Shawn Davis

29A – Venture Concept No. 2

   1.        

                My venture concept is based on the need of college housing in college towns. This opportunity comes from the analysis that in college towns it is hard for college students to locate an affordable college housing close to campus. This opportunity typically applies to those who are your typical undergrad but specifically students who are pass their freshman year of college. The changes are that colleges are admitting more and more students through the flexibility of online classes. With this trend there are more students then campus housing can hold which is why students tend to look for affordable housing close to college campuses. This is only happening in college town demographically the population is made up of 18 – 25 year old college students that are still financially being supported by their parents when it comes dealing with paying for housing. Typically while their undergrads parents are still paying for their housing due to them being full time students and not being able to have enough time to work jobs. Customers are satisfying this need by getting friendly referrals. Students that are still not familiar with the college town often go live in neighborhoods that they know their friends already live in or somewhere that their friends recommend them staying in. They are still loyal because they often stay in that place until they are getting ready to graduate. They are more loyal to the referral and not the product itself. This opportunity is big because there are colleges everywhere with students that are from 50 to 60 thousand plus students. This opportunity will be last for years because cities and colleges can only get so big so eventually we will run out of space. The product that I will be providing is more spacing for college students to be able to live closer to college campuses at a price that can be affordable for them to live great and also enjoy it. My plan is to work with other people on campus that will promote the college housing that I’m going to be setting up at affordable rates. Also I would partner with a group that would be willing to share my vision support my business plans. The reasons for me to think that customers will switch to my product is because it will be close to campus also it will be affordable for them to live in. It wouldn’t be hard due to the help I would have from my peer by promoting the product and giving them information on how cheaper my product would be compared to the others. The competitors are the other business people that own other college housing. They don’t have the option to provide people with different housing opportunities. They only have so much to offer they can’t over sell things. For packaging, price points, customer support, and customer experiences I would have a person that has patients, interact with people and someone who knows the system well to work with customers to guide them with things they want to know, need to know or anything they need help with. I would organize my business by having employees that understands my vision and value. I would have a number of 5 employees for different things. The roles are someone who would be able to explain what I need in my product to students who are looking for housing, another person will explain to me what will be the best set up location for my product, and my role will be to give a reasonable price that will meet needs for college students to switch to this new product.

    

   2.       The feedback that I got from my what’s next were helpful for me in a way that I could continue in the direction I was headed in. I received feedback from other students saying things like it’s a great idea for me to choose a market with people that may not be able to afford living in places that are expensive, finding ways to build loyalty from customers in giving services that will make them come back for repurchasing. From another post I received that it would be a great idea for me to expand low costing apartments to other universities and not just one. Also I received helpful feedback from someone saying “My only suggestion is to figure out how the financial aspects of your business work and find how to make money through your services.”  

   3.       If I were to change my venture I would do it in a sense of building housing for those who are trying to find financial help but is struggling to get the financial help. But to be fair they would have to sign an agreement deal to where if they can’t find a job in a certain amount pay for the time they stayed at this venture they would have to find a new home.

Shawn Davis

30A – Final Reflection

            Throughout this semester reading through all of my post the highs that I’ve had were the ones of getting the opportunity to get none bias feedback from strangers that supported my idea. The most formative experience throughout this course that I will remember years later is the ideas that I came up with, how to make my ideas better, also the experiences of this course taught me to never give up and keep pushing yourself until you succeed on your journey. From the beginning of this course to this moment I see myself as a better entrepreneur the knowledge and mindset that I’ve gained from this semester from getting knowledge and the feedback from others in the course helped me increase my skills in this type of career. The advice that would recommend for students who would be going down this path in the future is even though you might see your career come to an stopping point or a decrease in anything never give up on your dreams push harder. 

Shawn Davis

27A – Reading Reflection No. 3

            The autobiography I read was “Shoe Dog”. What surprised me the most while reading this was how big people perceived Nike to be today compared to how many times he has failed along the way to get Nike off of the ground. Another thing that was surprising to me is that Nike just started out with just shoes and that it started with a fifty dollar wire from Phil’s dad. While reading his autobiography what I admired out of Phil the mot was that he never gave up even when things seemed to have no hope and was in a huge financial hold. The thing that I least admired is when Phil thought that he had to lie to the people in japan in order to get more business from them. The entrepreneur did face adversity and failure throughout his journey to becoming Nike. One part of the reading that did confuse me was hoe Phil kept blowing through money and how he was able to function without the employees that you would assume a company like that to have in order to function. If I were able to ask Phil two questions I would ask him how this impact did on his family and if he has any regrets regarding that.  

Shawn Davis

28A – Your Exit Strategy

            My exit plan of my business would be me staying with the business for several decades and when it’s time for retirement I would keep my business within the family to protect the venture and keep it as a family business passing it down to my children. I’ve selected this particular exit strategy because I want to keep a constant income coming in to provide for my family for a life time instead of them just having a pile of money sitting there that can run out at any time of their young lives. This influenced my growth because before this class I would have said something like I would sell my business for a larger amount. But now the smart thing would be to keep my business because it would make more money than what I would sell it for.

Shawn Davis

26A – Celebrating Failure

            Celebrating my failure when I was younger I tried several times of attempting to do a back flip. When I was in elementary I would always hang out with the older kids, they were either in a high grade or in middle school. All of us went to after school care together and once we get there and finish our homework we would be free to play and all of the older guys knew how to flip and I wanted to learn how to flip so bad but every time I attempted to flip I seem to never control my body to do the flip. For weeks straight I failed at trying to get my body to flip until one day I tried to do a back flip I controlled my body to flip but It was a half flip my body wouldn’t go straight back my flips would go sideways. I never gave up I would practice flipping every day I had free time, as weeks go by I just stood there and jumped high as I can and threw my body backwards and I did a perfect back flip just to see if I can do it again before bragging about it I tried it again and I landed my second time, the next day in after school camp I was bragging about me knowing how to flip and all of the bigger kids came running saying let me see flip. When I went to show them I jumped so high and did the back flip everyone started flipping celebrating something I failed at for weeks. I learned that if you really want to do something and you are eager to learn to do it never give up.

          

         Failure to me is something you continue to fail at and you give up on it letting failure get the best of you. The way I handle failure is if I fail at something I would emotionally get myself together and do things differently from the first time I failed at what I’m repeating. this class has changed my perspective on things because dealing with our venture concept I continued to come up with ideas to make my idea better and hoe to be successful and I never gave up on coming up with ideas so I could stay away from my business failing.

Shawn Davis

25A – What’s next?

            Exiting market

Step 1. What’s next will be that there will be enough college housing provided for the college students to live in places without having trouble finding a place close to campus to live.

Step 2. After interviewing my three customers they gave me the idea of plan to always have extra connections than you think you need also to have a better understanding of the city to be able to build and expand upon college house in what’s already in a limited space. The things they might want next is cheaper housing once they have the simply that they have they’re going to want housing to be cheaper.

Step 3. Based on my expectations and feedback I’ve received form customers they most common things that make sense to me is to continue to create housing for college students, also to not only create housing for one college but also create housing for other colleges in numerous cities or even states at lower rates than the other expensive housing. Also due to the feedback I’ve receive in the future it will help me know the things that the customers will be interested in so for future housing that I will be providing I can expand and put extra thought into it.

            

            New market

Step 1. The part of society I would target is the poor. Where the funds aren’t coming from government funding and needs.

Step 2. The way I would create value for people in the market is by showing them why the need is there. The value would be helping the community and also helping the people that needs the help.

Step 3. The feedback I got from my interview that can help me be successful in this market is by providing people housing for the people who are having trouble with finding a job and provide them with a place to stay until they find themselves a job to where they can pay a certain amount of money.

Step 4. The thing I learned about this new market is that it’s really a great opportunity to help people that needs to be help until they get to a place in life to actually live not yet a perfect but a great life to give back to those who helped them until they were on their feet. I was surprised from the feedback I got from the people I interviewed on their thought of helping people that are struggling that are trying to find a job. My expectations and assumptions were correct. The new market is attractive as my second because you are helping those to bring more value to your businesses by looking out for those that will possibly promote your business to others.

Shawn Davis

24A – Venture Concept No. 1

My venture concept is based on the need of college housing in college towns. This opportunity comes from the analysis that in college towns it is hard for college students to locate an affordable college housing close to campus. This opportunity typically applies to those who are your typical undergrad but specifically students who are pass their freshman year of college. The changes are that colleges are admitting more and more students through the flexibility of online classes. With this trend there are more students then campus housing can hold which is why students tend to look for affordable housing close to college campuses. This is only happening in college town demographically the population is made up of 18 – 25 year old college students that are still financially being supported by their parents when it comes dealing with paying for housing. Typically while their undergrads parents are still paying for their housing due to them being full time students and not being able to have enough time to work jobs. Customers are satisfying this need by getting friendly referrals. Students that are still not familiar with the college town often go live in neighborhoods that they know their friends already live in or somewhere that their friends recommend them staying in. They are still loyal because they often stay in that place until they are getting ready to graduate. They are more loyal to the referral and not the product itself. This opportunity is big because there are colleges everywhere with students that are from 50 to 60 thousand plus students. This opportunity will be last for years because cities and colleges can only get so big so eventually we will run out of space. The product that I will be providing is more spacing for college students to be able to live closer to college campuses at a price that can be affordable for them to live great and also enjoy it. My plan is to work with other people on campus that will promote the college housing that I’m going to be setting up at affordable rates. Also I would partner with a group that would be willing to share my vision support my business plans. The reasons for me to think that customers will switch to my product is because it will be close to campus also it will be affordable for them to live in. It wouldn’t be hard due to the help I would have from my peer by promoting the product and giving them information on how cheaper my product would be compared to the others. The competitors are the other business people that own other college housing. They don’t have the option to provide people with different housing opportunities. They only have so much to offer they can’t over sell things. For packaging, price points, customer support, and customer experiences I would have a person that has patients, interact with people and someone who knows the system well to work with customers to guide them with things they want to know, need to know or anything they need help with. I would organize my business by having employees that understands my vision and value. I would have a number of 5 employees for different things. The roles are someone who would be able to explain what I need in my product to students who are looking for housing, another person will explain to me what will be the best set up location for my product, and my role will be to give a reasonable price that will meet needs for college students to switch to this new product.

Shawn Davis

23A – Your Venture’s Unfair Advantage

   1.      Connections I have made

   2.      Personable

   3.      Previous costumer

   4.      Social capital

   5.      Well-known name

   6.      Good understanding of the market

   7.      Able to give people things to their interest

   8.      Easily to interact with

   9.      Great understanding the need of this type of market

  10.  Social understanding to keep providing in this market

Based off of my VRIN the most valuable resource that I have is my social capital. Social capital is important because you need a group of people that also understands the market the same way you do or even understand it a little better to help with things and also give ideas and feed back to things that would make you sell things more. Also you need a group of people to invest and want to support you as a person.      

Shawn Davis

21A – Reading Reflection No. 2

            “How to fail at almost everything and still win big” by Scott Adams is about how one should be able to invite failure into their lives and how to embrace it and how to have it do the most for you that you can. There are parts in the book that are very real bout how not everyone success is going to be the same and how to achieve your big goals. Thins book enhanced what I learned in ENT in many ways specifically with the idea of being creative in what you do. Just like in class with the activity of the idea napkins it is always best with ideas to be blatantly creative with them. One of the ideas that was addressed in this book was that you need to be able to depend on people for being responsible in the process of achieving your goals. The biggest thing that I learned from this book that surprised me that in the promotion it is sometimes necessary to be selfish and that to me was shocking to because some people would deter you from being selfish saying it’s a bad trait to have. But he author of this book is saying that it’s something you’re going to need to have in order to be successful.

Shawn Davis

19A – Idea Napkin No. 2

            The feedback that I received on my napkin 1 is feedback that has allowed me to know that I would keep my same information on my second napkin. I would still consider it to be important to know the location of the services that are needed and feel that it is still important to keep this information.

Shawn Davis

20A – Growing Your Social Capital

1.      Domain expert in my industry.

The person I chose to network with for the section was Susan from The Ridge. I was able to contact her by email provided by the ridge for the person to contact for the market and selling for the property of selling. The ridge is something that is provided for off campus students in search for housing. By reaching out to Susan and having had make contact with her she now knows that I’m also interested into the same business and market and that I have the unique age and other things as the other students that are trying to find public housing.

2.      Expert in my market.

I networked with the contact in athletics who does researches and documents like housing opportunities for housing that is available for college students in the area. We are similar in areas because she makes sure that things are organized for move in dates and she also go over leases with the students that are trying to move in to off campus housing by connecting with her we both know that people are not wanting live alone they want to live with two to three roommates that are there friends from the same or another sport.

3.      Important supplier to my industry.

Sam Morre who works for Parrish McCall. I reached out to him through email listed on their website. They are a contractor company that supplies majority of construction for college housing in the area. There was a need for me to talk to them to predict the admission the insights of how many college students are going to be coming to UF and other students that are going to need college housing.

Reflection

            The people I talked to are people who worked with getting students situated with college housing or either build the housing that college students are moving to. Susan is a property manager, Shawnee is someone that works with athletics that research documents for off campus housing she also helps with on campus housing, and Sam is a constructor. I found and interacted with them because they are people that I’m aware of but not familiar with. By getting all these people included into my network it will allow me to better understand what the need is in this business.

Shawn Davis

Create a Customer Avatar

            

             Creating an avatar for my product of college housing would look like somebody between the ages of 18 – 25. This avatar can be both male and female it’s no specific gender. These cliental typically will be single unmarried students that do not have children either. Their hobbies will be things such as hanging out with friends, partying and shopping. Shows that this type of customer watch would be shows like power, love & hip-hop, and things such as series on Netflix and Hulu. Typically they are not spending time reading book as often or really getting involved with local politics. People that are in this age group typically are impatient, want everything that’s in interest, and want things bigger and better than what we have.

Shawn Davis

What’s Your Secret Sauce?

             

             Committed – I’m committed to my teammates to win on Saturdays. I play my hardest every time I step onto the football field.

           

             Humble – I’m not a cocky person through success. Being successful in football when doing well I still play as if I’m not having success.

          

             Loyal – when it comes to my real friends I am always there. If my friends ask me for things I always give to them without wanting in return.

           

             Dependable – when I’m ask to remind someone or ask for advice always there. If someone I’m close to needs to be somewhere at a certain time and I tell them I would be able to do so I would keep my word.

         

             Focus – I let nothing distract me. On Friday one day before my games I turn my phone on airplane mode.

Interview 1: Shawn is goal oriented, doesn’t settle for anything but the best, loves honesty, someone that respects fairness, also shows gratitude for things around him.

Interview 2: Shawn is loyal, dependable, really athletic, smart, and educated.

Interview 3: Shawn is impatient, takes compliments very well, a reserved person, a very skilled individual, also like a lot of peace in life.

Interview 4: Shawn is very flexible with sports, committed, capable of overcoming anything, clear minded, and dependable.

Interview 5: Shawn is dependable, dominant at sports, humble, consistent, and eager.

Reflection:

Most people thought of me mostly the same way I thought of myself.

Shawn Davis

15A – Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 2

I interviewed three people who are all walk on athletes from all different sports, one softball, one football, and one soccer. They all said similar things to where they start looking for close and affordable college housing. They all either started looking for college dorms primarily their sophomore year after a year spent on campus. They start looking for things that they typically can afford if holding a job or something that their parents can afford. Typically that another part that they mentioned is that it’s hard for roommates and to figure out what their approach is looking for house off campus as well.

They typically say that how they go about buying housing off campus includes driving around, looking onto online websites. Their biggest sources of finding college housing is through friends and roommates that are already off campus. The problem that they run into is that they are just being referred to be places that they only know about and not new places. This is sometimes why people run into problems like places already being filled or not being able to accommodate them.

People find that after they have found their off campus housing is that they continue to move because they are not happy with the place they found first. Overall the interviewers feel like they didn’t have the rightness that they are looking for. Overall people are unhappy with the stage of the purchasing of the product which in this case is affordable college housing.

Shawn Davis

13A – Reading Reflection No. 1

1.      The thing that surprised me the most was Ray Kroc who was the founder of McDonald’s did not have instance success because the fact it’s so successful now. The thing that I most admired about Ray Kroc as an entrepreneur is that he had futuristic mindset that allowed his to see what would basically succeed in the future. Reading the book I think it’s fair to say that there is nothing I didn’t admire about Ray. Ray defiantly encountered adversity throughout his journey of creating McDonalds what it is today. One of the examples of this is when he got screwed on his paper cup company and was struggling to live off of the income he was making afterwards, which showed the level of resiliency he had.

2.      One of the competencies that he had in his entrepreneurship was finding out the need in the people of the market so he saw that the global world was looking for products that would decomposed easily in the future. This is how he had such great success in the paper cup business.

3.      One part of the reading that you would have looked at that you would like to know more about so it wouldn’t be so confusing is how he became business partners with the McDonalds brothers so easily.

4.       When did you know that McDonalds would become as big of a company as big as it is? What made you so intrigued by meeting people’s needs with products? I would ask these questions because one day I would like to have a business of my own.

5.      Ray believed in hard work because that’s the main thing that go him through and also to be successful in his business. Yes I do share this opinion.

Shawn Davis

14A- Halfway Reflection

   

   1.      The things that I have used to keep up with the requirements for this course is the way manage time the way I complete assignments, keeping up with some of the current trends with what people’s needs are, to become comfortable with the whole blogging process, also making sure I leave time to interview people between assignments.

   

   2.      I’m someone who doesn’t give up on things easily. I have an understanding that the work I do in this class can contribute to things down the time line in my life.

  

   3.      The first tip I would give someone for the next semester is be aware of problems around the world. Don’t be afraid to solve the problem no matter how difficult it may seem. Have support into finding the thing that is causing the problem by interviewing people and getting their thoughts on the problem.

Shawn Davis

Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 1

The three people that I interviewed were college students between the age of 18 and 21, two girls and one guy. They become aware of their need for college housing when they are forced to find a place on their own specifically sophomore year of college. The need arises when they are struggling to find a place that’s close to campus that is at the time they are trying to make the transition out of college housing. Typically they are trying to solve their problem through word of mouth from people who have been through the problem but it seems to not fix the problem itself. If they choose to not continue to search for college housing due to frustration then that is a problem itself. All three of these people I interview you can make the conclusion that their problems are all very similar for college housing.

Shawn Davis

 Idea Napkin No. 1

1.      My name is Shawn Davis I attend and also play football for the University of Florida my skills is that in a very fast learner, I’m also a great listener when it comes to learner things or being taught something new. I hope be a relator in the future after my football career. And to find the need of customers.  

2.      The product that I’m selling is easy accessible housing to college students. The common thing that all my customers have in common is that they are having trouble finding housing on or close to college campuses when it is mandatory to be in local to attend in person classes.

3.      I’m offering housing to college students. Typically college students that are going to be under four year graduates.

4.      I care because it’s something myself have experienced and know the hardship that it can cause.

5.      Going to have to work alongside other people to obtain this goal.

Shawn Davis

9A – Testing the Hypothesis, Part 2

           

                I interviewed five of my teammates form the Florida football team. All of these people were selected because they should have the problem of not being able to five college housing but because they are student athletes this process is handled for them because of their scholarship. Their need differs from other people because it’s not necessarily the student athlete themselves that are struggling first hand like somebody else who would be looking for college housing. They may be upset with the type of housing they get not the problem of getting it itself. The why to this situation also has a large part to do with scholarships because of their status as a student athlete.

Inside the boundary	Outside the boundary
College students without scholarships.	College students with scholarship.
Need housing that they are finding themselves.	Need housing coordinator that finds the housing for them.
To attend college.	To attend college.

Shawn Davis

8A – Solving The Problem

My opportunity is a shortage of housing on college campuses. My solution is for the colleges to build more housing on campuses in a way that it doesn’t affect no one’s living situation or build anything to no one’s dislike. Colleges should be able to monitor and be able to provide the amount of housing for college students that they allow to enroll into the university. 

Shawn Davis

7A – Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

   1.      The opportunity I chose is a shortage of housing on college campuses.

   2.       

·         Who: This impact college students.

·         What: Upper classman are forces to move out after freshman year due to a shortage of housing on campus.

·         Why: they have to be next to campus in order to attend class.

3. 3.                 ·         Testing the who: The population of the city that the school is in. The parents of the students.

·         Testing the what: This is maybe worst in some college towns or others. Some people can have permission to stay on college campus all four years.

·         Testing the why: Amount of money spent on housing. Some properties make housing more expensive than it should be due to limited housing.

   4.      After interview my 5 people I got the sum of who, what and why does a shortage in college housing affect people. Dealing with the who’s in this situation it affects the students that attends the college, another who it can affect is the residence of the city, also this can be affected with how they go about to fix this problem. The what in this situation people would agree to not letting upper class man stay for long periods of time to resolve this confusion. People are going to start complaining about colleges are just letting people in who are wasting time and also college being outside of their infrastructure.

Shawn Davis

6A - Identifying Opportunities

1.     1. One opportunity is that people are looking for housing on college campuses.

(a)   https://www.educationdive.com/news/colleges-respond-to-housing-shortages-by-looking-off-campus/531555/

(b)   That their short on houses for college student.

(c)   The costumers are college students

(d)   This can be an easy thing other than needing space. It’s easy because it’s many people that are willing to exploit this to a housing developer to create more housing for people to live.

2.      2. The second opportunity that is found is a shortage in teachers.

(a)   http://neatoday.org/2019/04/03/how-bad-is-the-teacher-shortage/

(b)   A shortage for teachers in the U.S.

(c)   Schools need the product of teachers.

(d)   The shortage of teachers are falling from colleges are not falling out new educators.

3.     3.  An opportunity that recently just happened is a shortage of water.

(a)   https://www.miamiherald.com/news/weather/hurricane/article234468777.html

(b)   Shortage of water before a storm.

(c)   State of Florida needed bottles of water due to the storm approach.

(d)   A more local company so the water doesn’t have to travel, be delivered or have to go through different states to get to those who need it.  

4.    4.  Food scarcity in America.

(a)   https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2019-05-01/food-insecurity-in-america-tied-to-food-prices-poverty

(b)   People who can’t access food in America.

(c)   The United States as a whole needs control for better prices as a whole for food.

(d)   More grocery stores and more farmers can fix the world food insecurity.

Shawn Davis

My Opportunity Belief

1.      Beginning point – I believe that there is a group of people that are unsatisfied with their college experiences because of the cost of text books.

2.      The belief – People need a college degree in order to be successful in society. Each semester their professor are demanding a specific reading that is required for that class with no alternatives giving in this process and many time the options they are required to buy or rent these books from are bigger than the school its self

 3.      The Protypical Customer – Someone who wants to pursue a college degree typically between their 20s – 30s years of age.

  4.      Iteration No.1 – Chelsea late 20s professional – Master’s degree – she has completed her undergrad and Master’s degree at two different schools the cost of text books at each school were always something that wasn’t covered by loans or scholarships it seem as a concern about how they were going to be paid for she also was never sure what options she truly had based on what book she can buy.  

Iteration No.2 – Michelle early 30s - professional – bachelor’s degree – master’s degree – gymnast athlete - she completed her bachelor’s degree and master’s degree all from the University of Arkansas she experienced no difficulties for text books because she was an athlete. But she have an opinion about text books being over priced for non-athletic students that attend universities.

Iteration No. 3 – Alison early 30s – professional – two bachelor’s degrees – master degree – working on doctor’s degree completed bachelors and masters at two different schools at two different schools she feels that they are overpriced with them being useless being hard back also she thinks that they create new versions of books which makes them cost even more money and that professors don’t use them enough for them to cost so much money.  

   5.      Reflect – That the cost of book and being able to access them changes the potential of your success.

  6.      Summary – Your opportunity still exist after my interview because text books are still expensive and they prohibit people from being successful in their education.