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My typical customer would obviously be someone who regularly makes trips to the gym. They would vary from hardcore athletes to some of the more casual people that workout every so often after work. Their hobbies include watching sports, outdoor activities, and the occasional night out to drink. For the more hardcore gym goers, I would bet they tend to drive sportier cars (probably red), whereas the more casual customers drive black and gray sedans that they use to get to and from work. The hardcore crowd is probably a younger one and probably don’t have many kids, whereas the casual mom and dad crowd have 2-3 kids. As for TV shows, the hardcore crowd probably watches more action/popular shows like The Walking Dead (well, back when it was popular) while the casual crowd is more of a husband and wife sitcom kind of thing. The hardcore crowd is most likely not that in to politics because they’re so caught up in their own image, but the casual crowd probably has some stronger opinions. Both crowds think they are in their 20’s, regardless of age.

I think I have a decent amount in common with both crowds. A few years ago I used to be much more hardcore about working out, whereas now I don’t take it as serious, although I would like to. I do drive a little manual sports car and enjoy both action shows and sitcoms. Hopefully I won’t be naive enough to not realize my actual age, but hopefully I’ll feel younger!

Elevator Pitch No. 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VPA9KO5FGQ&feature=youtu.be

I didn't do the past elevator pitch assignment, however I paid attention to what others were getting for feedback and tried to use some of those criticism when making my pitch. I have done elevator pitches before, but none were this long so this was new to me. It was also new in the sense that I was pitching a product and not myself, which it was I had previously done. I think getting more feedback now that I have my own video will be nice to see what I can personally improve, especially some of the smaller things that I may not have noticed. I think maybe doing a pitch in front of someone, even for this assignment, could actually help a lot.

Halfway Reflection

1.       This class isn’t necessarily an extremely difficult class but it is very easy to get behind on your work. I would suggest not getting in a habit of procrastination and keeping up the determination to try and get all the assignments done early in the week. This is something I have personally struggled with and it causes me to stress more than I would need to. Time management is the number one thing.

2.       One time I felt like giving up was during a football game being down 3 scores late in the 3^rd quarter. The way I got through it was through my teammates. Sometimes relying on other people for motivation can be a good thing and in a team atmosphere like that it’s infectious. Throughout the course of the last two months it has been really cool to see everyone’s ideas and their motivations behind them. This has definitely helped me feel tenacious to try to compete.

3.       My first tip to students is to set goals and milestones. Without these it’s very hard to have a drive to do something. You can look to these goals to create a fire inside you. My second tip would be to talk to others in times of doubt. Everyone always has times where motivation is low. Although I do think motivation comes from within oneself, I think other people can help you realize that motivation. My third tip is to make sure you’re doing something you enjoy. Having motivation to do something you don’t enjoy is extremely difficult so having fun while doing things drastically helps.

Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 1

The segment I chose is college students that regularly go to the gym. Obviously being a convenience, it can’t really be seen as an unmet need, but it did seem to be a strong desire. The interviews seemed to all bring up the point that when the gyms on campus are busy it is a hassle to have to type in your UF-ID and fingerprint yourself every time. This is something that most likely can’t change at UF, but when asked if they would be interested in the sort of app I was offering for a gym after college they all thought it was a great idea. One of the students I interviewed said he liked to be listening to music on his way to the gym to get him in the right mindset and that having to talk to someone at a front desk to sign in could ruin his routine and put off his workout. People said that having to manually sign in would be a big enough inventive to switch gyms to one that uses the app, but that if they didn’t have a membership at either yet it would definitely help sway their decision. It also seems to be more of a problem of how busy a gym is which is especially bad on campus, and this seamless sign in could help alleviate some traffic.

My findings in the interviews gave me hope that this idea could actually get put into action. It was clear that this isn’t necessarily a need of gym goers but would definitely be a quality of life increase. In terms of need awareness, these people sign in to a gym almost every day, and at some point they probably stop thinking about it after getting into the habit. However, I think even hearing about an idea like this would instantly turn on the light bulb to see it could be much better.

Idea Napkin No. 1

You. My name is Shaun. I am a Finance student at UF. The stock market and technology have always interested me. I want to be able to build a career utilizing some aspects of both of these things. However, this business idea would be more of something on the side just as a passion.

What are you offering to customers? I want to offer an app for your phone that uses the phone’s location to sign in and out of gyms without having to do anything. Simply as you walk in, it checks you in, and when you walk out, it signs you out.

Who are you offering it to? Anyone that goes to a gym can use this app. Hopefully it would be a quick transition process for the different gyms to accept using this app and set up their systems to be compatible with it.

Why do they care? This app is really just going to be used as a convenience factor. It would save time for both parties and potentially money for the gym because they wouldn’t need to buy fingerprint scanners or whatever else they would potentially use to check people in.

What are your core competencies? I think this could give people more incentive to go to one gym that uses the app over one that doesn’t. It could increase competition for rival gyms and increase customer happiness, helping retention rates.

I think this business idea is formed around convenience being a large factor in customer satisfaction. I do think this could be a great industry for something like this, as many people just want to walk in and get their workouts started. The fitness community is generally up to speed with technology because of their use of social media, so I don’t think it would be too big of an issue in terms of usability.

Solving the Problem

I am going to use online shopping as my opportunity with the "problem" of having to travel to a physical store location. The growth of product variation in online shopping is the goal of this opportunity to hopefully one day be able to have nearly everything possible to buy be available online. I think the best step in the right direction to get to this point is to simply have more HQ's and more warehouses for online retailers. Amazon is expanding and building a new HQ which brings in more employees and therefore more ideas. Having more warehouses is simply having more areas to store product and having the product be more likely to be close to the customer for fast shipping time.

Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

Opportunity: Many people do the majority of their clothes shopping online, but the variety of things available online is constantly growing and now includes even groceries making convenience levels at an all time high.

The Who: The people doing the shopping

The What: They are shopping online instead of at a physical store.

The Why: It is more convenient and many times cheaper to shop online.

Testing the Who: Technically everyone who has access to the Internet could have this need. Many people are already taking advantage of it but some people still do shop at physical locations. Some of these cases are out of preference but some are because lack of knowledge or trust for online shopping.

Testing the What: The boundaries of online shopping are mostly a matter of the product. Obviously someone would be more willing to buy a piece of clothing online over a house, without ever seeing it in person. I do think the product variation can greatly increase, though. Another boundary is shipping times. Amazon has done a great job getting a lot of items on 2-day shipping with Prime.

Testing the Why: The why varies from a convenience to a potential actual need. If someone just prefers online shopping because it is easier they are probably someone who enjoys convenience. However, I do think there could be a need for someone who would like to buy groceries but doesn’t own a car. It opens up opportunities to buy things that wouldn’t normally be available to you if there isn’t a physical store in your city.

Interviews: In doing all of the interviews, it actually seemed like most people had very similar ideas to my own. For the last two people I interviewed I was curious as to why they thought most people were saying very similar things. Their reasons were basically because of how much newer generations grew up with the Internet that they know online shopping better than in person, and in some cases it’s all they know. I did get one different idea to my own which I thought was pretty creative. Online shopping gives you the ability to send products to other addresses than your own. This could allow you to simply get a gift sent directly to the person you’re giving it to rather than having to have it shipped to you and then you ship it to them. I think in asking a much larger pool of people there could be many more creative ideas, but most people use it for the daily convenience factors.