Final Reflection

Final Reflection

1) Read through your blog from this semester. Recall all of the experiences you've had a long the way -- the highs, the lows -- the fun moments, and the moments of drudgery, and even the moments of dread.

2) What sticks out to you as the most formative experience? The experience that you'll remember years later? What was your most joyous experience? What experience are you most proud of yourself for accomplishing?

3) At the beginning of the semester, I mentioned that I wanted each of you to develop an entrepreneurial mindset. And we repeated the mantra -- I am an entrepreneur. Now, at the end, do you see yourself as an entrepreneur? Do you think you have moved closer to developing an entrepreneurial mindset?

4) What is the one recommendation you would make to the students who are going to journey down this path in the future? What would you recommend they do to perform best in this course? What would you recommend they do to foster that mindset?

2. I think for me the most formative experience was either the Free Money assignement or the Customer Interviews. Both of these were formative because I never have had to really do something like that, so they provided me a completely new experience. Those are also the assignments that I will remember years later. I am proud that I accomplished the customer interviews and the elevator pitches because they provided me great experience. 

3. I do see myself as an entrepreneur. I think that this course has really helped me look at things in a new entrepreneurial perspective. This course has also helped me gain the experience in making business plans, pitches, etc. So, when I do create a business, I will have those skills. 

4. One recommendation I would make to students who are going to participate in this course would be to manage your time wisely and plan ahead. This class takes a lot of effort with the assignments, so if you wait until it is too late, you can definitely miss homework. I would recommend that they look at each assignment as a learning experience as well. 

Elevator Pitch No. 4

Elevator Pitch No. 4

Venture Concept No. 2 - Juntos

Juntos: Venture Concept No. 2

Overview

Juntos, meaning “together” in Spanish, is an online marketplace that connects people who are looking to make similar major purchases, allowing them to buy things together. Unlike Amazon or eBay, Juntos will help buyers find, contact, and communicate with other buyers before they make a joint purchase. Unlike timeshare markets, Juntos will allow for the shared purchase of any major item. Examples of such items include: boats, season tickets, condos, recreational vehicles, and bulk goods. Buyers will then be matched with a reliable legal service that will, if necessary, quickly work out a contract granting joint ownership of the purchased item.

Problem

When someone desires a product or property that is out of their price rage, unless that person personally knows someone who is interested in making a similar purchase, they will either have to stretch themselves financially to pay full price, or simply go without it. Each year untold billions of dollars in major purchases are not made because the buyer cannot bear the cost alone. This loss of economic transactions is referred to as un-captured potential. Un-captured potential hurts sellers as products go unsold, and hurts buyers as they miss out on products they want or need. If only like-minded buyers could easily find each other and work together, the potential transactions could take place.

Innovation

Juntos provides an easy-to-use online marketplace in which buyers can browse product and property listings, search for and connect with potential buying partners, find contract lawyers, and split the cost of products. Sellers can use the platform to list products, selling more than they would otherwise, and reducing un-captured potential. Juntos first screens marketplace participants, and then securely processes the transaction between any number of buyers and the seller, protecting both parties from fraudulent transactions.

Opportunity

Global e-commerce sales topped $1 trillion in 2012, a growth of nearly 16% over the previous year. Timeshares, boats, recreational vehicles, and season tickets are a few of the items commonly bought jointly. The timeshare industry reached $10 billion in sales in 2011. The recreational boating industry reached $83 billion. Recreational vehicles sales topped $42 billion in 2012 and are growing by over 15% per year. The season ticket sales in sports, music, and drama are a combined $50 billion industry. There is great opportunity to direct much of the transactions in these industries to Juntos as each industry has only a few scattered, ineffective online sales sites, none of which cater to joint purchases. Beyond capturing large market share of the transactions already taking place, Juntos facilitates transactions that would otherwise not occur, through its buyer-connecting platform.

Competitive Advantages

·     Connecting buyers: Any buyer can use the Juntos website to quickly find buyers in their area who are considering the same purchase, allowing them to communicate beforehand to ensure that the joint ownership will go smoothly.

·     Joint payment: No other online marketplace is focused on or even allows shared payment. Doing so is a shift from the norm and opens up vast new sales potential.

·     Marketplace consolidation: Anything that can be bought jointly is found in one easy-to-navigate marketplace. Buyers and sellers are also able to add or request any item to be added to the marketplace. 

Business Model

Junto receives revenue from each payment transaction it processes. Products or properties will be listed online by a merchant or individual seller. As the primary benefit of the platform is to buyers, they pay between 3% and 5% of each transaction to Juntos, depending on the dollar value of the transaction and the number of buyers involved. Each transaction is subject to a minimum transaction fee of $10.00 per buyer. As merchants can list products on their own sites, no fee will be charged for listing products. However, for timeshares and other real estate, a 5% commission will be charged to the property seller. Revenues will also be brought in through partnerships with law firms. Juntos will partner with contract law firms, sending every transaction of a specific type to that law firm, where the details of the new joint ownership will be quickly agreed upon.  

Financials

Transactions and revenue will increase dramatically in the second full year of operation as Juntos expands its model, allowing for any product in existence to be bought jointly and licenses out its group payment systems. Fixed Costs increase as new employees are hired. Variable Costs increase as marketing efforts are increased and more server capacity is added.

	2015	2016	2017	2018
Transactions	25,000	150,000	750,000	1,500,000
Revenue	500,000	3,000,000	20,000,000	40,000,000
Fixed Costs (Salaries, Overhead)	500,000	750,000	1,500,000	3,000,000
Variable Costs (Marketing, Servers)	100,000	300,000	1,000,000	2,000,000

Exit Strategy

The ultimate goal for Juntos is to be acquired by one of the established e-commerce giants such as ebay, Amazon, or Alibaba, that is looking to move into the joint purchasing market. Such an acquisition would not be allowed until Juntos has established itself as a bustling e-commerce marketplace, therefore providing highly favorable outcomes for any investors. 

The Feedback I received was extremely positive. Many students had concerns about the sharing of things like cars and boats, so that is why Juntos is now primarily focusing on real estate/condo markets. I am also altering some of the legal contractual concept that will be crucial to Juntos. 

Week 14 Reading Reflection

Week 14 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations? 

The biggest surprise for me in this reading was maybe the concept of developing the I-Teams. I had never heard of this term before. 

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

Nothing in the reading was necessarily confusing but I guess the concept of ecovision. 

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

If I were to ask the author two questions, I would ask about how do companies judge moral entrepreneurship? And, what is green capitalism? 

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

I do not think the author was wrong about anything. 

Going for Google Gold

Going for Google Gold

1)   A discussion of your general approach and strategy to search engine optimiation (SEO). What were some of the activities you did for each blog post to pursue SEO? 

     

My approach and strategy to SEO (search engine optimization) for my blog was to use many commonly searched words in each of my posts. I figured that in anything these phrases were searched, then my blog post could show up. I also looked up most commonly searched keywords and things and used them in my posts.

2)   What were your keywords. How did you select those keywords? Did you change or refine your keywords through the semester?

     

     I used different keywords but some of the most searched for keywords that I used was ‘news’, ‘translate’, ‘business’; keywords such as these. My keywords did change throughout the semester as my posts changed, so I infused different words. Also new words, so that my post got even more views.

  

3)   How did you use social media to enhance your SEO efforts? What your your surprises or general impression of using social media to improve your blog's profile? Was social media generally receptive of your blog, or did it get ignored?

      

     I really do not use much social media to enhance my SEO efforts. I guess I could have used more but I thought that it would have to be specific and relevant to my blog. I did use Youtube for some of the video submissions which could count as social media. I realize how impactful though social media can be to your SEO.

4)   What was your most "viral" post? In other words, which post obtained the most traffic? Why do you think?

     

My most viral post on my blog was the Celebrating Failure post. It got a huge whopping 8 views. I think it obtained the most because we had peer reviews for it plus I think it was extremely inspiring.

5) Finally, did you make it to the first page of Google results for your keywords? If not, what page of results did you make it to?

     No, I did not make it to the first page, but made it to the second which I am pretty proud of, I gotta admit. 

Very Short Interview, Part 2

Very Short Interview, Part 2 

For this second part, I went back to the friend who I interviewed for Part 1, Skip Ennis. Skip is a good family friend and a successful business owner and co-founder of a multinational jewelry/diamond brand. He has storefronts in Sarasota and New York City. Skip has been running this business for about 21 years. 

*Since Skip is a good family friend and lives in Sarasota, I really did not feel comfortable recording our conversation over the phone, especially because some of it was quite personal. You can go check the transcript from Part 1 for more info on Skip. 

Reflecting back on the first Interview, I feel like I got a good feeling for how he would describe his business and some of the aspects of that, but I did not feel like it offered anything too detailed or groundbreaking about the industry. I was glad though that I not only just asked him about the jewelry business but also about his thoughts on being an entrepreneur and what he wishes he learned in school. I was appreciate that he took the time to speak with me and I felt like he at least gave thoughtful answers. 

Me: Do you feel like you wish you had learned about how to create a business plan, or study the VC market, or perform interviews on other entrepreneurs? 

Skip: Definitely. I think all of those things are great skills to learn now, and it sounds like your class that your doing now is teaching some good skills. I have had to create multiple business plans and etc. over the years and had to learn those things on my own. So, yes I wish I had learned that back in school. 

Me: What keeps you motivated? 

Skip: What keeps me motivated now and what kept me motivated back in the day are very different (Laughing). Now, it is mostly about maintaining our brand and planning for that retirement one day when I can boat and go to the US Virgin Islands. 

Me: Is there any advice that you would say don't listen to? 

Skip: Great Question. It may seem cliche but I would advise you to always follow balance. I think that is the most important thing, because so much advice is to point you to one extreme or to another but really the best is just healthy balances. That is what can keep you motivated and consistent. 

I do think that I feel more comfortable now at least interviewing than I did before. I would say that because we were already very familiar with each other, it was comfortable both interviews but what I do feel like I especially got out of this class was that I developed questions quickly to ask him, and questions that I actually really cared about hearing the answer. Not just some generic questions, but specific questions to what I am interested in hearing the answer. He also thought the class offered a lot of good concepts, so in that sense I do think he feels like it has grown me. 

 

Week 13 Reading Reflection

Week 13 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations?
Something I felt surprising in this reading, Chapter 14: Valuation of Entrepreneurial Ventures, is that the P/E method is not something that I feel venture capital companies use to value, more so equity holders on the public markets.

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.
This concept that Venture capital firms use P/E to value companies. I would think that venture capital funds typically invest in companies that have yet to go public or offer any type of share.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?
I would obviously ask him why he thinks that vc uses p/e to measure? Also, what does he feel is more telling? Discounted Earnings Method? Discounted Cash Method?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?
No, I do not feel that the author was particularly wrong, but I still wonder why they referred to the P/E instead of a DCF or something similar. 

Celebrating Failure

Celebrating Failure

     I believe that a time this semester that I might consider failing, was when I recently got a concussion in a basketball game. Getting the concussion was not the failure, but I feel like I was not careful on how I was treating my body. That day, I had gone wakeboarding in the morning, then went and worked out, then went to a softball game, and finally played pickup basketball which made me faint and hit my head on the court which led to my concussion. I had to go to the hospital and had to be there a couple of days as well as be on bed rest for the following week. I could not drive, really even look at computer/tv screens which made me not be able to study, and not do any activities.
     I feel like this could of potentially been avoided if I was more careful and made sure to eat, not take too much caffeine, and let my body rest. This accident also obviously cost a lot of money as Shands is not cheap. So, overall I do not know if I would entirely call it a failure because it was truly an accident but I am now much more conscious and proactive about what I am eating/drinking/resting etc. So, I learned that I have to now be much more conscious which I believe will serve me well in the future.
     I do think that failure is hard but I also think that it is key to growing. I would never hope that I was too sheltered to experience failure, which I know would greatly hinder my personal growth. Failure will never be easy though and I hope that I will continue to handle failure better as I get older. I think that this class has helped me change my perspective on failure, especially the video interviews that sometimes made you have to act resiliently.
    

My Exit Strategy

My Exit Strategy

1) Identify the exit strategy you plan to make. Do you intend to sell your business in the next 5 years for a large return? Do you intend to stay with the business for several decades and retire? Do you intend to protect the venture as a family business, and pass it down to your children?

At Juntos, we plan to grow the company in various markets and gain as much market share as possible. We also plan to raise as much funding as possible from VC/PE etc. We look to grow Juntos into an international brand and the only one of it's kind that offers joint purchasing. I think the smartest step for Juntos down the road will be to go public with the company in an IPO, as I believe the company will generate a lot of investor demand which will inject excess capital into the company so that Juntos can even grow further. 

2) Why have you selected this particular exit strategy?

I have selected this particular exit strategy because I think that Juntos will continually need a lot of capital to continue running. Juntos is trying to target an extremely large global market which will require ongoing funding. Going public is a good way for Juntos to secure the amount of capital it will need. 

3) How do you think your exit strategy has influenced the other decisions you've made in your concept? For instance, has it influenced how you have identified an opportunity? Has it influenced your growth intentions or how you plan to acquire and use resources?

 I think that this exit strategy has allowed us to think about different markets that Juntos could move in to. Going public on the equity markets allows Juntos to generate as much capital as it needs which allows us to position Juntos towards global markets. I believe that since Juntos will be a new concept, it needs a lot of capital as well so that barriers to entry are high.

 

Week 12 Reading Reflection

 Week 12 Reading Reflection

1) What was the biggest surprise for you in the reading? In other words, what did you read that stood out the most as different from your expectations?

2) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you.

3) If you were able to ask two questions to the author, what would you ask? Why?

4) Was there anything you think the author was wrong about? Where do you disagree with what she or he said? How?

1. The biggest surprise from the reading might be about the entire concept of Entrepreneurial Leadership. I had not heard of this term previously.

2. I was curious to why outsourcing can lead to increased competition.

3. I would ask the author:
Why does outsourcing lead to increased competition? Just because the prices become cheaper?
What do you consider the One-Person-Band Syndrome?

4. No, I do not think the author was wrong about anything.

What's Next?

Whats Next? 

Existing Market. 
Step 1: Talk about what you think is what's next. You may rely on your analyses from "The Amazon Whisperer" exercise (when you discussed what product you thought might come next.)
Step 2: Interview three customers who are already part of the market you have identified, and ask them what they believe is next for a venture like yours. Describe to them your business, and simply ask "What should we be doing that we aren't planning to do?" Next, ask them about your ideas of what customers might want next. Video or audio record these interviews.
Step 3: Based on your own expectations and the feedback you received from customers, set a path for the future. In two to three paragraphs, describe what makes the most sense for your venture in terms of growing in your existing market.

Step 1: I think what is next for Juntos would be to find two markets to go into for selling products and trying to capture market share within those specific markets. I feel like Juntos needs to grow in it's existing markets which right now would be real estate and season tickets. I believe that once we grow our share in these two markets, then we can lateral into new markets. 

Step 2: Customers all have approved of the concept and say they would personally use it. Everyone can not afford everything, so if Juntos can help facilitate joint purchases on these products, than this 'uncaptured potential' can be fulfilled. Juntos will help these customers purchase items they would of had to gone without otherwise. 

Step 3: I believe that the path for our future is bright and it includes moving into many new markets. I am not exactly sure which markets will be best to move into next, but I do believe that after operating in the real estate and ticket market for some time, we will have an idea which other markets can be tapped in to. With Juntos, there is also a legal aspect that we have to think about since it deals with joint contracts and shared purchasing. 


New Market.
Step 1: Identify a radically different market from what you're currently planning to target. If you're currently targeting B2B, think about going after a B2C market. If you're currently targeting an affluent part of society, think about targeting a very poor part of society.
Step 2: Once you have identified a radically different market, describe how you think your venture concept might be able to create value for people in that market. You may have to get creative with this -- that's OK -- and perfectly welcome!
Step 3: Interview three people from this new market. Again, describe to each interviewee what your concept is. Then, ask them how they think your business might be help to meet customers like them. What kinds of adaptations to the product/service mix do they think you should make to be successful in this new market? Video or audio record these interviews.
Step 4:  Reflect, in two to three paragraphs, on what you learned about this new market. What surprised you the most? Were any of your expectations/assumptions correct? Does this new market, on second thought, appear to be as attractive as your existing market? And so on. 

Step1: A new market that we would be considering would be the boat and car markets. These markets are two things that I think possibly work for joint purchasing. I think that toys like boats are purchases that are not always used so it allows the opportunity for shared time usage. Also, many people are not able to buy a boat or sometimes a car because it typically can be extra spending that they do not have. If Juntos can help them purchase this item, then these are potential new markets. 

Step 2: It would create value by simply helping people purchase things that they would not be able to own previously. 

Step 3: Again, the customers agreed that both of these markets are possible. Some had concerns about the car market just because most of the time, sharing a car would be difficult. Also, you have to make sure that both buyers are extremely reputable which Juntos already plans on doing. 

Step 4: I believe that these markets would be the next step for Juntos after we gain share in the real estate and ticket markets. I think that with the feedback that we received and the problems that we have worked through, Juntos could facilitate in these new markets and provide value to many different types of customers. I believe that our original market is our main focus right now and I think that Juntos fits right into both of these markets with ease so that is where Juntos will head.