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? What stood out the most to me would have to be the whole big deal about strategic planning and business growth. I know they were important but not as important as the author makes them in the readings.

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. The one part of the reading that was most difficult for me was the charts. Especially the matrix model chart.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why? The first question would be is having a set and stone strategic plan always the best bet for a starting business? And secondly have you ever met someone that became successful from just hard work and time that did not plan everything out?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How? I do not believe anything the author said in the readings that was wrong. Just more explanation on the matrix chart.

Venture Concept No. 1 Week 12

With my business idea there is major opportunity involved when it comes to what is going to be available and who will be using my services. When it comes to the transportation for major universities and colleges bus services just do not cut it. The student body is who has the need and are the potential customers. The nature of the need is that bus services only have specific pick up and drop offs. With my service there will be an app and it will put your location on and we will pick you up from your car in the parking lot and take you to the door of your needed destination. The changes in the environment is that the streets keep getting more and more cluttered and with my services we will not have to wait for the lights on the crowded streets we can use the sidewalks or even designated drive through. My customers are satisfying this need because there will always be a huge student body for me to work with and they are extremely loyal to the bus system or walking because driving to school is just not an option. To me this opportunity is massive because it offers me the right age group of clients and a never ending supply of them and for me to give a good service at a fair price. The window of this opportunity will always be open as long as there is a student body at these universities. My product offers students that refuse to wait for buses or refuse to walk to their designated room for school an easier opportunity to get there faster. For just a dollar per student that can be paid with tuition and then the school will pay me there will be multiple 6 person golf carts that will pick up students from the parking lot and take them to the exact building within their designated time frame. Easily money will pile on and on from the more students decide to pick this service. My innovation will address the opportunity that I identified by making sure that students get the best price and the best time of arrival to their classes. I believe the customers would switch to my product because I offer such an easier alternative that the bus system and more pick up and drop off spots. I feel once I get around twenty students to switch and they like it, word of mouth would pick up and become a high demand for the student body. The only competitors are the school bus services or city bus system. Their weaknesses are that they are never on time and do not have enough pick up and drop off areas. And it can get crowded extremely easily. Customer experience is extremely important when it comes to my service because when they have a good time it will make it easier for me to connect to better business. At colleges word of mouth is the best way to market any product. Price points play a huge role because of the rate I charge it is impossible to beat my price and not stick with my product. The business location is seriously important because if it was not with schools it would not survive because then people can just drive themselves. I would hire employees as the time goes because the bigger the company grows the more people I will need. The roles that are played in this venture is getting students on time to their classes and satisfying everyone that has to do with this company. My most important resource would be the amount of transporters I can gather. The more transportation systems I have the more people I can carry around. The next opportunity I want to tackle will be moving to all major universities and become a transportation system they offer from the school and they just pay me per semester to keep their students happy. In the next five years I want to be somewhere living on the coast just being the owner of the company and let everyone else run it and keep my eye on the profits and the CEO's of the company. In a decade I could see myself investing or opening up different business and trying to do the exact same thing all over again. This venture would help me with my future ones because I started from scratch. I had nothing and worked this business idea from nothing and made it a successful business and I would have the money and courage to start another one from scratch.  

Week 11 Reading Reflection

1.What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? The biggest surprise for me in the readings was that failure was at such a high percentage when running a company and that technological advances can play such a big help in success in the business.

2.Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. Nothing really confused me in this weeks readings. Everything was well thought out by the author and explained in detail.

3.If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why? My first question is failure that high when starting a company? Out of 10 start up companies how many fail? Another one is can tech advances also hurt a company?

4. Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?There was nothing the author was wrong about at all. I really enjoyed this week's reading and hope the next ones are like this one well planned and an easy read.

Amazon Whisperer Week 11

• Describe the revenue drivers you currently include in your business concept for this class.  The different ways I make money is through selling custom made gun holsters, kydex wallets, and custom mag holders. I also make revenue off personal buyers and companies that want to buy in bulk. 
• Describe what kind of product offering you believe should be next? The next big thing that I would like to start selling is gear for outdoor users such as hunting and fishing. Things as long sleeve sun protective shirts, backpacks, glasses, and hats. 
• Describe how the "next" thing will enhance your existing product/service offering. Does it improve the user experience, does it increase customer switching costs. The next thing will make my sales sky rocket and change the customers experience not only because they are getting custom holsters they now will be getting discounted prices after a sale on gear for whatever the occasion. It will also bring me new customers because it is marketing my own brand when someone uses it or wears it. 
• Go to Amazon and try to find a product that is similar to the one you want to offer next. Describe the product. Include a picture of the product. The products are simple but yet effective when it comes to people wanting to buy additional items on top of the holsters or wallets especially for a discounted price. The shirt was on Amazon for 12.00-15.00 dollars with prime. The pouch was $15.98 on Amazon.
  

• What are the customer's reviews for the product? what exactly do customers not like about the product? What do they like about it? The tactical pouch has an average 4.5 out 5 star rating on Amazon. The pouch contains little things such as the flashlight and a tool. Almost every customer enjoyed the pouch once arrived and loved that it came with a flashlight they all thought it was handy. The few dislikes I got from this product was that it was smaller than they thought it was going to be and disliked it for the size.
• Describe what design/usability changes you'd make to the product. I would change the shirt to have my company logo or name on the back and the front would have a different desings per shirt. As for the tactical pouch I would make some with digital camo or some with just plain colors because not everyone likes camo. And I would make it cheaper once someone bought a product from me. Also if the amount total is over $60 a customer can pick from a free shirt or a free tactical pouch.
• Describe why you think this product would make a good addition to your current product.service offering. I think this product would be a good addition to my product business line because it gives people the incentive to spend over 60 dollars for free sports wear or gear. I know personally I would try to get my bill that high for something free just for getting something I needed for my gun. 

My Unfair Advantage Week 11

1. My team 

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• inimitable- no, very hard to copy what my team is like
• Non-Substitutable- no

2. Location

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- no
• Inimitable- yes
• Non-Substitutable- yes

3. Marketing

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no 
• Non-Substitutable- no

4. Experience

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no 
• Non-Substitutable- no

5. Creativity

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no
• Non-Substitutable- no 

6. Time management 

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- no
• Inimitable- yes
• Non-Substitutable- No

7. Care for customers

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no 
• Non-Substitutable- no

8. Leadership

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no
• Non-Substitutable- no

9. Social awareness

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- yes
• Inimitable- no 
• Non-Substitutable- yes

 10. Competitive attitude 

• Valuable- yes
• Rare- no
• Inimitable- no
• Non-Substitutable- yes

My top resource is leadership. It is more important to my venture than all of the other resources because every part of my team has to have some leadership to make the company stay at large. When everyone takes leadership it makes everyone kind of like a boss and respect one another. Taking initiative when it comes to my product brings leadership to the table. That is why leadership is the most important. 

Growing My social Capital Week 10

1) One person must be a domain expert in your industry. Justin Murray is someone that owns an exact same kind of business that I do custom gun holsters. His brand is called JM Custom Kydex. What this man has done for us is show us what it is like to own a company in this kind of business world. My brother and I first contacted him to see if he would could help us out with any questions regarding how to make and start up a business in this kind of work. Including this person in my network will help me because he has been doing this for over 10 years and has experience.

2) One person must be an expert on your market. Kyle Strack, is the person that I am picking for an expert in my social capital. Kyle has a background in firearms and does conceal carry classes around the Pinellas County area. He targets the market that my services need because he takes people to gun stores and shows them the right type of holster to better fit their needs. I found this person when I took my own concealed carry class and then from there starting to contact him about my own company and what my needs were. What favor he has done for me and the company is give me the right information on how to hit the market full force around our area and get things moving with the company.

3) One person must be an important supplier to your industry. Noah Brunk. Noah is our important supplier when it comes to moving the product to different stores and gun shows. His background is an online salesman for all sorts of products. I got ahold of him through email and asked him what it would cost or how could we do some trades to get him to get us on the market or for him to sell our product to other organizations. The favor he did for us is give us more clientele, and all I had to do was make him a few free gun holsters. Including this person will help my network because of the connections this person has over the internet.

Finally: Reflect. This experience will help me shape any future networking events because it shows me what kind of market there is for something like this. I should have asked some specific questions and asked how successful their companies are and how long it took for them to start up and get along. But this experience was helpful and was exactly what I thought it was going to be.

Week 10 Reading Reflection

1. What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? I would say nothing really took me by surprise when it came to this chapter because it had to do with finances and I was always good when it came to financing because of the two college classes I had to take and really really enjoyed them. What I think was cool was that it got into what liabilities entrepreneurs have when it comes to finances.  

2. Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you? Like I said in question one nothing was confusing me or difficult for me to understand. I actually enjoyed reviewing and re addressing key aspects when it comes to finances. 

3. If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? What I would ask is, as a business owner knowing all of this about finances is it that important? when knowing you can hire someone for? and for the second question do spread sheets come in handy more often than not? 

4. Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? No the author was spot on with this chapter. Great information and insight on financing and liabilities. 

Elevator Pitch No. 3 Week 10

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKWBTaShStQ&feature=youtu.be


After reflecting on the feedback I got from the last two elevator pitches I realized to just go with the flow and not try and right everything down and go from the heart and nail it. What I have changed in this pitch is that I did not really know exactly what I was going to say but one thing came after the next and it all segwayed pretty nicely. I did not have any silly comments on my last two posts just informative answers from my peers helping me or saying I did a good job.

My Secret Sauce Week #9

1) Describe five ways in which you can think you have human capital that is truly unique. 

• When it comes to emotions I usually stay extremely calm during hectic situations and can stay relaxed during stressful situations.
• I have a better understanding for situations than most because a lot of times people tend to break down and shut off instead of fix the issue. 
• I have a skill set that I think differs from others such as my listening skills and remembering all the important details.
• My abilities to understand others and what they need or want or to keep them happy is what I live for. All of my friends and family know that I always try to make everyone happy without hurting myself.
• I have a wide range of knowledge because I did not grow up a single child I am actually the youngest and always had my brother and three sisters teaching me things about life or the real world from such a young age. I believe I grasp it better than most. 

2) Interview the five people who know you the best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn6469_sz_E&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gx63DZnEVf0&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfqGkKc47lw&feature=youtu.be

3) Reflect on the differences.

How I see myself are pretty similar as to what my friends and family see me as. Of course there is a slight difference compared to what I think of myself to what other think of me because no one judges YOU harder than YOU. Some people might not always see the traits that you really have. Everyone has different perspectives. But the people that know me best know my true self and we have similar aspects on how they see me. I think my interviewees are correct about me, I would never argue with their answers because they know me the best from anyone. I do not think I would make any corrections. I still believe that is how I differ from others human capital. 

Week 9 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? I would say that how much social media is used for marketing within a business. When I ran my own business I used Facebook almost everyday and continued to get business. I liked how the author went into depth about how important it is to use social media for business because it is true.

2)  Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you? I would not say that it was confusing to me but I was alittle bit skeptical about the secondary data being as important as it is. I never used old data over and over again when running my business's. I now see how important it is.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? I would have to ask the author about how much money do you think social media brings in for businesses because of social media marketing? And also is secondary data that important to use that it will change the marketing aspect of the business that much?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? No there was nothing that I thought the author was wrong about. The author explained everything extensively through the readings.

Idea Napkin NO. 2 Week #9

1) You- I am Keith Adam, I have a few talents that are key to my success so far. Some of them are keeping people happy, staying organized at all times, and becoming a kickboxing world champion. My aspirations are to become a sports agent and get through law school. I see this business concept playing a role in my life because parking is always a big role in everyone everyday life.

2) What are you offering to customers? What I am offering to customers is a new way to get around campus easier and more convenient than the bus services. Bus services only goes to select locations which can be inconvenient to most. My business will have way more pick up and drop offs from where you park. No more walking to the bus stops we will pick you up and deliver you right to the class doors with virtually no wait.

3) Who are you offering it to? I am offering this service to college students around the country and will make it easier for them to park from a distance and still get to class on a faster scale than the bus system. What all my customers have in common is parking. When your on campus and you either can not walk or do not feel like it you can get this service for such a cheap rate you can practically not say no.

4) Why do they care? Customers will pay me money because most customers at major universities are sick of either being late or being cramped in a bus to just get dropped off somewhere close to their destination. With my services you will always be on time and never have to wait longer than 5 minutes for the transportation to show up. The service will bring you right to the front of the class which means minimal walking and waiting.

5) What are your core Competencies? What sets me apart from everyone else is the rate that is being offered. Just a dollar from the students on their tuition will give them a semester pass to ride in my transportation services. What I have that nobody else has is the time and direction and drop off zones that no bus service will be able to have.

These five elements fit together for my business concept because they are key to the success of the business. Some points that I have taken away from the feed back is that I have to be more specific when it comes to the services that I will be offering. Some of the feedback said that I would not be able to stay in business because a dollar is not enough to survive. But what people do not realize is that a dollar per student that may need it not necessarily going to use it everyday I still get paid. Think about the amount of people that go to major universities and tell me a dollar per person per semester would not be enough. I incorporated the feedback by being more specific about what I will offer and what will be given.

The Twenty Percent Week #8

1) Find a business owner and talk to them about their customers. The business owner that I found was Michael Thibodeau. Mike thought his 20 percent would have been retired vets and police officers. Mike owns a gun holster company that makes custom gun holster from scratch to order. Who is real 20 percent was the average population. Almost all of his sales are from people that just like to conceal carry for safety. After realizing who his 20 percent is now he knows how to reach out and make that continue and grow. He does this by marketing on the web such as facebook, instagram, twitter, and his official website. The customer's unmet need is having a great quality gun holster that is also comfortable and affordable. The type of media the customers consume is the facebook page Brothers In Arms. The name of Mike's company. He does not only post his product but current events that are relationable with what he has to offer and sell.

2) Next go and talk to 3 "target customers" -- using the demographics/psychographics the entrepreneur described.

3) Reflect. To my understanding the Entrepreneur does adequately understand their customer's problem. He has worked countless hours doing research asking people for feedback and what their day to day problem is with their gun holsters before buying his product. There are a few differences because not every customer is going to be the same. One of the customers I asked was what about a gun holster is an issue for you. His response was that it gets to be too expensive for something that is a must have if you want to carry.

* the entrepreneur did not want to be recorded. Countless hours of me walking around and trying to find the target customers. Almost everyone I had asked either did not carry or did not have any guns for them to carry. I found one customer to interview. Her name is Ashley Dridi. She agreed upon being voice recorded but she did not want to be videotaped and her image to be shown because of her job.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMhhoMFsB9A&feature=youtu.be