What's next

Existing Market

Step 1: It's rather hard to identify a relevant "next move" after a subleasing application. Maybe, we could take the platform to the next level to include a greater target audience, such as home buyers. It is also a possibility to use this same format of connecting individuals to leases and shift the focus: connect animals in need of homes to loving homes seeking animals. I had a difficult time procuring ideas, and therefore went on to conduct my interviews, as they always open my eyes to new or overlooked opportunities.

Step 2: Unfortunately I have been deprived of a recording device over the weekend when I began this assignment and was unable to record my interviews, but I shall describe them in detail.

Customer 1: Customer one had a difficult time identifying what may be the next step after launching this application. I did not prime them with my ideas before asking theirs, so as to procure their own genuine ideas and see what their mind would develop, hoping I might hear a brand new avenue to pursue. We ended up in a conversation about existing platforms that are being used to find housing such as Facebook groups, Craigslist, RadPad (a new one I haven't heard of), and Air B&B. We discussed what each of them had to offer and what made my application different than all of the previously stated options for housing research. This customer came to the same conclusion I had initially, before I had introduced my ideas, which would be to expand my application to a larger audience by encouraging home owners and real estate companies to post their listings.

Customer 2: With this customer I tried to focus the conversation on the idea of what we should be doing, what would be wrong with the application that needs development, rather than brainstorm a new idea or venture concept. Essentially, this customer encouraged me to add a timeline to my application. This threw me off a bit because I wasn't quite keen of the idea of mimicking Facebook, the platform currently being used by my target audience to find subleases. Despite my skepticism I continued to listen to their justifications and logic behind their argument. Customer 2 stressed that he was already so comfortable using that platform and would be intimidated and frustrated to have to become accustomed to a new platform that he doesn't trust just yet. People have to believe it works and believe in the platform in order to deem it worthy of possession of their time and energy. This one I had to jot down, it was an obvious obstacle I hadn't even considered due to my enthusiasm for the cutting edge platform.

Customer 3: With customer three I solely brainstormed ideas for what could possibly be next, but instead primed them with my ideas (which were very few and listed prior in step 1). This customer was certain that I could expand my application to include home buyers AND pets needing homes (pets have housing needs too), and decided to change the conversation to completely radical ideas that weren't necessarily related to my current application. We focused solely on the "connection" factor that my leasing service currently provides, and the ideas we came up with were pretty interesting. One of them was connecting bands and DJs to gig opportunities, making a band manager app that manages your band for you, finds local gigs and notifies you of the opportunities, connects you to individuals in need of live entertainment for the genre of music that you provide, and has features which facilitate communication between the band and the party of interest, and allows all payments to be made through the application. We felt like we minimized our target audience from the last one which could be a good and bad thing, we have found a very specific set of individuals: party goers and noise makers, allowing us to more specifically define our audience, but then again we have reduced the market which could buy into the application and use it sufficiently.

In terms of growing my existing market, I will market the new application created (or addition to the current application) to the users of my Subleasing application, and when a large enough base develops, market my subleasing application to users of the new service i create. I hope that by making the email subscription for the subleasing application appealing I can also retain the market that I develop in these applications so that the recurring emails keep the applications in mind with the users, driving the word-of-mouth marketing to increase use of What's The Move? and sales of membership with the leasing service.


New Market

Step 1: I want to create another mobile application called “What’s the Move?” which will serve as a social forum for locals of all ages. This mobile application will also sync with your Facebook contacts to make finding your friends easy. Create groups and get notified when there's an open invite party in your area, drink specials downtown, or when a party gets busted. What’s the Move will show you what’s hot and happening (or not so happening) in your local area, and see what the Next Move is and where the party is headed.

Step 2: My venture concept will create values of local community and social networking. Individuals are able to get involved with their peers over beers in a bar that's happening and not getting busted down by cops, (or crazy college kids, if you're an older adult looking for a more laid back scene!). Get to know people in your area and where all the hot spots are in town when you decide tonight is the night to go out, and bring the party to you by checking in and posting pictures and videos in the timeline to let people know that this club is "The Move".

Step 3: Unfortunately I have been deprived of a recording device over the weekend when I began this assignment and was unable to record my interviews, but I shall describe them in detail.

Customer 1: My first customer was very intrigued by the mobile application at first, excited to hear about an innovative solution to the inevitable ever-changing plans which plague college student nightlife. I really had only just thought of the idea off hand and hand't completely dissected my idea, so speaking with this customer helped me get the ball rolling on what all What's The Move? (WTM) could be. We developed the application to include drink specials, a map that shows how many people are checked into bars in midtown and downtown, ratings of people's nights at certain locations that could potentially be a business partnership with yelp, having an anonymous timeline in the application so there could be a live feed of statuses and pictures from around the local area, ensuring alerts and notifications get sent when cops are reported in the area, or when there is a large influx of check ins at a certain bar.

Customer 2: While this customer was very receptive to all of the ideas I had gone over with the last customer, they did not have anything further to contribute to those features and were more concerned about the safety of users. My target audience includes that of University affiliated students so I understand that there is an evident concern for the safety of students. We talked about options that would allow us to assure users that they were unable to be targeted through the application. Foremost, linking your Facebook would not release your information to other users in the system. You would remain completely anonymous to the WTM? community as would all of your posts. Only the individuals you have released your location to (an app feature) would be able to see your name and profile image displayed on your posts and check ins in the timeline. Furthermore, there will be features allowing you to block someone, or revoke their viewing privilege by ending the sharing of your location with that individual.

Customer 3: Customer three was very excited to hear about all the features I had developed with the two previous customers, but actually brought something really intriguing to the table which I had been waiting to hear: "Wait, isn't there already an app for that?" It was brought to my attention that there is a very new mobile application being used in Gainesville called "FOMO". Turns out that this is an application that provides a weekly forecast of drink specials, "ladies nights", and other deals for restaurants, bars, and clubs in the midtown and downtown area. It targets the same exact market and has been running successfully for the past three months. FOMO also hosts their own events and offers drink specials to attendees. While my application is focused more on serving as a communication platform, it would be great to network with the creators of FOMO to either help develop my idea and ask for their mentorship, or integrate my ideas into their platform and become part of their existing team and business.

Step 4: Based on my feedback from customers, I definitely see this as a viable opportunity to exploit. Once again I need to get back to the drawing board. I have to outline the application, develop a team, organize a marketing strategy, figure out how to gather funding, and draft a working timeline for the project and its milestones. In pursuit of this endeavor I will use the format of this class and the blogging exercises to guide the development of my app, continually revising my idea and interviewing future customers and persons of resource in order to perfect the application before launch.
What surprised me the most was how much information I was able to gather from these six different perspectives and how much this mere idea of an application came to live just over the course of a couple days through conversation. This expanded market can be more attractive financially (since there are more people who may use this app and end up connecting with the leasing application, purchasing membership) but I do believe it is much harder to exploit because of that growth in numbers. I now have to market to a larger range of ages, audiences, preferences, tastes, and technological savvy, rather than a concentrated target market of undergraduate students who meet a specific criteria which I thoroughly understand as a student myself.