21A - Reading Reflection 2

The Art of Social Media: Power Tips for Power Users, Guy Kawasaki

1. This book's theme is quite literal with its title. It is a book designed to give strategies on one's social media. It guides you with strategies on how to attract more followers, build your foundation, amass digital assets, optimize your profile, and effectively integrate social media and blogging. There are over 100 different tips that can help the reader effectively improve his or her social media strategy.
2. Social media definitely connects with what we are learning in this class. Nowadays social media is part of a products key marketing strategy. Since most people in the world are on social media right now, it is a very effective way to extend your reach and really get your name out there. You almost cannot probably market or advertise a product nowadays without needing to have some sort of presence on social media.
3. One of the strategies in the book was that you treat social media like its a business. One of exercises I would design based off this would be some sort of competition involving followers. Create a page from scratch; you are allowed to follow and friend 10 different people in order to have a base. After that you cannot add anymore people; you just need to post some sort of content in the hope that those 10 people will want to spread your page. By the end of the week, whoever has the most followers will win some sort of prize. If you treat it like a business and not like a hobby you will probably win the competition.
4. One of the aha moments I had while reading this book was that you have to create content about what the fans want and not what you necessarily want. It was a surprise for me because I always thought you would be most successful at doing what you enjoy. If you do something solely for the fans then your content might become weaker because you would be less passionate about it. I do not know if I necessarily agree with this strategy.

22A - Elevator Pitch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=720n8cGaB7E

I did not change my elevator pitch at all for a couple reasons. Most of the feedback I received was generally positive and I felt as if I did not need to change anything. For those few comments that did suggest a change, I disagreed with them. One comment told me to add in housing options to my elevator pitch. Housing, however, was never part of my product and thus I did not feel like I needed to add that. Some people thought it still should have been a little bit longer. I explained though in my previous post that the short length of the pitch was by design. I had no intention of making it longer. I am quite satisfied with the way my pitch turned out.

20A - Growing Your Capital

1. Domain Expert: Hakan Buruk
• Hakan Buruk is my former soccer coach from the Galatasary Academy in Istanbul, Turkey. Coach Buruk has been coaching soccer for the past 15 years and was a professional soccer player before that. He has all the money he needs, but has a passion for developing the youth in to the next soccer stars for Turkey. He would be my head trainer and will have most control over how the system actually is. I had facetimed him earlier this week to ask him about his opinion on this imaginary project and he thought it was quite interesting. He totally see the market and would honestly consider a new opportunity like this had it been real. He has a whole bunch of experience in in the field of player development and would contribute greatly. In addition, he would add to the product with his large network of former players and trainers who can help market and help these young players.
2. Market Expert: Necati Guler
• Necati Guler is the head of Turkish National Basketball Team's youth academies and teams. Although it is a different sport the process Mr. Guler does with scouting youth players and getting the right means of development for them is quite similar to soccer. He would be beneficial in scouting and researching what youth players would need this service. Necati Guler actually was the one who organized my internship at the Turkish Basketball Federation. He is also my uncle's former high school teammate and very close friend. He has a huge network of scouts under his belt and would contribute in research greatly. We discussed this all over WhatsApp.
3. Important Supplier: Zeki Dogan
• Zeki Dogan is the CEO of Nike based in Istanbul, Turkey. Nike is a huge sports supplier and would be able to help me tremendously with soccer equipment and gear. Zeki is my father's good friend and had provided internships for cousins a few years ago. He has a very entrepreneur style view on business and does not hesitate to try something new. I know he would be willing to help me out a little bit as long as the deal is fair. I talked with him over the phone when he was at our house the other day. 
4. Reflection
• This experience would help me a little bit in the future as if I ever do have a future business I will need to create a team. I would do so in a similar approach as this exercise and see what each expert can bring to the table. I would not say that this really was not different to previous networking experiences I have had. One reason is because I never really created a product and never needed to do something like this in my life.

19A - Idea Napkin 2

1. I am currently a senior majoring in Sport Management at the University of Florida. Some of my skills include being easy to work with, being open-minded, the ability to communicate well with others, as well as being able to manage time well. Some past experiences I have include working as an equipment manager for the lacrosse team, as well as working in the marketing and media department of the Turkish Basketball Federation and FIBA, the world governing body of all basketball. I have always wanted to be involved with scouting talent and developing them in soccer or basketball. I see a bigger need for development and scouting talent in soccer more in the United States, however. My concept is an academy where American youth can learn to develop their soccer skills in a European style based system. I would play a huge role in it as I would have to really market it well and I would have to scout all over the nation to see who would play for the academy. My role would also be developing them to a point where they garner European interest at a much younger age. While I do not have much coaching experience, it would be my responsibility to find and hire those that can coach.
2. I am offering a European style based training academy for soccer in the United States. It will be an academy that hopes to accelerate the development of youth here as well as connect them with European clubs at an earlier age. This would not only help the athletes but also the nation as we would become a bigger soccer power as a result.
3. I am offering this to aspiring soccer players of both genders between the ages of 8-21. These youth should have a strong drive to want to become an elite soccer player for their nation and be able to be successful abroad. 
4. Consumers will care as I am offering something very unique that can not give a chance for the youth to develop but also develop soccer in our nation as a whole. Through my connections, I would be able to higher credible trainers as well as connect them to clubs in Europe to get a head start.
5. I would be set apart with the fact I have experienced both systems and as a result can identify the strengths and weaknesses in both to come up with the perfect combination. I also believe that my passion for game and developing talent is quite explicit and should entice adults to send their kids to my academy.
6. I believe that all these elements fit together well and will lead to me delivering a successful product. I have the tools to really help develop the youth soccer here, which can be attractive to the demographic I have selected. You cannot really do this job if you do not have the passion from the beginning. The weakest part of my business concept might be credibility with my name. That is why I need to make sure I can hire the right credible trainers or credible spokespersons to help start up my concept.

Reflection:

I had received only one comment as feedback and it was one that I really did not agree with. As a result, I did not change my idea napkin. The feedback I received was that I should work within the system to improve it rather than bring a completely new system. That goes against my concept completely, however. The point of my service is that it is a completely different system to the current one because the current one has not been working at all. That was the only point that person made and I do not have takeaways from it.

18A - Creating a Customer Avatar

This is my customer avatar Jose. Jose is a huge soccer fan, who lives in Miami. He is 15 and currently plays for the newly developed Inter Miami CF's academy team but is said by many scouts that he has the potential to go abroad. Jose's dream is to be like Cristiano Ronaldo and play for Real Madrid one day. He loves him so much he even styles his hair like him.

Jose wants to be the best soccer player he can be, but his parents want him to get an education. They want him to get a scholarship and attend the University of Virginia, which has one of the best college soccer programs and is known as a great school. Jose believes he is already better than some of these college players however. His life has always been soccer and the only things he watches and plays is soccer. He believes he can already be a pro at this age; he just needs the right connections and proper European training. This is why he is my prototypical customer.

The only real common things I have with Jose is that we are both huge fans of soccer and that I used to also play for a soccer academy except it was DC United when I was 11. I was never good enough to be pro, however, let alone play in college. I do not think it is a coincidence we both love soccer. He is a big time player and I want to be involved in his development. We are also both foreign from countries where soccer is the main sport. I believe Jose is my ideal prototypical customer.

17A - Elevator Pitch 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=720n8cGaB7E&feature=youtu.be

In my second elevator pitch I chose to listen to some feedback I was given from my first one. I had received three comments and all of them had said I had started out great but cut it a bit short. They also said I did not reveal a lot of information that would have been needed. Some people suggested that I include a bit too much information like my target audience and overnight options. In my opinion 90 seconds is honestly long for an elevator pitch. The pitch should be short and reveal just enough that it is going to make your audience ask questions. If I had revealed too much then no one would have been asking my anything about the audience and age groups. My first one was short and got three people to ask these questions showing it was interesting enough for them to want to learn more.

I did extend this pitch a little bit longer than the last one but not by too much. I included information about costs, which in my opinion are a bit cheap for the product but my segment believed that was a good price, and I included one of my services, which is introducing some of these young players to agents around the world.

15A - Figuring Out Buyer Behavior No. 2

1. The three people I chose to interview were three of my fraternity brothers. One is not interested in sports at all; one is is a big sports fan, but not a huge soccer fan, and the last one is just as big of a soccer fan as I am. All three are seniors.
2. All three of these students have different opinions on the youth soccer development in the United States. For the person who was not a fan of any sports, he did not really care for soccer development at all. For him, alternatives were other sports like college football, which is the closest thing to sports he follows. He did not care about prices, he just simply did not have an interest at all. The person who likes sports but not soccer listed a bunch of different sports he does follow as alternatives. He said the marketing of these other sports is probably a reason why he follows them more as soccer is not marketed that heavily here. He does believe that is a market for development of youth players but because of so many different sports already available. My brother who is a huge soccer fan sees huge potential for this idea. He said if America continues bringing in stars than that would attract consumers then the alternatives would lessen and more people would support the idea of better youth soccer development.
3. All of my interviewees said they would prefer handling purchases online. They state that the convenience of not leaving your home trumps having to go to the place and buy. All of them also preferred paying by card rather than cash because they simply always have their cards on them but never have cash.
4. For my interviewees, they thought that if they ended up using the product for a decent amount of time then they would feel right about the about the purchase. They said that even if they did not necessarily love the product if they actually put it to use then they would still feel right about the purchase. On the contrary if they did not use the product at all then they feel it is a waste of money.
5. I would say that this segment generally leans toward marketing as a main way for them to get attracted to the product. They all believe that if they were more aware of soccer in the United States then my prospective product would probably succeed more.