25A – What’s Next?

Existing Market

            Step 1: I believe that what is next is to improve the social media management service that we provide in order to not only prevent controversy, but also to grow the brand and outreach of the clients through their social media accounts. 

            Step 2: I attempted to contact several customers already in the market, however it was extremely difficult to do so, given that I do not currently know any athletes who play at the professional level. However, I did go back to some people I know who play collegiate sport and asked them about what I should be doing next. I approached them as they were the most likely people to enter into the market in the future. The people who I spoke to hit on two major points; one of which I expected and one I did not. I expected to hear that they wanted to see how my service would act in not only a preventative manner, but also a brand-building one. They agreed with my sentiment that this would likely be the next step that customers will want from my company. I did not expect, however, to hear that clients may also be interested in my company having the ability to build and maintain a website for the athlete. Many athletes currently have their own websites which mostly act as a place to sell merchandise. Two of the people I interviewed suggested pursuing the creation and management of athlete-based websites.

            Step 3: The path of my venture is very murky and hard to decipher. The pace at which I create new opportunities for the existing market depends on the pace that I acquire clients. If my company takes off very quickly, I will likely look to implement plans to increase value at a quicker rate. However, if it takes me a while to obtain clients, I will not begin to work on the ideas discussed until a later date. Simply put, we need to get a hold of any percent of the customer base before we expand our services to include more price-heavy ventures.

                        In addition, I think it would be beneficial to begin pursuing the route of athlete website management soon after we acquire a solid customer base. The ability to create and manage personal websites for athletes will greatly improve the value of the company.

New Market

            Step 1:For the targeting of a new market, I can focus on two ideas. The first would be to offer to manage the social accounts of the general public (not just affluent athletes). However, this would be difficult to pursue and possibly devalue the service. The other idea would be to target business. Targeting companies and organizations, especially ones in the sporting industry, would greatly increase the customer base. The company will offer to manage social media accounts for corporations in this idea.

            Step 2: My venture concept of ensuring that the social media postings of the client’s account do not create controversy and damage the value of the client translates fairly easily from B2C to B2B. No major changes to the venture concept would be necessary to add this new market.

            Step 3: I spoke with two individuals, one who works high up for a major corporation and another who owns a small business. I described my service to both of them and asked if they thought it would be of any benefit to them. My interviewee who works for the major corporation did not think that it would be easy for me to get their business. He said that most corporations already outsource their social media accounts to smaller companies or to the marketing department. The owner of the small business did think that the service I am providing would definitely help small businesses to reach customers in anew way. They both said that in order to enter this new market, a large amount of extra time would be necessary, my company would be in more of a “working for” state than a “working with” state that I see in our B2C side.

            Step 4: I learned that trying to enter this new market would be a bit of a beast. It would be extremely difficult to convince major corporations that we could offer them an improved service. I was wrong in my initial assumption that I could offer an improved service to large companies. I was not entirely aware that as many corporations already outsource their social media profiles.

            On second thought, this market does not appear to be as attractive as I initially believed it to be. The fact that only smaller businesses would consider the service really complicates things, as many small business owners have no issue with running their own social media profiles. There is still some attractiveness to the market, it’s just not as much as I initially believed existed.