24A – Venture Concept No. 1

Opportunity

Using the phone while driving has become a major issue in the past. Especially now because smartphones become more and more distracting with all of the available social media, notification and apps. A large amount of car accidents occur because someone was using their mobile phone. Not only can using your phone while driving cause car accidents, but it can cause death as well if someone is not paying attention to the road and their surroundings. The forces that create this issue are the smartphones themselves. With continuous updates, the phones become more and more appealing as well as people believe they are capable of multitasking while driving. The market is defined demographically. The ages range from 16-35 years old, people who use a smartphone on a regular basis, male and female. Customers are currently satisfying their need by turning their notifications off on their phone, putting the phone away or having a passenger text/use their phone for them. I know some people continue to text at stop lights, text in traffic, text while driving, change music or use it for maps. Many of the customers are not loyal to their solution because people will continue to use their phone while driving. This opportunity is relatively big because not many agree with Apple's new disable notifications while driving feature. I know people have turned it off because they did not like it because it would turn on even when they were not driving. I think this window of opportunity will be open until someone, possibly me, comes up with a solution to solve this issue. I have yet to see an effective app or phone feature that drastically reduces texting and driving.

Innovation
My app for smartphones will help reduce using the phone and driving by giving incentives to its user. The way this works is in the app, the user has access to change music without changing the screen, receives points for not using their phone, a map for navigating and the ability to notify people when you are near/arrive at the destination. The way the points work are as follows: the longer the person does not mess with their phone or change screens, the more points a person gets. The points increase the longer someone does not use the phone. The incentives/rewards are free Starbucks, Duncan Donuts, Chipotle, et cetera. If not free, than discounts and coupons to popular establishments that people ages from 16-35 enjoy. For example, 200 points would be one free Starbucks drink. The business that I partner with would get advertisement because customers would see the products available and obtain more business. The app would be 99 cents. This would make sure there were no advertisements to distract the driver. The only time an advertisement would show up would be when the customer is using their points to choose the reward.

Venture Concept
I think customers would switch to this product because it is cheap, they pay only once and they gain rewards that are worth more than 99 cents. It can be difficult to switch because no one wants to pay for something they are not sure they'll 100% love. That could be the issue. To solve this, I could do a free trial for a week. The competitor is Apple's in app feature that has a do not disturb while driving. However, this can be turned off by users and not used. Other than that, there aren't many popular ones. Packaging, distribution and business location do not play a role in defining my business concept. However, customer support and experience play a big role because if a customer is having an issue, it needs to be fixed immediately. It is an app. If an app has bugs, people will not use it. Because this is an app, it would not require a large employee base. I would need a person to design/create the app, a coupe customer support employees and people to promote the app on college campuses, where I believe in the beginning is where I would gain most customers.

Important Resource

I think the most important resource I have is that I am friends with the target customer. If I perfect my app, I can have my friends test it out before I make people pay for it. While they test it out, they can report to me what they would change, add and fix until I make it perfect and sell in the smartphone app store. Not many competitors would have access to their specific customers and be able to get feedback. Networking one of the greatest assets. 

Next Opportunity

The next adventure for me would be working on my photography portfolio and gain business there as a side job/hobby.

Next Five Years
For the next five years, I'd love to be working with an in-house public relations agency. I would prefer it to be with a large non-profit or help plan events as well. Being a huge people person, I love interacting with people and satisfying their needs whether its to help build their brand, expand their brand or plan an event to raise money for non-profits that need it. This first venture helps serve a good cause: to keep people off their phones and focus on the road.