20A Growing My Social Capital

1) One person must be a domain expert in your industry. This would be someone who's engaged in the same type of business activity as you would like to be. They may own the same kind of company that you would like to own, or they may be a technical expert who knows a lot about the kind of product or service that you would like to produce.

1) Who they are and what their background is.

John Neer. The owner of a Virginia Beach-based furniture store called East Coast Furniture Company. 

2) Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

My Domain Expert

3) A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

My Grandmother is a good friend of his and we actually had exchanged contacts before as I had mentioned to him before I came to UF that I was interested in woodworking as was he. I ended up giving him a call this week just to check in and see how he was doing and fill him in on my idea for a dorm design company. 

4) The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

One of the favors that John did for me came in the form of a warning. He warned that I must adapt quickly because in the furniture industry, if you don't want to target a local niche you're going to have to learn to quickly scale to the size of your competitors or they will simply copy and paste your idea into their own company and leverage their larger supply of resources thus destroying you. I don't really think he had any return expected in mind but just didn't want to see me end up like many of his competitors who had tried similar businesses. 

5) How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

I think that having someone who is currently running a business in the furniture industry is very valuable as he has years of experience that he can pass to me and hopefully cut down on some of the learning curves that I'd have to go through by myself. 

2) One person must be an expert on your market. This would be someone who is targeting your market with similar products services -- or knows a lot about conducting customer research in your area -- or represents a major piece of your market (this might be most applicable with B2B markets).

1) Who they are and what their background is.

Amanda Zuckerman. Owner and founder of Dormify, a company who has a model very similar to my idea. 

2) Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

Market Expert

3) A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

I really respect the presence of Dormify in the market and wanted to know who the owner was, so I found her listed under the contact us page and simply sent her a DM on Instagram. With my personal page having over 13k followers I think she was more inclined to take it seriously and ultimately my message elicited a response. 

4) The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

I explained a little about my idea but kept it kind of vague simply because I didn't want to hand out the improved plan I had created out of their business model but she definitely was impressed with the knowledge I had already gained and the traction/progress I was making. I wasn't really expecting to receive any major help but really just some advice and that's pretty much what I got. I asked her what the biggest challenge she faced within her company and marketplace was and she explained that marketing and low costs are the name of the game. People don't want to have to hunt you out because it is rooted in their mind to just go to the local Bed Bath and Beyond and your products have to have a great appeal without a whopping price tag! 

5) How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

I think that having a brief conversation with the owner of another company in the marketplace and having my name "out there" is something of value. Also, now that she knows who I am, there is an interesting relationship that has been formed. 

3) One person must be an important supplier to your industry. This would be someone who is selling products and services to other organizations/firms in your industry. 

1) Who they are and what their background is.

Joanne House. Owner of House Interior Decorating. 

2) Which 'slot' you are filling with each person (i.e., domain expert, market expert, supplier), and how the person fills the spot.

Supplier. 

3) A description of how you found the person and contacted the person.

While this might not be a supplier of products, the main portion of my business is the design element. I actually know this person because she is my Aunt so all I had to do was give her a quick call. 

4) The nature of the exchange you have with the person -- what favor did they do for you? What is the return expectation? 

Basically, I explained the nature of my idea and she loved it! I once again didn't really ask for a favor but she said that when I come home for a break we can sit down and talk more about how she keeps costs down for modeling and how to utilize digital software to stage digital models of homes. She was very concerned and determined to make sure that I understood that the cost of inventory was crippling to this type of business and dead inventory was even worse! 

5) How will including this person in your network enhance your ability to exploit an opportunity?

I think that by including an interior designer in my company I've acquired someone with experience in staging rooms which is a key component to marketing my business. 

Reflection: 

I feel like there are lots of connections ahead of me that I will need to make in order to be successful as I've seen just how much of an impact just three people have made. This assignment has been one of my favorites so far because it has pushed us to talk about our business with meaningful people in the industry, something that was kind of outside of my comfort zone but ultimately very useful.