Assignment 19A - Idea Napkin No. 2

Assignment 19A – Idea Napkin No. 2

·       Who you are. What your talents are. What your skills and experiences are. Also: What are your aspirations? Specifically regarding your business concept, how do you see this business (if you were to start it) playing a role in your life?

o   My name is Kaitlyn Legaspi. I am an avid writer who is observant of the world and the people around me, and I am also a good listener. After talking to five people who were close to me and examining myself further, I learned that I am a person with a strong will and perseverance, and I am also easily to get along with after getting past my shy barrier. I am also someone who is empathic and tries to put myself in other people’s shoes in order to try and understand their feelings and where their thoughts and ideas come from.

o   If I were to start this business, it would definitely take up a lot of time and effort in my life. Personal finances is something that everyone has to deal with and experience inevitably, and having the skills, even a source to learn the skills, to handle them properly can be hard for people depending on a lot of things, such as their income level, education, etc.

·       What are you offering to customers? Describe the product or service (in other words, how you’ll solve customers’ unmet needs).

o   I didn’t change this part. I am offering an app, that helps keep track of finances and gives tips and advice on how to budget money. This product is mainly for individuals who have trouble budgeting their money and also want a simple way of how to manage their money more efficiently. The app doesn’t only keep track of finances and shows where a person’s money is going (groceries, leisure, etc.), but it also gives daily tips on how a person can save money while also being able to pay for the daily to yearly things they pay for. The app is a means to keep track of money and a way people can learn personal finance skills.

o   I didn’t receive any feedback from Idea Napkin No. 1, but after thinking about it and doing other assignments, I did learn that the app has to be user-friendly so that people who aren’t as tech-savvy are able to easily use it and not get confused navigating the app, and it has to be physically appealing both in layout and in design so users won’t get confused where certain things are and to also be aesthetically pleasing.

·       Who are you offering it to? Describe, in as much detail as possible, the demographic and psychographic characteristics of your customers. Think especially of this question: what do your customers all have in common?

o   This part has changed in regards to how much detail it has. I am offering it to one, large general group with different subsets within it

§  The first subset that I am offering it to are high school and college students who have jobs, so generally between the ages of 16 and 22. These students are looking for a means to track their money and get easy tips on how to manage and save it. I specifically say students who have jobs because they are more likely to want to learn more about personal finances than students who don’t have jobs, who don’t have the sense of urgency to learn how to handle their money.

§  The second subset I am offering it to is general. This consists of people who have already graduated from college and are part of the workforce, so people typically older than 22. This includes people who are single, in a relationship, and parents who have one or more kids.

·       Within this general subset, I’d be targeting parents more than the other groups because they have more things to keep track of monetarily than people who don’t have kids. Unlike people who don’t have kids, parents have to save and keep track of finances for schooling, clubs their kids might be a part of, and saving for college tuition among other things.

o   If there is one thing my customers all have in common other than the need to keep track of their finances and learn the skills to do so, it would be that they have a phone or access to the internet on a computer since my product does have a website equivalent to the app.

·       Why do they care? Your solution is only valuable insofar as customers believe its valuable to them. Here, explain why customers will actually pay you money to use your product or service.

o   I believe that individuals care because financial literacy and feeling financially stable is a big issue in the U.S. since most schools in America do not offer personal finance classes or home economics class where personal finance skills are taught. There are some schools that do have a personal finance class, but they fall short on effectively teaching students the skills needed since most teachers say they don’t feel qualified to teach them these skills. A good majority of the workforce do not feel financially stable regardless of whether they live above or below the poverty line and whether or not they live paycheck to paycheck. This is true for people who have graduated from college and have a job and especially true for people who have kids. In addition to grocery and leisure expenses, both groups have to keep track of loans, paying rent or house payments and car payments. In the case of parents, they have to save money for their kids to go to school and participate in clubs if they want to. These groups are more likely to feel financially unstable, and they are more likely to want an efficient way of keeping track of finances.

·       What are your competencies? What sets you apart from everyone else? Also: what do you have that nobody else has?

o   There are many competitors in financial tracking, such as Mint, Wally, and Acorns, all of which are good apps to keep track of finances and save. However, they do not give tips on how to better budget money and save for the long term. They are apps who keep track of money and save in the smallest of ways, but they aren’t a full, well-rounded substitute for personal finance skills that a person can be taught. While my app isn’t a full substitute for taught personal finance skills, it does offer more than these apps do by actively providing tips for budgeting and saving, something those apps don’t have.

o   Based on previous assignments, something that sets me apart from everyone else is my perseverance, which means that I will be determined to make sure the app is running well and provides the best tips and all the services I have said it would have. In addition, there is my empathy, which means that I will be able to tailor the app to those who need it because I’m able to put myself in their shoes and be able to relate to their worries and what they want to find in a finance app.

·       In addition to these five elements, please spend a paragraph evaluating whether you believe these elements fit together or whether there are aspects of your business concept that are weaker/out-of-joint with the others.

o   I believe that these elements work well together, but the main part that I think is weaker than the rest if my lack of connections for developing the app and people who can help with marketing the product. I may meet these connections in the future, but right now there isn’t anything that sets me apart from everyone else. In addition, there are many finance apps out there, so making my own stand out would be a big challenge. Other than these weaknesses, I do believe my target audience is appropriate.

·       Feedback Memo:

o   In this assignment, I included the strengths that the five interviews brought up, more specifically my perseverance and empathy.

o   I slightly changed who I am offering it to in order to include parents in the main target audience along with high school and college students since they also have a lot to worry about financially when keeping kids in mind.

o   I added aspects of the product that I realized would take a lot of connections and a lot of work to develop, which are the functionality of the app and its design so it can appeal to a wider range of people.