The Twenty Percent

For this assignment I will be interviewing a local doctor I know who has established his own practice and made a living through hard-work and perseverance. He specializes in internal medicine. He does not feel comfortable giving his name out or being in a video, because he's talking about his customers.

1) He thinks his customers are people who need medical advice or treatment.
He says his customers unmet needs are doctors who take time with them while other doctors want the appointment to be as quick as possible. He says that he cares about his patients concerns and wants to help answer any of their questions.
His customers typically find him, though he does use some marketing strategies.
His customers are around early 20s to anything older. He says that the media they consume most would be television while his younger target customers use internet, he gets a majority of his customers through his reputation and word-of-mouth.

2) Customer videos:

3) I think he does understand his customers. He knows what they want and need and he is able to fulfill that need.  However, from the interviews it doesn't seem apparent that the customers understand the time he takes for them compared to other doctors.

Week 8 Reading Reflection

1) I was most surprised by the fact that it isn't in the best interest of the company to go public. I assumed that would help increase revenue and profits.

2) I don't think I fully understand what debt financing is.

3) I would ask the author about the best approach of finding investors for a new venture is. I would also ask the author if they had any interesting stories from a time when they may have needed to find an investor.

4) I don't think the author was wrong on anything.

Half-way Reflection

1) I have created many skills for this course. First, I check my canvas regularly every day now much before the hour of 9pm so I can make sure everything is done for this class. I also have had to break out of my shell for several of the assignments, like interviewing customers or "free money." I have also had to practice good time management.

2) Not related to this course, I can think of a few times I felt like giving up. Usually do to overwhelming from tests or when my job was asking a lot of me. I felt like giving up but I realized that it would be difficult only temporary but I would be better off if I didn't give up and I persevered.

3) Three skills I would offer: 1) Work ahead, 2) Remember this class is about improving you, and to improve you must do things that are harder than what you've done before 3) Pain is only temporary.

Week 7 Reading Reflection

1) I'm surprised that companies started using ideal people for advertisements in the 1970s. I guess I assumed that spokespeople or just using beautiful people for advertisements was a thing for much longer than that.

2) I'm confused by why companies continue to use marketing segmentation even though the studies reveal that it is not the most effective thing.

3) What demographic is the least effective to market to, if any? Who should be in control of the segmentation studies and who uses the results most effectively?

4) I don't disagree with anything or think they were wrong, I'm just surprised by how much goes into the marketing of some products. You would think that marketers just trying to think of the most receptive advertisements but it can be so much more complicated.

Free Money

1) For this exercise I'm going to outside my apartment complex where there is almost a constant flow of people entering and exiting the building, and easy place to find someone to interrupt.

2) I am going to approach people who are typical college age. These kids are usually tight on cash and would likely take money more willingly.

3) I'm going to start this out by asking people if they want a dollar. I'm trying to think of this from my perspective and I think I would probably be weirded and and reject the money.

4) I'm going to say that I'm trying to do something nice.

5) Out of the 5 attempts, I think I will be able to give 4/5 away. After: I actually only gave 2 away. I think the people who rejected it were suspicious of the camera, thinking I was 'pranking' them or something.

2 interactions: 

This exercise was more difficult than first anticipated. I was kind of upset when reading about this assignment because I didn't want to lose $5, in the end I only lost $2. I think that the camera made it more difficult because people thought it was fishy. If I wanted to make it easier I would have approached homeless people because I could have given $5 away. I did suspect that people would be hesitant, people don't give out money for no reason!

Elevator Pitch No. 2

1) The Pitch:


2) A lot of people commented saying that the idea was feasible and might do well. One issue that several people have mentioned from the pitch and from my interviews is to make sure the cost stays low. Of course, if people didn't want to clean themselves they would hire a cleaning service but those can be very expensive this would be cheaper hopefully. That is why the bidding system is implemented too.

3) I need to aim the idea at several demographics, first is students who party and hate cleaning the mess, the second is students who are so busy they are unable to clean the mess. Sometimes I actually find myself in both demographics. Someone I interviewed the other day also mentioned that the elderly could use this because cleaning can be strenuous at times, which I thought was a good idea.

Customer Interviews No. 3

These interviews are for the mobile application idea I had called Squeaky Clean. The app is like uber, but instead of being for taxis it's for cleaning your apartment, especially if it's after a party or something similar. The user would videotape their environment and people who work as cleaners for the app would see it and would bid in a reverse auction style. That way, the user gets the cheapest price.

1) I will be asking 3 questions per interview.

1. What are your first thoughts about the app?
2. Anything that you would change or include?
3. Anything that would stop you from using the app?

2) Video interviews: 

3) I learned quite a bit from these interviews. I learned that I am not capable of thinking of every single problem that my idea might have, perspective is an amazing thing. I also learned that feedback is one of the best ways to improve and I learned that complete strangers give great feedback.

EDIT: It looks like I screwed up the video when I saved it. I am trying to fix it, I'm not very good at video stuff like this.

Edit: Having a lot of issues editing the interviews together so I'm going to post them 1 at a time.

Week 6 Reading Reflection

1) I was surprised from the reading that new entrants are big threats to businesses but now it makes total sense. I'm sure sometimes new businesses don't stand a chance because the businesses are so established but if we look at Uber for example we can see that new businesses can totally surpass established businesses, if the new business is revolutionary enough.

2) I'm a little confused that customers are considered competition. I think it means that because customers always want the cheapest price you must compete internally to give them the cheaper price.

3) I would ask the author, what are the best ways to deal with each form of competition and I would ask him what the biggest threat of competition is.

4) I don't think the author was wrong per se, but I'm sure lots of consumers don't want only the cheapest good, but they want a certain amount of quality for the cheapest price.

Idea Napkin No. 1

1) My name is Collin Dieffenbach, I am an Applied Physiology and Kinesiology major, so my idea doesn't really pertain to my major or current aspirations, however, I wouldn't mind changing my aspirations and focusing on becoming an entrepreneur if I felt my idea had real substance and could potentially make it. I enjoy partying and I've had many issues where I was left having to clean up after a party and it was miserable and almost made me regret throwing the party in the first place. Or frankly, I am too busy to make time to clean my room and it will take several days before I can get to it.

2) I am offering a mobile application that will match users to a nearby cleaner, one that is much cheaper than professional services. Users will share a video of their mess and nearby cleaners can bid on the ability to clean it. It will be reverse auction style so the user gets the cheapest price. The cleaners will have ratings so the user can keep that in mind when he picks his cleaner. Cleaners will have to give enough personal information if they want to be registered to clean, that way if there's an incident the cleaner can be located, and background checks will be good to stop most incidents proactively.

3) I think this app is aimed at young people, college age, that enjoy throwing house parties or are extremely busy. The cheap price and convenience also makes the app enticing to college students.

4) People will pay money for this app because they find that their time is more valuable than spending the time cleaning up. Imaging all of the school work that can be done on Sunday morning that gets wasted (pun intended) by cleaning up the damage from a rager the night before?

5) This idea is different because it's original. Uber pioneered this system of matching those who demand to suppliers and it worked well for taxis and it has worked for other systems, like a tutoring service I know.

I think the idea has some merit. Not sure how well it would work in the real world. People are not incredibly trusting so I can see issues with that. If the price is good enough I'm sure it will work for a lot of people, that is how uber became so popular.

Week 5 Reading Reflection

1) I am a little surprised by lack of objective evaluation being a notable pitfall. I am not surprised at all that lack of technical knowledge is one and I'm not surpised that lack of market knowledge is one but I am surprised that so many entrepreneurs don't ask for feedback. That is extremely crucial to the whole process.

2) I'm confused at what point a company has uniqueness. For example, how unique is Facebook when compared to Myspace? Both are very similar but Facebook won the social media game, so where is Facebook unique?  That's just an example but you could look at many products and ask where the line is drawn as well.

3) I would ask the author how one could go about getting investments for an idea, and I would also ask where does uniqueness come into play for similar products, like Coke vs. Pepsi?

4) I don't think the author made any mistakes. 

Interviewing Customers No. 2

I was caught off guard by this assignment, though I suppose I shouldn't have. Unfortunately, I went out of town and I really have no way to find 5 people to interview. So I apologize to whoever has to comment on my blog. Though I didn't interview anyone I did talk to a few people about the idea and I have thought about it over the week and did my elevator pitch on it, that being said I think I can write what's needed.

1) When I wrote the first Interviewing Customer No. 1, I wrote about the first idea that came to my mind. It was silly but pretty feasible, an application that matches the user with the cheapest cleaner in the area, similar to Uber. I have thought of a few additions and I will break them down.

•            Squeaky Clean
• Rating system - user can rate the cleaners on several areas. Speed, satisfaction, price, and a few other factors. This will help users pick good cleaners.
• Bidding system - The cleaners will be able to bid on jobs, this will keep the prices lower for the users.
• Customer satisfaction - We would make sure to alert the authorities if any items went missing during a clean-up.

2) This idea is aimed at college kids mostly. Assuming they are too busy or too lazy to clean up, either after a party or because they are unable to find the time to clean. Last time I approached college kids but they said they didn't party enough. Perhaps I could aim this towards the Greek community on campus?

3) I think my questions were pretty solid last week. Perhaps, I would ask for any ideas they would have to improve it, that way I can hear different perspectives.

4)  Sorry, no video.

5) I think I benefited slightly from No. 1 but doing this assignment makes me wonder in about a year or so how many f the people taking this class will have actually gone the extra mile to make their ideas real. That would be quite amazing.

6) I have several tips for the kids taking this class next semester about interviewing kids.
         1) Make sure you stay in Gainesville around the time of the assignment. Turlington is probably              the best place to meet people.
         2) Make sure you do all of your assignments ahead of time.
         3) Make sure you have good questions written out, that helps the people you are interviewing if              they understand the question.
I hope people actually create the ideas they are interviewing about. That would be so amazing to think that a professor made them come up with a profitable idea.

Elevator Pitch No. 1

My opportunity is a matching service that matches the user with cleaners in the area and the user gets to choose the lowest price option, I call the app Squeaky Clean. Here is the video: