Dominant expert in industry: Employee at a storage
unit facility
1)
This person works at a storage unit facility,
and he helped me move my things from my apartment into storage in Gainesville
for the summer; I have kept his contact information for any concerns about my
storage unit
2)
This person fills the slot of “dominant expert
in industry.” This is because he is very knowledgeable about the security for
the storage units, and I want to be able to implement a similar locking system
in my product.
3)
When I had to leave Gainesville due to coronavirus
and all classes moving online, I began the task of moving out of my apartment
so that I wouldn’t have to worry about it right about now. In the midst of this
with just my roommate and our moms, this employee helped us with the process
and also taught us how to properly open and close our storage unit. He gave us
his contact information in case we had anymore questions, so I just sent him a
text asking for information and advice on what best to use for my product.
4)
Having created goodwill between us by helping my
mom and I with our moving-out process, he is someone I am comfortable asking for
help and advice from.
5)
Because of his knowledge about the security used
for the storage units, I can learn from him and figure out how to implement a
similar system for my idea.
Expert on market: Owner of a bow-making business with
a similar target segment
1)
This person used to run a business selling
custom handmade hair bows, often dealing with the mothers of many of my classmates growing up.
2)
She fills in the slot of the “expert on my
market.” This is because she primarily sold to middle aged women with young
daughters, thus capitalizing on mothers’ natural yearning to do things for
their children.
3)
I found the person because she is one of my high
school classmate’s mothers. I first contacted my old classmate and thus was
able to establish contact with her mother. With a phone call, I asked her if
she could give me any insight on how to deal with and create close
relationships with consumers in my target segment.
4)
Having known each other for some time now, I
believe we have sufficient goodwill. I would sometimes to go over her house to
hang out with her daughter, and I was able to build a sort of rapport with her.
5)
I believe this person will enhance my ability to
capitalize on my business venture because of her experience in dealing with my
target segment. She knows how to speak to and conduct business with middle-aged
mothers, and I think that that is very important for me.
Important supplier to industry: Manager at local
materials manufacturer
1)
This person is a manager at a local material’s
manufacturer, and has several years of experience in materials I am thinking of
using for my project.
2)
This person fills the slot of “important
supplier to industry.” This is because as a manager at a materials
manufacturer, I would be able to learn about and choose from the materials I
want to make my lock box product out of.
3)
My father has been friends with this person for
many years, and I was able to ask him if he knew anyone that worked with materials.
He then gave me his friend’s contact information and I called him and asked for
an explanation of what best materials to use for my product.
4)
This person has a friendship with my father, and
thus a sufficient amount of goodwill with my family to help me.
5) I will be able to exploit an opportunity with what I learn from this person’s knowledge and experience. More importantly, I will be able to finalize some aspect of the design for my product.
Reflection:
This experience showed me how to actively seek what I need
from people when I network. Instead of just meeting whoever I can, I learned to
instead focus on what certain people can offer me in terms of information,
advice, and resources. This does differ from my previous experiences, because I
have usually just met with and asked people about what they do, not with any
targeted mission in mind. Overall, I really liked this assignment, and I can
see it helping me in the future.
Great job on this. I think your network is unique in that it is quite personal, an example of this being the employee from the storage unit facility who helped you move. I think your overall approach to this assignment was very creative in my mind, where I think most people would reach out into a commercial/professional world they have yet to understand, you decided to keep your immediate network close to home. I think having social capital like this can later provide you with ideas and solutions that may be unorthodox in comparison to what is expected, and give your product a real chance to be truly differentiated from the rest. I also like the fact that someone in your network is already an entrepreneur. The information and guidance that someone with that type of experience (you included) can provide is invaluable. I think your network is very well rounded and surely capable enough to propel you towards success.
ReplyDeleteHi Sophia,
ReplyDeleteI think you did a great job on this exercise. It seems like your choices for the interviews were well thought out and that you had a unique and natural connection with each of them. I'm glad that you could gain some experience seeking out and interviewing people for a purpose. This was my first time doing this as well, and it showed me that I never even thought about what a valuable network I have. It seems like you might have had a similar realization. It's really nice knowing you have trusted people in your life who can help your business.