20A – Growing Your Social Capital

1)    Who they are and what their background is.

The first person I contacted is a family friend who owns a seafood restaurant.

2)    Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

Domain expert

3)    A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

This person is one of my dad’s closest friends and my family eats at their restaurant all the time.

4)    The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

This person gave me advice on how to run a restaurant successfully. They gave me the opportunity of going fishing on a boat and learn how to catch fish. The return expectation was promoting their restaurant on social media.   

5)    How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

This person will always be there for me when I have questions about opening my own restaurant. They already have connections with other business owners as well.

1)    Who they are and what their background is.

The second person I contacted is a family member of mine who is a dentist. They went to the University of Maryland for undergrad and dental school.

2)    Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

Market Expert

3)    A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

This person is my first cousin and we have a very close relationship with each other despite the age difference.

4)    The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

This person taught me how to create great posts on their social media accounts to promote their dental services. In return, I advertised their dental office to my friends.

5)    How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

This person gives me the best advice on how to succeed in college since they already completed their bachelor's and doctoral degrees. They have lots of experience which allow me to always learn from them.

1)    Who they are and what their background is.

The final person I contacted is my friend that started their own vintage clothing store.

2)    Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

Supplier

3)    A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

I’ve known this person my whole life. I went to school with this person since I was a kid. This person decided to skip college and start working right away instead. They got a loan from their parents and opened up a vintage clothing store that does very well. They make lots of profit from this store.

4)    The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

This person provided me with some awesome shoes and clothing that are limited. They expect me to provide them with products once I start my own business.

5)    How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

This person has connections with big companies, so I believe that having them in my network could provide me with opportunities that I wouldn’t be able to get by myself.

Finally: Reflect. This experience requires you to do a little 'targeted networking.' How will this experience shape how you participate in any future networking events?

This experience will shape how I participate in any future networking events because I will make sure I take full advantage of meeting remarkable business owners and learn from them.

Did this experience differ from your networking experiences in the past? How?

This experience has differed from my networking experiences in the past because I actually learned from all of the people I contacted and it is important to gain new knowledge when starting a business.

19A – Idea Napkin No. 2

1)    You. Who you are. What your talents are. What your skills and experiences are. Also: what are your aspirations? Specifically, regarding your business concept, how do you see this business (if you were to start it) playing a role in your life?

My name is Jacob Tillinger. I am a first-year Information Systems major. I believe that I have great leadership skills. I gained these skills from my experience as being the president of a club back in high school. I held meetings for my club and made sure that every board member performed their job correctly. I aspire to be my own boss one day. I hope to open my own business with the business idea I have now or with one of the other business ideas that I have in mind. I believe that creating the SafeDrive app would play an important role in my life as it could potentially provide me with a decent income.

2)    What are you offering to customers? Describe the product or service (in other words, how you'll solve customers' unmet needs).

I am offering a product/service that prevents drivers from looking at their phone while their driving. This would solve customers’ unmet needs because it would prevent car crashes on the road, and this could save lives.

3)    Who are you offering it to? Describe, in as much detail as possible, the demographic and psychographic characteristics of your customers. Think especially of this question: what do your customers all have in common?

I am offering my product/service to anyone that has a driver’s license. I think my product would be especially useful for new inexperienced drivers. These drivers would most likely be high school students as they are just learning how to drive on their own for the first time.

4)    Why do they care? Your solution is only valuable insofar as customers believe its valuable to them. Here, explain why customers will actually pay you money to use your product or service.  

I believe that customers would pay money for this product/service because of the facts and statistics that prove how many car crashes are caused by texting and driving. Customers will care about my service since most drivers want to stay safe on the road.

5)    What are your core competencies? What sets you apart from everyone else? Also: what do you have that nobody else has? 

What sets me apart from everyone else is the fact that there aren’t many services similar to mine. I believe I have the motivation to start this service right away and I will always improve its skills.

I believe my elements fit together well because I can use my leadership skills to put together a team and create the app. I think my service would be very successful with all of the elements put together. The only problem with this service could be for older cars because they don’t the same technology that newer cars have today so people that own older cars would only be able to use the app I create.

Feedback Memo: I didn’t receive any feedback from my Idea Napkin No. 1.

18A – Create a Customer Avatar

The avatar I created using the My Blue Robot website can be considered a college student or middle-aged adult. My customer has hobbies such as playing sports and driving their kids to school. They tend to drive a midnight blue Honda Accord. Some TV shows that my customer watches are Lost, Madmen, and Game of Thrones. My customer has 4 children that are all in elementary school. His children's favorite books are the Harry Potter series. They don't follow politics because of their young age. They are 4, 5, 7, and 9. Some similarities I have in common with my customer is that we both love playing sports. I think this is a coincidence because I'm the one that created my customer avatar. We will definitely have a lot of similarities since created the customer avatar. I understand now that when selling your product to customers, it is important to see what you have in common with them to create a more personal relationship. 

17A – Elevator Pitch No. 2

1.  

2. What stood out to me as important was that a lot of the people that gave me feedback said similar stuff so I suppose what I can improve on was very noticeable. What surprised me the most was that some of the people that gave me feedback made me realize that I would have to compete against other services that are already out there and similar to mine. I think the most useful feedback I received was to be more confident in my voice. I believe that I did a much better job with being more confident in my second elevator pitch because I used the advice I was given!

3. Based on my feedback, I changed my tone in my voice to sound more enthusiastic. In my first elevator pitch, my voice was more monotone so I tried my best to fix that problem in my second elevator pitch. The only other thing I changed was that I stepped back a little bit so that the camera showed more.

16A –What’s Your Secret Sauce?

Five Ways I’m unique

1. I have always been able to learn things quickly and get projects done efficiently.

2. I can be a leader when needed.

3. I am a team player and I listen to all the ideas that are present.

4. I am dedicated to getting the job done.

5. My motivation is what keeps me busy.

Interview #1: My brother described me as hard-working and motivated. He noticed that I help others no matter what. He sees me as a great role model and hopes to meet the expectations I have for him.

Interview #2: My dad thinks that my personality makes me different compared to other people. He said that he sees how I react toward my younger siblings and understand how responsible I am towards them.

Interview #3: My music teacher thinks that it is easy for me to learn new songs on the trumpet right away. She described me as a super quick learner that strives to be the best.

Interview #4: My high school teacher described me as a professional leader. They saw how I started a club in high school and lead a great team. They told me how great of an experience it was to be the advisor for my club.

Interview #5: My friend described me as a caring person who always looks out for other people. They said that they enjoy the time we spend together and make sure to cherish every second of it.

I think that everyone has different opinions about me while there is no right or wrong opinion. I agree with most of the responses I got from my interviews. I think my interviewees are pretty spot on correct about me because all of these people know me personally. I think the responses would be completely different if I interviewed random people. I wouldn’t make any corrections to my list because everything on my lists seems accurate.

15A – Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 2

After conducting all of my interviews, I found that each person has a different opinion on my product and service. I don’t think that there could be an alternative to my solution. My solution is effective, and people’s lives could be saved if they used my service. People are more likely to buy my service in-store because the product has to be installed in their cars. They are more likely to use cash because the product/service will be set at a reasonable price that allows them to buy it right away. I think what matters most to my customers is purchasing a reliable product. Good reviews on the product/service could help them determine that the purchase was a good idea. To summarize my interviews, all the people I interviewed agreed with my product idea and they ensured me that they would purchase it. I believe that lots of people would recommend my product to anyone after purchasing it.