30A - Final Reflection

1.) After reading through all my posts from the past, I have seen how much I have grown my business idea, whether it is improving my actual product or what I should focus on when it comes to putting myself in the best position possible to succeed. I really enjoyed the reading list assignments and the more creative assignments where I had to imagine my target market and expanding my product. Those assignments allowed me to be original and utilize a more future-focused approach rather than being more realistic with the short-term. I did not enjoy however, some of the longer assignments that I felt had less value, such as the bug list assignment. This was just very time consuming and took way too much effort for something so personal. I felt as though I had to eventually make up some bugs because I couldn't think of any more.

2.) I really enjoyed participating in the extra credit project we had the option of doing. This allowed me to actually participate in creating a service and making a small profit. Not only this, but my service involved teaching people to workout, something I am extremely passionate about. I am proud that I was able to train 6 kids and make them more comfortable working out, something I find to be very valuable in life because it leads to healthier lifestyles.

3.) I definitely see myself as more of an entrepreneur than before. This class has provided me with different ways of thinking and formulating ideas that result in more value creation. Rather than simply brainstorming about the future, I was forced to go out and actually interview individuals and find out whether or not my product is actually valuable and useful.

4.) I would recommend staying ahead in the class and actually choosing a product you are passionate about. It is much easier to conduct interviews and do research on an industry you enjoy talking and learning about. This class does take up some time, so planning out when you are going to complete assignments is also very helpful. Lastly, just think like an entrepreneur. What I mean is to actually imagine yourself trying to solve a problem rather than trying to get through the class, it will lead to you actually gaining valuable things from this course.

28A - Your Exit Strategy

1.) I do plan on selling my business in the future, most likely in 10, not 5, years. Once this business takes off, it will become large enough to sell to a larger technology company in which I can profit and still have shares of the company. I want to become a sports agent down the road and owning this product may not be the best look one day.

2.) I have selected this strategy to protect my future profession and to create enough time for myself to succeed one day. Marketing my product and maintaining the website will be very time consuming and will get in the way of wanting to become an agent. Once I establish enough relationships with athletes and acquire them as clients, I will no longer need the website for increasing revenue as an agent.

3.) I think that recognizing that I will only own this product for a short time will make this product's goals much more short-term than it could be. This places an even heavier emphasis on marketing and advertising the product soon and getting companies on board. I also have been able to more clearly define my target market given the time period I have to operate.

27A - Reading Reflection No. 3

The book I read was How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big by Scott Adams

1.) This was an extremely interesting book that discussed Scott Adams' journey through life as he developed methods to obtain success. He provided multiple valuable lessons in this novel, including building your life around systems rather than individual goals generates further success, try jobs with some risk to find the one you love, and utilize time and space to maximize your energy.

2.) This book is very helpful considering what we are currently learning, specifically the last assignment I did about 20 minutes ago. This motivational book is very useful in understanding that you will fail many times in life, and as long as you learn how to adapt to make the most of those failures, it will help down the road.

3.) The exercise I would come up in class would be to set up ten future goals and then discuss how they will adjust to them if they don't turn out successfully. This will allow students to start thinking ahead to providing useful backup options for themselves to prepare for potential future failure.

4.) I was very surprised when Scott Adams mentioned to not focus on goals. This was shocking because all I did growing up was focus on the goals that I wanted to achieve. This is all that my parents, teachers, and friends taught me. However, after reading this book I understand that by creating a system, you are better preparing for success.

26A - Celebrating Failure

1.) I had a horrible experience with my first business law exam. I waited until the last 3 days to study for the exam and only read the smokin notes rather than watching lectures and taking notes. I even found a way to stall enough so I couldn't do any of the 300+ practice problems that come along with the professor's recommended study material. As a result, I didn't know what type of questions were going to be asked in a class that I couldn't afford to do poorly in. As a result, I received a very low grade on the test.

2.) This was definitely a learning lesson for me. Business law was a class I was confident going in to, however, it did not turn out so well. This ended up being the lowest grade I received on any exam in any class so far. I learned that even if I'm confident going to a class I need to work out, learn as much material as possible, and practice that material to enable future success. 

3.) Failure is undeniably a hard pill to swallow. It shows weakness and portrays a time when you attempted to do something and subsequently failed at that thing. It renders negative emotions and makes one feel awful about themselves. However, it is a great learning moment and can allow a person to reflect on themselves and dig deeper and try harder to accomplish their previous goal. This class hasn't necessarily changed my perspective on failure, but it has reassured me that many people fail and fail quite often. What matters is that you don't give up and you try to improve on your previous failures.

25A - What's Next?

Existing Market:
 1. I will continue to develop the actual website and once I do, I can start expanding to athletes and agents in South Florida.

2. Interview 1: The first people I spoke to emphasized perfecting my product before moving on and thinking about advertising to athletes and agents.

Interview 2: The next person spoke about how reaching out using my current network is the easiest way to access athletes and agents alike.

Interview 3: The final person gave me a long speech about working on the search aspect of the website because this is where I will sell my product to companies looking for athletes. If I can advance this area, it will seriously benefit myself in the future.

3. Once I create the product, I will need to advertise to other companies in the local area. This involves using Linkedin, Facebook, and other social media outlets as well as meeting in person with companies to spread the word of my product. After this, I will continue to improve the website after hearing complaints and instructions for improvement from users of the platform.

After this, I will start expanding to other regions, such as New York, California, Texas and other areas with a high concentration of sports organizations, athletes and sports agency companies. This will heavily increase my revenue and allow this platform to grow even more.


New Market:
1. I have found a new market where I can definitely increase revenues and expand business interactions. This would be by expanding the platform internationally, and to other sports such as soccer, rugby and other smaller sports that aren't as prevalent in the United States.

2. The way to make this more successful would be to increase the business internationally by reaching out to international sports teams, players and industries. Soccer clubs have youth teams so it would be a lot easier overseas finding young, talented players.

3. Both people I interviewed saw the room for growth in the industry I am talking about and enjoy the product. Just as it was in the US, international sports athletes and agencies can use a better way of communicating with each other. The only difference is, of course, I will need to utilize more webcams and other technology to help make business.

4. This market surprised me because it relies more on trusting families and not just individual players. Many families are very supportive of their children overseas and have a lot of say in their futures. Unlike the United States, Europe displays a much more caring attitude and have kids training seriously from a very young age.

Instead of having to deal with 18-year-olds in the United States on their own, I will need to directly deal with their families which will make it more difficult. These individuals will make it a lot more difficult and I will need the practice of pitching companies here first to better prepare myself for this future endeavor. This market can definitely be as attractive as my original market, due to the money in soccer.

24A - Venture Concept No. 1

Opportunity:

The need for my product resides mainly with sports athletes and sports agents trying to increase their brand and business respectively. Athletes are trying to go pro and acquire fair representation and agents are trying to increase revenue by obtaining more business. The need is so crucial due to the expanding sports industry. As there are more and more viewers tuning in to watch athletes perform and the industry continues to increase in wealth, agents are vital to athletes so they can successfully be compensated for their performances. This market is defined by athletes between the ages of 18 and 22 and agents of all ages who are hungry for more business and challenges to take on. There are agents and athletes need all over the globe, but they are more prevalent in larger sports towns in America such as New York, California, Texas, and Florida. Customers are currently satisfying this need by communicating through social media rather than having a better way that helps streamline the industry. I don't think agents and athletes to loyal at all to the method they are currently using, it is just the best as of now. This is a million dollar industry, that if it hits, can truly change the way that agents and athletes interact in the future. This window of opportunity most likely won't stay open that long, as someone will figure out an even better way than social media and try to make that a successful product.

Innovation:

My product is a website that allows for constant communication between sports agents and athletes trying to become household names. It is a platform that streamlines the current industry by allowing agents and athletes to post contact information, stats and highlights on a website with a search platform. This makes communication and research much easier for both parties and allows for more specified research in comparison to the current method. I am going to profit from this product. in two different ways. First, agents will have to create membership accounts to be able to post information about their company and using the search center to collectivize information regarding the best players in the area. This will either be a monthly or annual account and will be priced based on the success of the company and the number of available athletes registered. Secondly, I will allow for advertisements from different sports sponsors and companies who will want to market their products. This can include companies such as Gatorade, Powerade, Nike, and Under Armour.

Venture Concept:

My innovation will help solve the problem that most agencies currently have. They are unable to successfully track down tons of athletes and recruit them. On the flip side, it will also solve the problem many athletes also have of finding agents to represent them. I think both parties would switch to this platform if they knew it is going to be successful and have plenty of agents and athletes. It will be incredibly difficult getting the first set of individuals and companies to switch over, but after that, it will be a chain reaction. The competitors are other websites and social media accounts that are trying to solve this same issue. Everybody is trying to find the best way to connect agents and athletes, but not a lot of people are currently thinking about centralizing the industry into one website. Customer experiences play the largest role out of pricing points, packaging, distributing and customer support because the experiences that agents and athletes have on the website will truly test whether or not this product will be successful in the long run. Due to it being an online platform, location won't play a role at all in this. I would organize a business to go along with this idea by creating my own agency. Due to this platform benefitting agents, I would easily be able to set up my own company and interact with athletes as if I didn't even create the website in the first place. I would need around 5-6 employees and I would be a partner and actual sports agent.

Most important resource: The most important resource would be the connections I have. This will help start up the product because I will utilize these connections to successfully market to agents and athletes and get them to register.

Next Opportunity: The next opportunity could be then creating my own agency and having them register on the website I have built. Having this product will seriously impact the validity of my agency.

What's next: I see myself constantly interacting with sports agencies and athletes to spread the word of the website, as well as consistently interacting with companies that want to advertise on the website. I want to own my own business in the next decade, and this product will provide myself with incredible experiences that will help reach this goal.

23A - Your Venture's Unfair Advantage

Resources in my venture:

• Potential investors (family members)
• Access to sports agents
• Access to athletes
• Partners who are willing to customize the website
• Advertising/marketing background
• Creativity to make the idea work
• Experience customizing database to contain agent/athlete information
• Relationship with CEO at the orange bowl
• Sports world continuing to expand
• Network to expand idea quickly

VRIN Analysis:

• Potential investors
• Value: very valuable because it will allow me to actually create the product
• Rare: not very rare, as lots of people have investors
• Inimitable: others can copy this method rather easily
• Non-substitutable: There are other resources, such as friends and random investors that can emulate the same value
• Access to sports agents
• Value: This is incredibly valuable when it comes to my business idea
• Rare: This is relatively rare, as most people haven't had detailed communication with agents
• Inimitable: This is inimitable as long as you have a good work ethic and are patient to get in contact with them
• Non-substitutable: There are no other resources/people that can substitute for agents
• Access to athletes
• Value: Very valuable, just as agents
• Rare: Having connections is somewhat rare, but less rare than relationships with agents
• Inimitable: Pretty easy to copy for other people 
• Non-substitutable: There are no other resources that can provide the same value
• Partners who are willing to customize the website
• Value: Invaluable, considering the individuality of the website
• Rare: Having friends willing to help out isn't necessarily rare, but in this case, the technological advancement is rather rare
• Inimitable: Others can copy this resource easily for other ideas
• Non-substitutable: I can hire other people to help with the website, I don't need the partners I currently have picked out
• Advertising/marketing background
• Value: Pretty useful in figuring out the best way to advertise my product and maximize revenue
• Rare: Reasonably rare given my age and detailed experiences 
• Inimitable: With education and practice others can easily copy this competitive advantage
• Non-substitutable: This invaluable knowledge is irreplaceable and will help out in the future
• Creativity to make the idea work
• Value: Very valuable in identifying the best way to turn this idea into a product
• Rare: Relatively rare, but others definitely share as much, if not more creativity
• Inimitable: With practice, it is a skill others can acquire as well
• Non-substitutable: This is a pretty invaluable resource that only takes with practice
• Experience customizing database to contain agent/athlete information
• Value: This is incredibly valuable, as it something I acquired working for a financial planning firm
• Rare: This is a very rare resource as most people don't have this background
• Inimitable: Others would need very specific experiences to understand how to run this
• Non-substitutable: Other resources can help this experience, however, it is hard to come by
• Relationship with CEO of the Orange Bowl
• Value: This tremendous relationship I have is incredibly useful for building future connections
• Rare: This is a one-of-a-kind relationship
• Inimitable: The vast majority of people would have a tough time imitating this relationship
• Non-substitutable: Not many resources can provide the same benefits as the CEO of the Orange Bowl
• Sports world continuing to expand
• Value: This is a huge asset to my future endeavors 
• Rare: This is an extremely rare thing that is uncontrollable by any one person
• Inimitable: Once again, due to it being uncontrollable this is tough to answer
• Non-substitutable: No other industries can provide the same benefits for myself as this one
• Network to expand idea quickly
• Value: The in-depth network that I have built is priceless
• Rare: It is extremely rare because no one person shares the same network that I currently have
• Inimitable: With time, others can imitate it to an extent, but not all the way
• Non-substitutable: Other people can definitely serve as even better resources, but it will take time and effort to attain those relationships

Top Resource: After conducting a VRIN analysis for each resource, I have concluded that my experience creating a database my top, most relevant resource. It can directly contribute to the success of my product and is the most real-world experience I have attained so far.