Sunday, April 24, 2016

Final Reflection

1. This has been a semester full of assignments in ENT3003. Some taught me quite a bit about Entrepreneurship and some left me a little confused. The assignment that taught me a lot about myself and my idea was the Venture Concept No. 1. I am developing a travel app and have done a lot of research to validate whether or not it's needed. When I posted the concept, everyone's comments blew me away with how much they loved my idea and how it was the best one they've seen all semester. For someone that's spent a lot of time on this project, it made me feel very good.

The assignment where we had to give away 5 one dollar bills left me a little confused. I am still not completely sure what that had to do with being an entrepreneur, but at least I can sleep at night knowing there are 5 college students with my money.

2. My formative experience - speaking with strangers about my idea and validating whether or not it was going to be used by the general public. I was very nervous about sharing my idea and talking to strangers, however, I realized that no one is going to take your idea. If anything, they are excited for you and will help spread the word when it's an actually thing.

3. I definitely see myself moving closer to the entrepreneurial mindset.

4. Stay ahead of your work! There are only 100 points in this course and skipping 5 assignments, which may not seem like a lot can kill any chance of getting the A you want. There was a couple times where I fell behind and it stressed me out quite a bit.

The picture I leave you with is the company I follow most closely - AirBnB. They are continuously innovating and design
minded. I use their business structure to model my own after. If you're searching for an entrepreneur to follow, please check out Brian Chesky, the CEO of AirBnB.


Saturday, April 23, 2016

Week 15 Reading Reflection

Biggest surprise from the reading: Customer loyalty is one of the most useful tools in the growth of a company. I learned that building a customer base and a community around your product is essential.

One part of the reading that was confusing to me: I did not find any part of the reading that was confusing to me.

2 Questions to the author:  
What other companies do you think represent the base of the pyramid you had in the text?
Is a pyramid the best way to 'describe' your thoughts and ideas?

Was there anything I thought the author was wrong about? No, there was nothing I thought the author was wrong about.

Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Elevator Pitch No. 4


Venture Concept No. 2: Tinder For Travel





For anyone new to my idea - I am currently building a travel app named Tripon. The simplest way to describe the app is 'Tinder For Travel'.

The opportunity I recognized was that it's extremely hard fulfilling your travel needs with things you want to do in the most efficient manner possible. I brainstormed and found that no one had tackled the challenge of matching travelers' interests to specific trips that locals create. There are other travel apps on the market that let you search trips or even create your own, however, you are spent aggregating information from several different sites, which takes forever.

My solution - Here I will lay out the steps that a new user would take with my app:1.) Sign in
2.) Select where you're going and when you'll be there
3.) Select a few things you know you want to do or see (optional)
4.) Fill out travel interests

Once you have done these 4 steps, you are then presented trips in a 'tinder' format where you can swipe left to dismiss the trip or right to like it. Once you've found the trip that fits you, press go and it will tell you the most efficient way to get around the city in order to get to your first stop.

From the previous Venture Concept, I learned that my app would be used by a large majority of millennials. From everyone I spoke to and got feed back from, they all said this would be a fun and unique way to be presented with things to do. I haven't changed my concept from when I started because I believe that this is needed and is designed in a way that will make it easy for anyone to use.



The app will be coming to the iOS App Store in the Fall and will be free for users. We will make money by charging businesses to advertise on our app. This is similar to how yelp makes money - businesses advertise by paying money to be put in front of potential paying customers.

The resources I currently have are the skills I possess and the skills of my cofounder, Kolby. The skills I possess are graphic design and business management. I am able to design all of the assets for the app, which is very time consuming. Kolby, is writing the code for the app and is excellent with user experience - he is able to make very challenging steps extremely easy.

Once we launch our app in the fall, we plan to bring on investors if possible and promote our app very well. We will also use any money given to hire on more developers and designers to take the app above and beyond our wildest imagination. We plan to change travel planning for the millennial generation.

In the next 3-5 years, I would still like to be working on this concept. I will take any money I've made from the company and invest it in other startups in the future. I hope to live a very good life and travel constantly, using my app all the time.










Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Very Short Interview, Part 2

After reviewing the conversation I had with Bill, the co-founder of APS Propellors, the answers he gave to my questions aligned pretty well with how I feel now. I asked him what triggered him to start the company, what obstacle did he face and do you think it's becoming increasingly harder to start a company.

He said that he pulled the trigger to start his own company because he realized that he had all the tools to succeed and saw an opportunity that no one else was trying to attack. I felt the very same way when it comes to the travel app I'm building now.

He also said that the biggest obstacles he faced involved cash and purchasing equipment. I am not having these problems right now because of the type of product I'm trying to create. The app I'm building is very low cost because I'm building it "in-house".

Bill said that it was becoming harder to start a company because the world is becoming flooded with ideas and it's hard to start something original. I totally agree with this statement. However, you don't need to innovate, you need to take readily available technology and apply it to new applications.


Second Interview w/ Bill: 

  1. How long did it take you to get your first sale?
    1. "It took us 3.5 months to get our first sale. The sale was to a local plane manufacturer who use to work at McCauley aircrafts."
  2. How long did it take to break-even?
    1. "We broke even around a year in to the business. We had paid off all equipment and were doing very well at that point."
  3. What types of marketing techniques did you use?
    1. "Back in the day, we use to just sell to locals we knew we had a connection with. The industry we were working in was very small and once you knew one person, you practically knew them all."
Throughout this course, I've learned about several different techniques to approach others. These assignments have allowed me to try different types of contact between myself and others and has made me more confident to speak to entrepreneurs - I look at them as just another person now. I don't think Bill noticed much of a change in confidence level because we were speaking over the phone.

Google Gold

In order to gain better SEO, I focused on adding consistency to my blog throughout the semester. Whenever we were assigned the same format of blog posts every week, I would try and include the same style and wording to the post.

The keywords I used included the headlines that were assigned by Professor Pryor. I didn't really go out of my way to add key words in the text itself - most of them were very generic. If I were to do this again, I would try focusing on better use of words in the post itself.

Unfortunately, I did not try and utilize social media to boost my blog. I wish I would have used twitter or Facebook to promote my blog, however, since it was my first time blogging, I wanted to perfect the skill before I try and promote myself in the future.

My most viral post was the one about "My venture concept No. 1". I'm not quite sure why it went so viral but I did have a lot of page views. It might have been due to the use of the word "yelp" in the post - which is one of the biggest review sites in the world.

As far as making it to the top of google for particular keywords I used - I did not succeed. However, if you were to search "flgatorblogging" in google, I would now appear at the top of the list. This is a big step forward from my first blog post, when I wasn't even listed in the first 10 hits.

Week 14 Reading Reflection

What was the biggest surprise from the reading?  I wasn't really surprised by this chapter. Most of it was already discussed by Professor Pryor in lecture.

One part of the reading that was confusing to me:  Corporate entrepreneurship strategy - this is just something I haven't considered before.

2 Questions to the author:

  • Is there a point when the organization should focus on either radical or incremental innovation?
  • Is it really necessary to share the vision of the leaders of the organization to build/create corporate entrepreneurship?

Was there anything the author was wrong about? Along with the rest of the chapters, there was nothing I found that I thought the author was wrong about.

Friday, April 8, 2016

Week 13 Reading Reflection


1. What surprised me the most: The checklist for analyzing a business and how much they had listed on it.
 
2. There was nothing I found confusing about the reading in this chapter.

3. Two Questions to the author: 
What is the biggest pro in the valuation method?
Can you name the benefit of using an LOI and term sheet? 

4. There was nothing I disagreed with the author about.

Celebrating Failure


via GIPHY
The most recent incident that I have encountered failure was during my marketing exam several weeks ago. I had studied for many weeks and thought I was prepared, however, my test score proved otherwise. I had failed myself and my grade.

I learned that the strategy I was using to memorize terms wasn't working as well as I wished it would. I came up with another strategy to memorize vocal terms and it seems to be helping quite a bit.

Failure can be an extremely humbling experience. The best entrepreneurs always discuss how failure makes them stronger and I agree that it does. I believe that every experience we encounter in our lives is just another piece to the puzzle. If we don't encounter certain experiences, we will never finish our goals to live a complete life. This class has helped me recognize failure in a positive way. Instead of continuously being down on yourself, it is best to learn from the situation to do better next time.

Wednesday, April 6, 2016

My Exit Strategy

Tripo's exit strategy is one I have thought about quite often. Several friends of mine always ask, Drew, what are you going to do once this thing takes off? Are you going to sell it to another company or will you stick with it for the long haul? In all honesty, I would sell the company if I were offered a substantial amount of money. There would have to be a contingency plan in place for me to continue building the app, however, I would step down from CEO position.

I have selected this particular exit strategy because of the financial constraints I am currently under and the future of the app if it were to be purchased by a larger company, such as yelp. If I were to sell the company, I would also ask to remain a stakeholder to benefit from the apps growth once it is in the hand of a much larger company.

This exit strategy has definitely influenced my actions for building the app. Originally, we were going to source all of our own reviews, however, now we're using yelps reviews in our app, so one day they can buy us out. Yelp is constantly buying smaller companies to increase their portfolio and I would have no problem being another one.

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Week 12 Reading Reflection

1.) What was the biggest surprise? The amount of time venture ideas take. The process they laid out in the text was extremely long.

2.) Which part was most confusing to me? There was no part of the reading that was confusing to me. Just like the rest of the text, it is very straight forward for me.

3.) 2 Questions to the author:
How can you allocate time to venture ideas, to complete the most work in the shortest amount of time?
What is the most important part to a venture idea?

4.) Was there anything the author was wrong about? No, there was nothing in this chapter I thought the author was wrong about.

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Venture Concept No. 1

Traveling is great when planning and finding unique experiences is extremely easy. However, what happens when it's not easy and you don't find the things you want to do? 

Travelers everyday visit new and familiar cities with one common problem. They generally know one or two things they want to do in this city, however, they don't know the rest. With such little time in most cases, people want to see the most and get the most out of their trip. Locals provide a very distinct advantage over travel services and tourist oriented trips. They know where to go and what to see compared to other services provided. They are familiar with local cuisine and travel options that your typical travel guide wouldn't suggest.

Travel apps & websites such as yelp and trip-advisor offer excellent listings for businesses in every city in the world. They provide a list of the top destinations to see and the restaurants to try according to thousands of reviews. However, what they don't provide is an entire trip from start to finish with the traveler in mind. Yes, maybe that traveler wants to see all of these listings, however, efficiency, budget and time all play very large factors. 

The travel industry is extremely large and continues to grow at a rapid pace. More and more travel apps are being created to help meet these needs, however, no one has solved the problem of finding a trip for someone based on that travelers interests. There are currently apps that provided hundreds of trips, yet you, the traveler, has to go digging through these trips to find the right one for you and who you're traveling with. 

Tripo solves this problem by matching your interests to a trip, created by a local/travel expert that will help you get the most out of your trip. 

App Steps

1. Download Tripo from the Android or Apple Store
2. Sign in with facebook or email
3. Selet the city you would like to travel to
4. Select the dates you'll be traveling
5. Fill in your travel interests - Do you like Nightlife? Art? Music? Nature? Etc.
6. OPTIONAL - Choose a couple of the major destinations in that city that you know you want to see

= A set of trips appears in a user interface similar to Tinder. Each trip is presented as a map with the specific pins  identifying the exact stops along your journey. You can click on each pin to get more info. or swipe left to move onto the next trip or right if you like it and might possibly want to try it. 

*****Again, these aren't computer generated trips, they are trips created by people who live there and know what to do and where to go.


By providing travelers a simple and easy way to find experiences they normally wouldn't try, I believe we can completely change the way people travel. There has been several times in my life where I've visited a city for the first time and knew one or two things that I know I wanted to do. However, after doing these things, I realized that I wasn't utilizing my time in the most efficient manner and felt like I wasn't getting the most out of my trips.

Tripo will use a business model structured like yelp.  Yelp provides a free mobile application/website to it's users and makes money through advertising businesses listed on their app. These advertisements are known as sponsored ads that are pushed to the top of the yelp search page. We will use this same model, however, we will make the advertisements less 'bulky' and provide them in a different format. 

We will make the advertisements less bulky and more discrete by integrating them into a map pin. Map pins that have advertisements in them will be inserted to relevant trips that have other businesses near the one being advertised. 

By allowing free access to our app, I believe we can have an extremely large community of users. Through our 'free' format, we can create more value to the traveler. The ability to provide them a trip tailored to their specific interests at absolutely no cost to them is extremely powerful. 

The best part about all of this is that we aren't reinventing the wheel. The technology we are using has been around for years and the business listings and reviews are already readily available.  By using available technology and software, my company is reducing R&D costs and allows us to ship a product sooner. 

Some of the most successful companies in the world didn't create great things from scratch. These extraordinary companies took readily available resources and applied them to new applications to solve common problems that everyone shares. This is what I consider my unfair advantage - I have discovered a problem, opportunity and technology and found a way to use it to my advantage to help others. 

My team and I are currently developing tripo and will launch this summer. Once we have successfully launched our first version, we will begin working on integrating reservations, ticket sales and hotel/airbnb reservations into our app. 

In the next 5 years, I see myself still continuing to innovate tripo with an ultimate goal of helping travelers plan their trip from beginning to end in a quick manner. After successfully building tripo, I will take my earnings and become a venture capitalist to help other entrepreneurs fulfill their own dreams.  I absolutely love seeing young entrepreneurs continuing to innovate and launch revolutionary products. I think I'll be most happy when I can help others achieve this and watch them and their products grow. 





Sunday, March 27, 2016

Week 11 Reading Reflection

1.) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? There was nothing that surprised me in the reading. All of the material, including the part about innovation landscape gap, were things I had already known.

2.) Identify one part of the reading that was confusing to you? There was no part of the reading that was confusing to me. This was one of the easiest chapters to understand.

3.) 2 Questions to the author 
Which companies are showing the most innovation in the _______ product group?
Which industries do you think need the most innovation?

4.) Was there anything that the author was wrong about? There was nothing that I disagreed with the author about.

The Amazon Whisperer

For those that don't know my company, I am building an app that is made for travelers. The app lets you pick where you want to go and when you'll be there and then select what types of travel interests you like. Once that is complete, you are given trips that match your interests and preferences best. The trips are created by locals who know the city and businesses the most. The trips are provided in a "tinder" format, where users either swipe left to dismiss the trip or right if they like it.

The app will be free for users. We will make money by charging businesses for "sponsored" advertisements on our app. They will choose the business they want to advertise and how long they want to advertise for. We will then take that business info. and distribute it through our app depending on the location of the business and where users select to go. For example, if someone wants to travel to NYC and the business is located in NYC, then we might push that information in front of the user.

The main opportunity that I have to work on for my company is the "magic" behind matching peoples' interests to a particular trip. When people use Uber, it's so simple and quick that it really does feel magical. It is an extremely complicated process behind the scenes, yet Uber makes it so easy to use. Another important factor for my company is not providing businesses that don't apply to the preferences a user is selecting. Yelp has been in the news recently for forcing businesses on users because those particular businesses pay them a lot of money. We will focus on quality content for our users and not force paid content on anyone. The third factor to my business is providing trips to anyone, no matter where the go. Some travel apps only provide trips for major cities, however, we would create trips for any city in the world. This consistency will help grow our user count. My business service is an app, so I can't do the amazon product search portion for this assignment.

Wednesday, March 23, 2016

My unfair advantage

10 resources:

1.) Adobe elements experience
Knowledge of adobe elements is valuable because it allows you to create professionally designed mockups and convey your ideas to others. Anyone can learn adobe, however, it takes quite some time to master it.
2.) Xcode, Swift experience
This is the most readily used code these days and swift is being updated constantly to allow for quicker app building. This is the code we are using for our app and it is very useful and inexpensive. Anyone can learn code, however, it takes a lot of time to perfect.
3.) Graphic Design experience - Sketch
I am able to turn ideas into designs in the matter of minutes. Also, using sketch's database, allows me to tweak other people's designs that I like and customize them to fit my own.
4.) 3 Day Startup
By attending 3 day startup, I was able to learn how startups function and the speed at which they need to grow. It taught me that you should just build great things that people love. Just go, go, go! and never look back.
5.) Investors
Having investors allows us to focus on the product without any financial constraint. Our investors believe in us and know we will make them their money back.
6.) Friends with other founders
Being friends with other founders allows me to pick their brains about what the next steps should be for my company. They've done it - now I just use what they learned, to perfect it.
7.) Marketing experience with SportsGuru
By interning with SportsGuru, a startup company, I am able to see how to communicate with a team and completely many different tasks.
8.) CTO - technical founder
He is very valuable. He has been coding for about 6 years now and has built multiple websites and apps that are being used by thousands of people. There is a limited amount of highly skilled engineers and he is one of them. Some engineers are extremely hard to work with, yet he remains focused on design and UX.
9.) Technology
The technology already exists for what we need to do. We are just applying that technology to a new application to create something special. We don't have to reinvent the wheel.
10.) GitHub account
This allows us to use code that people have already created to use as our own. This saves so much time!

My most valuable resource is my CTO - he is able to solve technical problems and find solutions for what we want to construct. He is also great at taking my designs and mockups and turning them into a working prototype.


Sunday, March 20, 2016

Week 10 Reading Reflection


1.     What surprised me the most: The amount of graphing and charts needed for responsible business practices. 

2.     What confused me? Capital Budgeting. I'm sure if I studied this a little more I could understand it, but at this point it is a little confusing.

3.     2 Questions: 
What do you think is the most difficult type/style of budgeting?
Can you explain the preferred payback method a little more?

4.     What was incorrect? There was nothing about this chapter that I thought was incorrect. 

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Elevator Pitch No.3

In the comments left on elevator pitch no. 2, people told me to explain what differentiated my app from others that already exist. The biggest difference is that you are still having to go find trips that match what you want to do. My app automates that process by taking the interests you fill out, listing one or two things you know you want to do and then finding a trip that has already been created by local travel experts who know what to look for.

This time I decided to add what differentiates myself from the competition in this space. Hope you like it!

Sunday, March 13, 2016

Week 9 Reading Reflection

1. What surprised me the most was that there was a whole section focusing on the Internet. The internet is readily used these days and everyone knows that it is important in today's society, so I was surprised that they spent that amount of time on the subject.

2. The marketing philosophy section wasn't very clear - wasn't really sure where they were going with it.

3. Questions:
 Is knowing the financial ratio super important to the success of the business?
When is the right time to do market research - when should you begin?

4. There was nothing that I found that I didn't agree with the author on.



My secret sauce

Five ways in which I am unique enough to start this company.
  1. I am extremely innovative. Where others see problems, I see opportunity. My mind is constantly running with ways to improve our everyday lives. 
  1. Taking technology and applying new applications to it. I am always using tech. Whether it be on my phone or computer I'm always staying up to date with the latest technology. I am constantly thinking of news ways to apply tech features to new ideas in order to solve problems. 
  1. I can influence others. Whenever I'm passionate about something and know the end goal I want to reach, all I need is a short period of time and I can get anyone to join my team. The idea doesn't have to be great, however, the way you talk about it does. 
  1. I'm great at taking a bunch of different thoughts and conveying it into one message. My co-founder has a lot of great ideas and is very A.D.D., however this is where I come in. I can take her thoughts and great ideas and turn them into one powerful message or idea.
  1. I'm very big into UX/UI design. I can envision how I want something to look and function as soon as an idea comes to mind. 

Interviews - they are voice recorded because they live back in Ohio(where I'm originally from) and sent me their thoughts last minute.


After hearing what kelsey has to say, it sounds like she thinks I'm very innovative and I don't look at things like the rest of people. I'm always see opportunities in everything I do. 

Isaac stated that I was really good at coming up with ideas and expressing them in real life. Some people can come up with great ideas, however, they don't know how to design them so others can understand.

It sounds like my dad thinks I would be very good at starting this travel app because of our experiences with traveling all around the world and the problems we encounter.

From my brother's perspective, he clearly thinks I'm smart enough to make this app very successful. It was amazing actually hearing nice things from your younger brother. That doesn't happen very often to anybody.




Reflection:All of the things that I listed above are 100% how I feel about myself. I'm a fairly confident person and I can recognize what my strengths and weaknesses are. Even without mentioning what I thought about myself to my family and friends, they said pretty much the same things I mentioned above. I'm pretty happy to hear this from them, because it reassures that I must be doing something right. I would not make any corrections because this truly is how I feel about myself and they confirmed them.


Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Idea Napkin No. 2

You. 
Hello, I'm Drew Stuerman. I'm a third year student studying Business Administration at the University of Florida. Aside from school, I spend time designing and building projects such as iOS applications, 3D printed models, and website design. I plan to take one or two of my many ideas and turn them into a very successful company that can help others. I see TripIt(travel app that connects your interests to trips others have created) as being my future as long as I can make it worth while and build a community of users that love it. 

What am I offering to customers through TripIt?
I am offering a travel platform for people who struggle to get the most out of their trips. Almost everyone I've spoken too feels like they didn't get 100% out of every trip they've been on because they didn't know where to go or how efficient to be. TripIt changes that because you can select a couple things you know you want to do and we'll find a trip that fills in the rest and is very highly rated.

Who are you offering TripIt to?
I am offering TripIt to travelers that aren't sure about what they want to do or struggling to figure out the most efficient way to get things done. Through market research, I've discovered that the age range of 18-32 male and female is the sweet spot I want to target. 

Why do they care?
In my business model, users will value our product because it's free to use, quicker than other travel methods and laid out in a very simplistic way. 

What are your core competencies?
What sets us apart is the fact that we aggregate all of the information for you and connect you to destinations that match your interests. Currently, you have to do the research and aggregate the info. yourself through multiple sites such as yelp and trip advisor.



I believe all of these segments/questions fit with each other nicely. If anything, it justifies that what I'm doing, needs to be done. I'll let you all know when it's available in the app store. I hope I can not only provide users with an easy way to plan travel but also allow you to find and try things you typically wouldn't. 

Feedback I received:

  • People are still using multiple travel sites to plan trips.
  • People carry their phones on them all the time when traveling.
  • Travelers generally know one or two things they want to do in a city, but that's it.
  • Travelers are very much focused on a particular budget and satisfying their groups needs.
  • People would much rather have an iPhone app than a website - to start out with.


Sunday, February 28, 2016

The Twenty Percent

Local Entrepreneur:

Who?
Justin Boike

Company?
RugbyProfile

Rugby Profile is an online platform to connect coaches and recruits.


  • Their target customers are coaches who are purchasing subscription packages in order to search their database for potential rugby prospects.
  • Unmet needs - having to dig through many profiles in order to find the right player. This can be time consuming. 
  • They find their customers through word of mouth. The rugby community is very close and if one coach uses the service, typically many more do as well.
  • The customer demographics are going to be 30-50 year old males who coach at high levels. 
  • Their customers consume Facebook advertisements and media through rugby websites. 

Talking to three customers - 

The feedback I received from these 30-50 y/o males who coach at high levels of rugby is that Rugby Profile is working very well. They have been targeted through advertisements consistently on Facebook and websites such as WorldRugby.com. These customers have also said that they talk quite frequently about the company to other coaches who are searching for higher level players to play for their clubs. 

The Entrepreneur seems to have a clear understanding of exactly who his target customer is. Because the rugby market is very controlled and smaller than most sports leagues, they are able to promote their company in an effective manner. As rugby grows, I could see Rugby Profile utilizing their site to increase traffic and revenue even more by making players pay for accounts too. 





Week 8 Reading Reflection

What surprised me - venture capitalists only care about good management. They refuse to invest in companies if they just have a good idea and no competent management skills.

 What confused me - I was a little confused about why investors are called angels, but I do understand the difference between the different types of business angels.

Two questions: 
Why do venture capitalists not invest in good ideas even though they have bad management?
Who decided to call investors, "angels"?

I did not disagree with the author during my reading. 


Thursday, February 25, 2016

Half-way Reflection

Tenaciousness is a skill.
ENT3003 with Chris Pryor has been extremely enjoyable so far. The way he structures the course is very consistent from week to week and you know what to expect way ahead of time. In order to stay up to date with the assignments on hand, I've gone in and checked the canvas and UF email multiple times a day. It's been easy to finish multiple assignments in clusters because most of them are the same thing, just posting across multiple blogs.

Tenaciousness is also about attitude.
There have been a couple times during the semester where I've felt like giving up on this course. Although there are no tests or quizzes, there is a ton of assignments to complete. When we got to the Interviewing customers and free money assignments, I definitely thought about skipping them. Then you realize how important one or two points is in this course. Missing those assignments would have been huge.

Three tips.
1.) Check canvas and UF email multiple times everyday.
2.) Submit blog post up to 2 days in advance.
3.) Give honest feedback on blog posts. - This makes everyone better

Friday, February 19, 2016

Free Money

Where will you go?
I will go to the University of Florida Campus and ask people who are heading to class.

Who will I approach?
I will approach anyone who looks like they are on their way to do something.

What will I say to get the conversation started?
I will say "Hey, do you want a dollar?" "What would you do for a dollar?"

Plan for the conversation:
Just say whatever comes to my mind.

Out of five attempts I think I can give away three dollar bills.



Reflections: I'm so surprised how many people turned down a dollar for such simple tasks. I'm not sure if the value of a dollar is so small to them or if they were afraid of getting embarrassed in front of other students. It could also have to do something with the wide array of prank videos online that ask people to do stuff for a dollar. Out of the five people I asked, I was only able to get 2 people to accept the challenge. As I assumed, the more confident looking people were the ones that accepted to stuff for a dollar. The people who were walking fast or looking down at the ground were extremely hard to approach.


Week 7 Reading Reflection

The biggest surprise to me - The shift from demographic to behavioral segmentation.
This surprised me because in my mind I always pictured that you used a top down method of identifying your market. First you look at their age, gender, location and then you find out stuff about those people in order to say "this age of men in this location are going to use this product because...". What I learned from this is although it may look like they are easily broken up that way, those men have way more different behavioral traits that they can be segmented into.

The part that was most confusing - The shallow/middle/deep end.
This was most confusing to me because are they looking at the level of decision making that is occurring or implementing new features?

Two questions to the author -

  • Do you think age or gender can be directly tied to behavioral buying decisions, when everything else is held constant?
  • What questions could you ask potential buyers to learn more about their behavioral decisions?


Was there anything the author was wrong about?
I didn't disagree with anything the author had wrote. It was all very new to me and opened my mind to how marketing should really work.

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Elevator Pitch No.2


I didn't change anything. All of the feedback was beneficial and aligned with the problem I was trying to validate. This experience was very insightful into people's real world problems.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Week 6 Reading Reflection

What surprised me the most - The profitability chart 
Markets can sometime be extremely unpredictable.It is surprising to see that this chart was presented with such confidence. I don't clearly understand his reasoning behind why he is so confident that you can predict profitability so well. 

Where I disagree - Competition is the main force that drives us
I think this is a very pessimistic view of commerce and the world. Many entrepreneurs create inventions/companies/businesses to make the world a  better place. I would argue that some people  would rather collaborate to make something better than compete.

The things I disagreed with him on were already mentioned.

My questions to the author - 
Why do believe competition is the best driver?
Is competition seen in every single person and if so, where is more evidence to support this?

Sunday, February 14, 2016

Customer Interviews No. 3

Went out and recorded 5 people for this interview - had trouble uploading the videos. Will upload them as soon as I get this issue resolved.

Here is the one-paragraph summary I wrote on the card:
"TripIt is an app and website that allows you to turn your interests into travel itineraries. Planning trips is extremely challenging, especially when you're trying to meet several peoples expectations. Instead, you can use TripIt where you will select where you're going, when you'll be there, fill out your interests and a list of user-gernated trips will appear that best match your preferences. You swipe left or right through trips until you've found the one that you like."

Questions:
Would you use this app if you were traveling to a new city and didn't know what to do for the day?
Would you use this app to pre-plan for trips or use it once you've arrived?

Who:
I went and asked 5 students who were passing through Turlington Plaza on Sunday.

What I learned:
Throughout the interviews I realized that everyone I interviewed struggles with planning trips, especially with multiple people involved. They mentioned how tough it is deciding on what to do. They said that they have a lot of information at their disposal, such as yelp and tripadvisor. However, it's difficult knowing whether or not those things will meet their own interests. Another problem they have is filling their trips with as much as they can, while staying in line with their budget. Everyone said they would use this app to pre-plan and for once they've arrived. They would use it to pre-plan if they were given information push notifications about their trip periodically. People would use this once they have arrived at a city and peoples plans/moods change in the group.

Thursday, February 11, 2016

Idea Napkin No. 1

Who is Drew?
Drew is a third year business major at the University of Florida. A man with many dreams, Drew has formulated several business ideas and networked with countless individuals to one day launch his own business with their help. He currently specializes in business analytics, which allows him to understand the data behind businesses and how to use it to their advantage. His aspirations are to one day co-found a multi-million dollar company and relocate to Chicago. If this business is successful, it will allow Drew to do something he's passionate about for once.

The product -
A desktop and mobile application to find travel itineraries that best match your interests. You select where you're going, when you'll be there, your interests and we'll match you with the best possible itinerary to help you get the most out of any trip.

Audience -
Our audience is targeted to millennials age 18-34 who lack trip planning skills. We recognize that people enjoy when they have very minimal trip planning to do. Both men and women is this age group access travel information on a regular basis to narrow down what they want to do.

Use -
Customers will use our app/website because it offers them convenience for free. Why would you spend hours, even days searching for things to do, when you could do it in minutes?

What makes us unique -
Travel planning apps these days only allow you to search information and drop them into your schedule. We're different because we base your travel plans off your interests and preferences.

After evaluating the market, so far we view this product as being very beneficial to our users. One day we envision a world that can correctly predict where you will want to travel next and the trip destinations will automatically be filled in for you. We are very close to product launch and I will share my company with the class once it's up and running. It's a very exciting time for me and I'm curious as to what opportunities this creates for my future.

Sunday, February 7, 2016

Week 5 Reading Reflection

During the reading, the biggest surprise to me was - "Securing a Patent: Basic Rules". I've always struggled with the background information for filing and securing a patent. This information was very beneficial and surprising to me because I have yet to find a clear, detailed way through the patent process.

The most confusing part of the reading was - I didn't find anything in this chapter that was confusing to me.

2 questions to the author - When filing for a trademark, can companies register names that are commonly used such as "juice" or "apple" or "hey" if that really is what their company is named? If one trademark name is taken can you add words to the end of it to make them different?

Anything the author was wrong about? how? disagree or agree? - I didn't find anything I disagreed with the author about.

Interviewing Customers No. 2

After conceiving the idea for customized trips and speaking with several surveyees, it is apparent that people struggle with discovering unique trips. It is evident that people love to travel, yet have a very hard time with logistics, financial planning, and convenience. These three problems have reassured me that there is a need for my idea.

Through research, I have discovered that the target audience for my service is men and women age 18-34(millennials). The five people I previously surveyed fit into this relative market category. During this second attempt I have stuck to surveying men and women age 18-34 on the University of Florida campus. The target audience has conceptually stayed the same since the first interview.

This go around, I asked three questions that were much more specific to the problems travelers encountered.
  • How early do you plan a trip in advance?
  • When traveling to a new city that you've never been to before, would you travel 'far distances' to try a unique destination?
  • Please tell me the number one factor when determining what you will do when visiting a new city. 
Responses:
How early do you plan a trip in advance?
Katie, 23 - "Month to a month and a half"
Kasey, 18 - "At least 3 months in advance" 
Luke, 18 - "Depends on the trip, but usually 2 months in advance"
Trevor, 20 - "A couple weeks in advance, if it's only for a couple of days"
Kyle, 24 - As early as I can. Probably 3-4 months prior to the trip. 

When traveling to a new city that you've never been to before, would you travel 'far distances' to try a unique destination?
Katie, 23 - "Depends how much I wanted to visit it, but I would say so"
Kasey, 18 - "No, I tend to stay close to wherever I'm staying"
Luke, 18 - "I would travel up to 30 minutes to see something"
Trevor, 20 - "I like to stay close to my hotel"
Kyle, 24 - "If it's something I'm really interested in, yes"

Please tell me the number one factor when determining what you will do when visiting a new city.
Katie, 23 - "money"
Kasey, 18 - "money"
Luke, 18 - "time"
Trevor, 20 - "money"
Kyle, 24 - "group preferences, and what we all wanted to do"

After this process, I learned that people need a more efficient way of planning trips. Travelers are tired of searching and aggregating information for their trip. I will continue to pursue this idea and let everyone know when it's available to the public. 

What I learned about interviewing customers - try to never go up to people and ask them if you can ask them some questions. They get easily scared by these words for some reason. 








Wednesday, February 3, 2016

Elevator Pitch No. 1

Hello everyone - here is my elevator speech for the future of travel. Enjoy!


Sunday, January 31, 2016

Week 4 Reading Reflection

The biggest surprise I found while reading, was that "it has been estimated that adults use only 2 to 10 percent of their creative potential. I've always heard how the human brain has so much potential for use, yet we only tap into a small fraction of it. However, I thought we would use way more creative power than between 2 to 10 percent. Imagine how different our world would be today if we did have the potential to access all of that information and creativity.

I didn't find any information to be extremely confusing from this chapter. The mindsets and processes for becoming a better entrepreneur were very thought out and direct.

Two questions to the author:
Do you believe the most uncreative, original human being on our planet could use your tips toward creativity and benefit from it?
Do you believe we can use an entire side of our brain at one time or will we always be drawing from both sides?

There wasn't anything I found the author to be wrong about. The conceptions I had formed prior to reading remained even after I read through his processes.

Saturday, January 30, 2016

Customer Interviews No. 1

Over the weekend I had the opportunity to compete against other teams in the "3 Day Startup" competition held here at UF. On Friday, everyone came in with separate ideas and presented them to each other, to come up with the top 5 ideas that we would try and create. The group I teamed up with, was for a custom travel app to ease the pain of coordinating vacations. As a team we set off to interview future potential users around the University of Florida.

We decided to choose UF college-aged students not because it was easy, but because our generation tends to travel and explore more than others. We came up with a list of questions to survey to our target audience.


  • Have you ever planned a trip to a major city that you've never been to? If so, what city?
  • Have you ever used any travel apps to assist you with your trip?
  • Did you speak to any locals about potential trip ideas during your stay?
We interviewed 52 people throughout campus and here were 5 responses we received for the questions we asked.

Have you ever planned a trip to a major city that you've never been to? If so, what city?

Chelsea, 22 
"Yes, I have planned several trips with my girlfriends. The most recent trip was to Orlando and we stayed 2 days."

Matt, 20
"Yes, most recently I planned a trip with my family to go to New York City."

Kyle, 21
"Yes, my girlfriend and I planned a trip to Tampa for my 21st birthday in December."

Irina, 23
"Yes, my friends and I planned a trip to Atlanta over the summer."

Josh, 26
"Yes, my wife and I planned a trip to Austin, Texas to visit family in December."

Have you ever used any travel apps to assist you with your trip?

Chelsea, 22
"Yes, yelp and trip advisor, as well as Google."

Matt, 20
"Yes, yelp, quite frequently actually."

Kyle, 21
"Yes, I mainly use yelp to find restaurant reviews."

Irina, 23
"Yes, when I planned the trip to Atlanta, I used trip advisor.

Josh, 26
"My wife and I used yelp to find good local restaurants."

Did you speak to any locals about potential trip ideas during your stay?

Chelsea, 22
"No, just used my phone to look up cool things to do."

Matt, 20
"Our family spoke with the hotel concierge to find the best local restaurants."

Kyle, 21
"No, I just used my phone to find information."

Irina, 23
"Yes, as soon as we arrived, we spoke to the doorman and hotel concierge for recommendations."

Josh, 26
"Yes, we talked to a local coffee shop employee and family about what to visit."

By surveying people, our team was able to learn so much from the experience. We figured out that people were using several different outlets to find information, but had no way to streamline the entire process. 

The biggest thing I learned from this experience is that people love to share information about where they've been or what they've experienced. I thought every person was going to shoot us down and avoid us, however, that was not the case. 










Sunday, January 24, 2016

Week 3 Reading Reflection

The biggest surprise for me in the reading was the attention to all of the negative effects associated with entrepreneurial success. Whenever I sit and think about what my next idea could lead to, I never take into account the negative effects if it were to become successful. Entrepreneurial Fear 101 states that money is not the main cause of fear. Instead, fear of failing and leaving little to no effect on the world tends to scare entrepreneurs more.

One part of the reading that was most confusing to me was included in the "Grief Recovery Process." The oscillating process to recover from hardships was confusing for me to understand.

Two questions to the author:

Do you believe that majority of startup companies are originally driven by the wealth they could create for themselves?
By instilling a winning entrepreneurial mindset, do you think companies have a higher opportunity to succeed?

There wasn't anything I found in the reading that would make me disagree with the author.


Identifying Local Opportunities

1.) Boston Symphony embraces the iPad

"the Sacramento Philharmonic and Opera, Virginia Symphony Orchestra are among those offering "tweet seats," specially designated sections where concertgoers are encouraged to interact on Twitter with a concert official as they gave running commentary during select performances."

http://search.proquest.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/docview/1759219414?accountid=10920

Modern arts are tending to find that they must keep up with audience technology in order to gain attention from younger crowds.Our generation tends to become easily distracted or bored by the lack of interaction available. This Orchestra is using twitter, virtual reality headsets and iPads in order to keep audience members actively engaged. 

The opportunity for future art venues, could be potential using iPads and personal headsets to allow audience members to select which actor/musician they would like to view the play/concert as. If cast members were wearing body cams or showed exclusive back-stage content during a show, it would keep me much more intrigued. 



2.) Mobile ads get a useful twist; Snapchat, Zynga and others lead new wave in advertising that offers fun and value.

http://search.proquest.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/docview/1759080926?accountid=10920


Major social media companies are finding that interactive advertisements engage viewers more than static ads. Companies are trending toward advertisements that are personalized for each individual person, that they can share via social media to the rest of their followers.

The opportunity for future revenue, could be using interactive video screens located at sporting events, grocery stores, theme parks, that allow you to take photos embedded with neat advertisements that would automatically be sent to your phone via RFID chip. 

3.) Uber for seniors program to expand  

http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/15A88EA7E221EE28?p=AWNB

The City of Gainesville, uber, ElderCare, and Wells Fargo have teamed up to offer uber-style services to the elderly in Gainesville, free of charge. Elderly people struggle to drive and get places on their own, so to have someone a call a way is huge.

The opportunity is to allow drivers with two door cars to escort the elderly around the city. Uber currently restricts any vehicles less than four-door, so by allowing people with 2-doors to drive, it could free up the potential for a large quantity of drivers to assist the elderly. 


4.) Celebrity ranking startup gets $7 million infusion

http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/15A7E3A71A9BA928?p=AWNB

Well known-golfer Jordan Speith and several other investors have invested in his father's startup that quantify's athlete and entertainers engagement via social media. Similar to how Neilson ranks tv shows, Speith's company ranks YouTube, twitter and instagram stars. By knowing how far their social media engagement reaches, advertisers can pick and choose who is most valuable.

This is an absolute huge business to get into. The idea I have, is to allow individuals to invest in athletes and actors/actresses before they make it big. People can pick and choose who they think will be most valuable in the future, and hope for a large return on investment, based on how they do in the industry. 

5.) House of tomorrow made on 3-D printer and comes via shipping containers


http://infoweb.newsbank.com.lp.hscl.ufl.edu/resources/doc/nb/news/15A889B9BB3DA640?p=AWNB

Modular housing is becoming increasingly recognized as the future of housing. With easy setup and simple designs, the cost of housing and the space needed are some reasons the idea is so great. Along with shipping containers as the main structure for the home, manufacturers are using 3-D printers to developer custom parts for this new style of home.

The opportunity for modular, 3-D houses is to use them in underdeveloped countries with limited space. It is easier today than ever before to ship containers across the world for a relatively low price. If countries could take new or used shipping containers and turn them into homes, they could cut down on cost and place the homes directly next to one-another. There could be centralized 3-D shops which can produce parts for the standardized home.






Friday, January 22, 2016

Very Short Interview No. 1

Bill Jesse is an entrepreneur who helped form Aerospace Propellor Systems, based in Dayton, Ohio. Bill and my dad, Michael, saw an opportunity to compete with larger propellor manufacturers. They created less expensive ways to manufacture their product, which expanded their margins.

Here are the three questions i asked to Bill Jesse:

Drew: What triggered you to start APS?
Bill: 1.) "While me and your dad worked at McCauley, we realized we had all the tools necessary to work in the FAA field. The FAA is a closed, niche community that has plenty of opportunities  once you get in. We knew that if we could get into the FAA and create our own propellor company, that we could directly compete with McCauley, who had gotten fat and lazy."

Drew: What obstacles did you see early on? 
Bill: "Cash and purchasing equipment. We had very little money to work with. We sold the airplane we purchased in our early thirties to gain money for investment. We were originally going to design our own parts, but instead realized that the money needed was astronomical. Instead we began creating alternative after-mark parts that were less expensive to create." 


Drew: Do you think it’s becoming increasingly harder to form a startup? (Because ideas are very limited and most ideas are already taken these days)
Bill: "There are more ideas now then there were ever before. However, the overbearing regulatory government requirements cause more obstacles then there were in the past. Added insurance, workers comp, 1099 employees, fica, social securities are all reasons why entrepreneurs could become discouraged to create their own company."

From this interview, I learned about how APS was started. I knew they had worked together at McCauley, but I didn't know they started a business to directly complete with them. Bill told me about the sacrifices they made in order to startup their business. I never knew they  purchased and sold a plane together in order for their business to survive. The statement he made about startups becoming increasingly harder to create sides with me. I agree that their are more ideas and markets to enter these days than ever before. However, the regulations put in place cause people to easily become discouraged. 

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

World's Biggest Problems

The world is an extremely large place. We are faced with several problems that restrict how entire communities function. Below, is my list for the 10 biggest problems the world faces today.

1.) Gun control - No one has found the answer to limiting the amount of injuries caused by guns. We live in a society where there are school shootings, terrorist attacks, etc. that revolve around the access to weapons. Whether we restrict everyone from purchasing guns or increase background checks, something needs to be done.

We could restrict put a tighter restriction on online gun purchases and also gun shows. A large number of attacks are tied back to large gun purchases at events.

2.) Student loan debt - The amount of loans required for in-state and out-of-state tuition at public and private universities is astronomical. We can choose to defer our loan payments until 6 months after graduating from school, however, the loan repayment programs and lack of jobs, are causing students to fall behind.

I believe their should be decreased rates for in and out of state students. The repayment program should be restructured and the deferment period should be longer than 6 months, to allow graduates to find and secure a job.

3.) Poverty - The gap between lower class and middle class families is growing. Minimum wage jobs can maintain living for single mothers and children to survive. This has led to a decrease in education, food quality and housing. No one should suffer because of lack of money.

There should be increased assistance from the government for food and educational purposes. Cut spending in other areas, to assist families who need it most.

4.) (Prison reform) First-time, non-violent, white-collar offenders in prison - There is no need to lock up men and women who have been involved in white-collar crimes. The alternative is to allow for probation with a repayment plan to cover any damages, the inmate caused. If they're stuck in prison, we have to pay for them, when they could be repaying what is due.

There should be a probation for criminals, instead of privately funded prisons. It would allow them to apply for government related jobs or other jobs, where the employer would be granted tax credits. This would allow them to work and repay what is due.

5.) Public Education - Due to the lack of funding in low income neighborhoods, public education has decreased drastically. Children begin their lives with a lack of education that leads to crime, poverty and unstable lives.

The government should fund more money to lower income neighborhoods with low graduation rates. By supplying money, they could afford better supplies and teachers.

6.) Minimum Wage - The lack of major increase in minimum wage has caused families to fall behind. Parents who work morning until night can barely afford to live on what they're being paid. There needs to be more government assistance to help families who suffer from this.

The minimum wage should be increased to $12 per hour. I do not agree with $15, however, $12 is enough for a small family to break-even every month.

7.) Lobbying - Money in politics is absolutely corrupt. Politicians are elected because of financial gain and their voting styles are directly related to the way the lobbyists want our country to act. There needs to be a limit to the amount of money involved in lobbying or get rid of it altogether.

Lobbying should either go one of two ways. First, money in politics shouldn't exist, or when lobbyists do provide money to politicians it must be clearly stated in media and any vote made in congress must have a label that says who funded their decision.

8.) Climate change - This year was the hottest year on record since 1880, when we first began to record weather patterns. Scientists agree that climate change is here and will effect the the future for all of us.

The United States should do even more against climate change. Research new ways to decrease fossil fuel use and find more alternative energy resources.

9.) Political Instability in the Middle East - There continues to be well financed terrorist organizations being created and painted in the Middle East. They are not afraid to attack one another and they will risk it all to gain recognition from the rest of the world.

The United States should have constant ground troops in the middle east to maintain control. It seems like whenever we leave, everything goes to shit. If we want stability, we need to take it in our won hands.

10.) Donald Trump becoming president - This is terrifying to me. We have a man, who has little to no political experience and who is out of touch with the rest of the world. If he is elected, I'm afraid he will isolate us from the rest of the world. The world operates as a global economy, and relationships must be maintained with other world powers.

Elect Hillary or Bernie Sanders. I'm hoping that when debates between Hillary and Donald commence, voters will realize how unrealistic Donald really is.