Final Reflection

By completing this course, I was able to exit out of my shell and become a new and more confident person. Countless experiences contribute to this; however, one of the most interesting ones was the Figuring Out Buyer Behavior assignment. By completing this assignment, I interviewed random students which made me uncomfortable in the beginning. Although I consider myself outgoing and social, I was nervous but it ended up being a really great experience and one that I will not forget. In addition, the secret sauce assignment was one of the most enjoyable ones. Having friends give me their opinions on some of my strengths and personality traits was interesting to hear. Some of my friends gave answers I was expecting and others see some of what I thought were my weaknesses as strengths.

I definitely see myself as more of an entrepreneur than I was before I took this class. I have always thought I had a business/entrepreneur side to me since my dad and grandparents are entrepreneurs/business owners. I think I have developed an entrepreneurial mindset because of this class and I am thankful for it.

My one recommendation I would make to students who are going down an entrepreneurial path in the future is do not be defined by your failures. Everyone fails, but not everyone is determined to turn their failure into success. It takes a large amount of grit, passion and mental toughness to truly learn from your mistakes and turn it into a positive learning experience. To perform best in this class, you should watch the lectures and be organized. As long as you stay organized and do not forget to complete or submit an assignment, you should do well. In order to foster that mindset, you have to be prepared to step out of your comfort zone for whatever an assignment asks of you and make time to complete the work.

Venture Concept No. 2

In order for any business idea or product to succeed, there must be an opportunity, innovation and a venture concept. An opportunity can be described as who you are providing the product to and what you need you are attempting to fill for them. An innovation can be described as a creative or relatively newer way to solve the need that the customer has. This process can either change the way people go about their daily life or provide a new way they fulfill their unmet needs. A venture concept can be considered how one administers the innovation of their product to the opportunity they are reaching toward. This is the ultimate reason in which customers would rather use your product rather than someone else’s, it is the difference-maker in the business world.

Opportunity

With opportunity comes customers and unmet needs. For my product that I am providing to customers, I am fulfilling their unmet need with parking. I am catering my product toward University of Florida students who are aged from 18 to 22 and drive either a car or a scooter (or both). These students specifically live near Fraternity Row. The majority of these students are in fraternities; however, some may live at Springs Complex or sorority houses nearby. The force in the environment creating this opportunity is the growing frustration that students have aimed at the current parking situation on Fraternity Row. This opportunity is huge; there are a large number of students who park in this lot or who would like to, but the parking lot is not built for that many people or the types of vehicles that currently park there. The customers are not very loyal to this parking lot now. They want changes to occur- at the very least they want the parking lot renovated to have larger spots for people to park in. The window of opportunity for this business opportunity will be open for as long as the University of Florida does nothing about this. This could be years until a change is made, and it seems inevitable that someone will do something about it soon.

Innovation

With opportunity comes innovation- changes necessary to keep the customers happy and loyal. The service that I am providing to my customer segment can be considered an incremental innovation. It does not change the way people live their life such as the invention of a smartphone or a plane. My product offers a new way in which students can park their car or scooter. A new parking lot with many spaces, and larger spaces than the current parking solution provided by the parking lot on Fraternity Row has better features. This makes parking extremely more convenient for my customers, which is exactly what they are looking for. They want to save time looking for spaces to park in, and have spaces large enough to park their big trucks or large vehicles without the chance of getting in an accident or fender bender. I am making money by selling these spaces in the new parking lot to students who want to purchase them. Once these students realize how much time and how much easier it is to park in this lot, everyone will want to hop on the trend. I am selling these spaces for $90 per semester or $175 for two semesters. This is 10$ more expensive than the current lot, but it is the only way I make my money back for my investments.

Venture Concept

My venture concept is what separates my product from the current parking lot on Fraternity Row. Customers would switch to the service my product provides rather than their current solution because mine makes their life easier. The solution I am providing solves their most important needs when parking anywhere: convenience and safety. My solution not only guarantees spots to students who pay for my product, but it makes the spaces larger in length and width. Due to the increase of the size of the overall space, the parking lot becomes safer as cars are not as close to each other as they were in the lot on Fraternity Row. The customer experience on my product is impacted by the location and price of my product. As I stated previously, the price is extremely fair and equivalent to the added benefits my product offers. There are no true competitors to my product. The only competing service is the parking lot on Fraternity Row. The only thing my business venture needs to turn this idea into a product is a construction crew and investments of time and money.

Three Minor Elements

The most important resource that my business has is connections. Having a certain network of connections with people in the business world can help bring my product to new heights. Competitors cannot copy my success because the customers I am providing to are loyal to the solution they choose. The only thing that can sway them away from my product is a competitor providing an extremely low price for the same service, which is very unrealistic and unlikely. The next product that could be aimed at my existing customer segment is something I have not thought about yet. However, I know it will have to be something revolved around improving the lifestyle of a college student. I think that this venture will be a one-and-done for me. I plan to do this, then build upon my business network and connection as a result of it. This will help me realize what it is actually like for an entrepreneur fighting real world problems and solving customer needs.

Based on the feedback I received from my first venture concept, I did not make many changes. Much of the feedback reiterated and agreed with my ideas. I was glad that many people agreed with them!

My Exit Strategy

For my business, I plan to sell it to the University of Florida once I start making enough profit on my product. This could take up to five years. As a result, I will not only rely on this business on my sole source of income. I plan to explore other business ventures and entrepreneurial endeavors and use this as a side business/project.

I selected this particular exit strategy because this is something I do not see much profit in. And once I start making profit in my product, I think it is best to move on from it. It does not have much potential to grow and I can only see a steady or declining market for it. I also have my future set on other business industries such as the sports world or entertainment.

I personally do not think that my exit strategy has influenced the other decisions that I have made in my concept. I make all of my decisions in my business concerning profit and customer needs. The whole purpose of creating this product was to improve the lifestyle and convenience of University of Florida students. My mindset has not changed based on the fact that this will be a side business to my other ventures. I still care about it as a University of Florida student and want to help as much as I can while still making profit.

Reading Reflection No. 3

How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big, Scott Adams

The overall message of this book is that people should look at failures with an entire new perspective. Adams talks about his life story as an entrepreneur and discusses how he maintained his motivation and happiness through all of his failures which guided him to his success. Three important lessons learned throughout the book include building systems instead of goals, think of activities in terms of time and space and learn more about yourself through your strengths and weaknesses to see what job you are fit to do.

This book connected with what we are learning in ENT 3003 by going into further detail and personal experiences on some information we learned in the lectures. Things like taking risks in the business world and creating success out of your failure were discussed in depth in this book. This was also discussed in class but it is great reading about it in someone’s personal experiences.

If I were to create an exercise for ENT 3003 based on this book, I would have students create a list of their strengths, weaknesses and hobbies. I would want them to see what they think they are passionate about and good at completing. After doing this, I want students to search for jobs or internships that have employees with similar strengths/weaknesses and hobbies. This would incorporate a lesson from the book and simultaneously help students find what they are looking for in a job or work environment.

The lesson taught that surprised me the most and changed my perspective on goals was that you should build your life around systems contrary to goals. It was described that the two flaws with goals are that they are in the future and they are specific. I originally expected that this made goals better, but the reasoning Scott provided illustrates a different and eye-opening perspective.

Celebrating Failure

This past semester has taught me many lessons through my failures. For example, one of my friends knows an aspiring rapper who was looking for a songwriter and I volunteered to help. The rapper asked me to write a song for him using a certain beat that his producer made for him. I kept writing lyrics until I thought I compiled a perfect song that would fit his rapping style and the song’s beat. However, I was wrong. The rapper and producer both thought the lyrics I wrote did not synergize well with his style and the instrumental. I tried a couple times to come up with better lyrics and I failed continuously because I did not know what they were truly looking for.

I learned that maybe I should not write songs for aspiring rappers who I have nothing in common with. I also learned that instead of writing about certain things that relate to only my life in songs, I can write about issues around the world and make it more relatable to the audience I am trying to reach.

In general, I think failure is definitely hard in the moment. Meaning that for a couple of hours or even days, one can get distracted by his/her failures. However, I try to look at failure as a way to go about things differently. I try to learn by my mistakes and think of new ideas to approach whatever I am trying to accomplish. It is hard to do this initially, but once you can accept the failure you must know it is time to look at it as an opportunity. This class has helped me become more confident in myself to take more risks. I learned that even if I fail, I had a helpful learning experience that I will use to grow and better myself.

What's Next?

Existing Market

For my product and services for my venture, I believe that talking to President Fuchs and approving a property where I can buy to build my parking lot is the next step. I believe that once I get the rights to land around where the best location to be, I can focus further on what will draw the customers to my product and what innovative features I would need to attract more. In the customer’s perspective right now, they think of this product as an idea and they really it. I want to show them that this is a real product that is in the making.

In terms of growing my existing market, the thing that makes the most sense is showing them that this is not just an idea, but rather a reality. I want them to know that changes are coming and the best way to show them this is by starting my construction. It would attract people who I did not even know were in my customer segment. In addition, every in my customer segment would be pleased to know that their needs are on the way to being fulfilled.

New Market

Instead of targeting fraternity students are students living near fraternity row, I decided to target University of Florida students who do not live on campus for my radically different market. My venture concept is able to create value for people in that market by giving them a spot to park their car or scooter while they are on campus. If these students do not live on campus and have either a car or scooter, they are using their vehicle to get to class but may not have anywhere to park it. My venture concept covers this issue and provides them a trustworthy solution.

I do not think that this new market would be best to target for my product consumption. Although I do believe that some people from this market would benefit from and purchase my product, it is not feasible to allocate my marketing efforts and resources to draw these customers in. The majority of my customers would not be from this segment, so I would not want to change my product design or features to draw more people from this segment and lose some from my existing segment.  

Venture Concept No. 1

In order for any business idea or product to succeed, there must be an opportunity, innovation and a venture concept. An opportunity can be described as who you are providing the product to and what you need you are attempting to fill for them. An innovation can be described as a creative or relatively newer way to solve the need that the customer has. This process can either change the way people go about their daily life or provide a new way they fulfill their unmet needs. A venture concept can be considered how one administers the innovation of their product to the opportunity they are reaching toward. This is the ultimate reason in which customers would rather use your product rather than someone else’s, it is the difference-maker in the business world.

Opportunity

With opportunity comes customers and unmet needs. For my product that I am providing to customers, I am fulfilling their unmet need with parking. I am catering my product toward University of Florida students who are aged from 18 to 22 and drive either a car or a scooter (or both). These students specifically live near Fraternity Row. The majority of these students are in fraternities; however, some may live at Springs Complex or sorority houses nearby. The force in the environment creating this opportunity is the growing frustration that students have aimed at the current parking situation on Fraternity Row. This opportunity is huge; there are a large number of students who park in this lot or who would like to, but the parking lot is not built for that many people or the types of vehicles that currently park there. The customers are not very loyal to this parking lot now. They want changes to occur- at the very least they want the parking lot renovated to have larger spots for people to park in. The window of opportunity for this business opportunity will be open for as long as the University of Florida does nothing about this. This could be years until a change is made, and it seems inevitable that someone will do something about it soon.

Innovation

With opportunity comes innovation- changes necessary to keep the customers happy and loyal. The service that I am providing to my customer segment can be considered an incremental innovation. It does not change the way people live their life such as the invention of a smartphone or a plane. My product offers a new way in which students can park their car or scooter. A new parking lot with many spaces, and larger spaces than the current parking solution provided by the parking lot on Fraternity Row has better features. This makes parking extremely more convenient for my customers, which is exactly what they are looking for. They want to save time looking for spaces to park in, and have spaces large enough to park their big trucks or large vehicles without the chance of getting in an accident or fender bender. I am making money by selling these spaces in the new parking lot to students who want to purchase them. Once these students realize how much time and how much easier it is to park in this lot, everyone will want to hop on the trend. I am selling these spaces for $90 per semester or $175 for two semesters. This is 10$ more expensive than the current lot, but it is the only way I make my money back for my investments.

Venture Concept

My venture concept is what separates my product from the current parking lot on Fraternity Row. Customers would switch to the service my product provides rather than their current solution because mine makes their life easier. The solution I am providing solves their most important needs when parking anywhere: convenience and safety. My solution not only guarantees spots to students who pay for my product, but it makes the spaces larger in length and width. Due to the increase of the size of the overall space, the parking lot becomes safer as cars are not as close to each other as they were in the lot on Fraternity Row. The customer experience on my product is impacted by the location and price of my product. As I stated previously, the price is extremely fair and equivalent to the added benefits my product offers. There are no true competitors to my product. The only competing service is the parking lot on Fraternity Row. The only thing my business venture needs to turn this idea into a product is a construction crew and investments of time and money.

Three Minor Elements

The most important resource that my business has is connections. Having a certain network of connections with people in the business world can help bring my product to new heights. Competitors cannot copy my success because the customers I am providing to are loyal to the solution they choose. The only thing that can sway them away from my product is a competitor providing an extremely low price for the same service, which is very unrealistic and unlikely. The next product that could be aimed at my existing customer segment is something I have not thought about yet. However, I know it will have to be something revolved around improving the lifestyle of a college student. I think that this venture will be a one-and-done for me. I plan to do this, then build upon my business network and connection as a result of it. This will help me realize what it is actually like for an entrepreneur fighting real world problems and solving customer needs.