Posted in MGT 5985 - Reflections

Reflection

This was one of the best courses so far, after taking other management classes. Most of the learning was self taught, reading articles, putting all what you have been taught into action, creating a website. It was all for our benefits, coming out of our comfort zone and trying out things we thought we could never do or achieve. Is one thing to create a business idea plan for a class and it is another thing to take more steps further and run this business idea plan to see what your targeted customers really think. That was the most fun part of this course the MVP testing. I am happy I got the chance to actually create an ad, I have never done that before. It is so cool to watch other people or see people being interested in your product you thought of  literally two months ago. It takes people years to come up with an idea but all of us in this where put into that test and we experienced what it had to take design a solution/product that people would be interested in. 

Also, I liked the fact that the mode of teaching for this class was very open and understanding, giving students the option to pick working by themselves or working with students in class was a good teaching skill. People are better off working better when they are alone and they are given the opportunity to do that. 

It was a pleasure taking the course with all of you and professor you were the best! Have nice summer everyone!

Posted in MGT 5985, MGT 5985 Product

Final Project

Here is the link for my video College Ivy – YouTube

This idea is actually interesting for me because this is something I would need for myself and creating a business idea to solve a problem I face will be an addition to me. After I spoke to primary and secondary competitors, I went towards the negative comment’s customers made and incorporated that into my strategy. I definitely think this will be a good idea, if I am to go into it, I will start with small amount of targeted audience maybe concentrate on New York, Texas, California alone for now giving that those were my highest engagement and viewers came from when I tested my MVP and with that, I provide the solution to the negative feedback customers give to other companies.

Posted in MGT 5985, MGT 5985 - Reflections

Key Takeaways from competitors.

The key takeaways I took from both my primary and secondary competitors were that some companies who are involved in tutoring business mostly take care of your major customer which shouldn’t be. A tutoring business is made of both the tutors and students but for some reasons the tutors are never fully compensated for the service that they give to this business, when truly it is really the tutors that are the body of this products, without the tutors they can face their main customers, the students. 

Another thing I took was that in general it is really difficult to start a business all on your own, I mean we all know that but really when the business is in motion, you start facing real life issues, you can’t handle the competitors, it is extremely difficult all on your own. The interviewer I spoke to made this sink in my head, because that is really the reality. I know people who do it all alone and they are doing extremely well but it is advisable as an entrepreneur to have open minds on building trust with other individuals who you believe will add value to the company and will be a great business partner.

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Competitive Landscape

I created a company analysis based on important key characteristics that college students and tutors will be looking for, before joining the company or working through the company app. I used three primary competitors and two second competitors in order to have different points of direction and know if my business is still of relevance in the market. 

I did some research online for the characteristics for each competitor and the company that almost matched with mine is Wyzant and tutors.com. The one significant factor I think that really stood out was price and price is a huge factor.Tutor.com makes students pay over $60 per hour for Private tutoring sessions, which is really expensive especially if students are the ones paying for out of their pocket, they have other important bills to worry about too. My company will be willing to give these students the same quality of tutoring they get from these other expensive competitors with their own choice of payment, meaning there isn’t a fixed price of payment on the website. Tutors and students will come to an arrangement of how they each know what to pay or the price the students are willing to give before they start the session. One of our weaknesses will be competing with Wyzant, Wyzant is already a developed tutor, although they have no upfront payments or subscriptions that are known to be taking 25% off tutors pay which will make the tutors increase their price for each of their sessions.  This competitive analysis has helped learn more about this type of business, it has helped me analyses my business further and ways I could build it to stand out. I believe my company still has a chance here and I want to see how it goes. 

Posted in MGT 5985 - Reflections

Interview with secondary expert

After three weeks of not hearing from anyone, I decided to make use of my social media platforms to reach out to some start up business, I honestly thought it wasn’t going to work out because I felt it was more appropriate to email companies or use professor social platform to reach out to people for interviews but this time it actual worked out.

I message the owner of Tutting, a start up company.  Andres Sanabrai, he is from Guatemala and it is a different time zone from New York, he still agreed to meet up with me for 30 minutes to asers the questions I had for him. Andres was extremely grateful that I asked him to do this and he was happy to search his experience with me.

Andres started his Tutting business started recently in 2020. The platforms used in hiring face- to- face and online tutors via mobile.

Questions asked during the interview

  1. What Motivated him to start the company?: Before I thought about starting the company I worked in universities, I had my own students that I will tutor. I made a lot of friends while I was working, I had some personal problems that people were dealing with as I was tutoring but I really couldn’t do anything about it, it wasn’t in my place. Then he did some surveys and reached out to people about his idea, quit his job and decided to start his own business. 
  2. Where their competitors made it difficult for you to start, how did he handle it?: He said, I have just started, I am still at a point where I am trying to validate the customer bracket. It is difficult for me to directly compete with other established businesses, it is pretty difficult for a one man team, compared to already established companies that have all sizes of business customers. The most difficult part is building up something that will be entirely different and people will like so much and will prefer to use your application than the other established companies. 
  3. What constant challenges he is facing right?: The most difficult thing is to have enough people on your platform. There are tutors, students and you need to have a good amount of tutors for these students. If students come online and search for the type of tutors they are looking for and they don’t find them, they will end up leaving his platform and going to another tutoring site, which is bad for him. This is the type of challenge he is facing right now. Balancing tutors with students.
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Failure in getting an interview with potential competitors.

While this assignment was assigned almost three weeks ago, I was deceived to first reach out to the main five companies that were highly skilled in the business I am trying to get into. I reached out to five of these companies, which were:

  1. Chegg
  2. Tutor.com
  3. Skooli
  4. Cub Z
  5. Wyzant

I was more focused in speaking to someone from Wyzant because that was like my main competitor, I did everything I could possibly do to at least speak to someone on the inside, I searched up some of the people working at wyzant on linkedin, I sent out emails to their information centers, I found a number that I could call and I actually got to speak to someone but they didn’t have an inside connection to talk to one of the actual people who built/created wyzant, they only has access to tutors who are registered under the company. So Wyzant was a failure and I was sad about that because this is my first time hearing about them while I was doing research on this assignment. 

Although I was interested in speaking to a candidate from Wyzant, I really thought Chegg would at least answer me from their customer representative line or email because that is a company I am familiar with, but they did.

As none of the top five competitors got back to me I started reaching out to other secondary competitors and start up, I will list down all the companies I reached out to. 

  1. Varsity Tutors
  2. Babbette moore – this was a home private tutoring 
  3. Insta edu
  4. Kurslab
  5. Testive
  6. Toppr
  7. Tutting
  8. Turtee
  9. Ziizoo
  10. Moodle
  11. Tutor Vista
  12. Everly
  13. Flip Class

I believe these were all the companies I reached out to from my sent emails. 

Good News!!! I got to interview someone last Tuesday 23rd and I will make a new post about it. 

Posted in MGT 5985 - Reflections

Interview Questions with Primary competitors.

I will be reaching out to Wyzant (Key Competitor) through their support customer care email and hoping someone actually writes back. I am also going to Tutor.com on the website they have a session where you could make inquiry to speak to someone working with the company. 

Questions I’d like to ask is:

  1. What motivated them to start this company?
  2. Where there competitors that made it difficult for them when they started and how did they handle it?
  3. What are the constant challenges you can be facing in the business? Have you faced any yet?
  4. Could you give an estimate of how much it cost you or your team to start this business?

I am hoping to get more insight about entrepreneurs and their business. I know it’s very difficult to start a business and be successful at it, I want motivate ideas that they had to come up with. The challenges that they faced while working, did they have a partner that almost sabotaged the business and how did they handle their competitors. I will like to gain more knowledge on how to be an entrepreneur, the gains and pains companies go through to succeed. I am looking for real life problems and accomplishments. 

Posted in MGT 5985 - Reflections

Competitive Analysis

How to Sell Your Business to a Competitor | Steve Sprindis - Waypoint  Private Capital

I did a competitive analysis on a tutoring company called Wyzant. It is also a professional private tutoring platform that connects students with professional teachers who have a Bachelor’s degree, teaching certificate to provide solutions to students’ needs. This company had features I plan on implementing into my business idea such as having in person tutoring and not just online through the website or app, having multiple ways to pay tutors, no upfront payments or subscriptions to making sure students get the full satisfaction before they pay. Those are some common features that both my company and wyzant will be having.

Although this is similar to my idea, during my research I found some cons about wyzant that make their customers quit using their planform and I could use those cons and apply them into my own idea in a good way, for example wyzant allows tutors to pick the prices they want to charge their students which is a good thing but then 25% of the money goes to the company which tutors find that really challenging and difficult to give because they aren’t making much profit on their ends. Wyzant does not supply previous exam past questions to students who need them for practice and wyzant in person meetings with tutors are based on locations that either tutor or a student pick, which is not safe for both parties. For my idea the in person meeting has to be within a school’s premises to keep both the tutor and the students in a safe environment. I won’t want to be taking 25% off tutors payment, instead I let the students pay in cash to tutors after their services or give the tutors the options to pick their mode of payment.

Our value proposition is almost the same goal, being flexible, efficient and effective to serve both tutors and students from different colleges because we are both carrying out the same kind of services. I think I’d still go on with this business idea, I will probably still have to do more research on how to stand out because Wyzant currently has tons of users at different colleges, they are flexible, have multiple slots available for students, over 300 subjects available to all students not just college students. If I am coming into the market I have to make that big/important change to attract customers and make profit. 

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Lean Canvas and Justifications.

JUSTIFICATIONS:

Problem.

These problems I have stated are what I go through personally when working in group tutoring and it is not just a personal problem for me but for other college students. People complain how they aren’t able to get quality time with tutors or professors at office hours because they are busy attending to three or four other students within a two hours time frame and that isn’t enough time to solve or explain questions that a student is having difficulty with. People get intimidated by other students in group tutoring, they find it hard to ask questions because it is easy for other students to answer and they think it’s a shame for them not to know it.

Solution.

I came up with the solution of developing a Private tutor app to find a quality professor that can have a one on one with students in the United States. There will be tutors available both on weekdays and weekends, with multiple time slots that work with students’ time schedules. This will help students to worry less about finding the right time. The mode of teaching will both be online and in person to bring comfort for students or tutors who can’t make it in person or tutoring late hours. 

        Unfair Advantage. 

As we are targeting college students we already have the existing customers that will be in need or this app. Students will want to also interact with other students, so we have it possible for students to also connect with one another and share the problems they can be having too. We will build our website to be user friendly and easy to use for our customers.

Key Metrics. 

In order to monitor our performance, I will be reaching out to students to complete surveys on the tutoring app to know exactly what we can be doing wrong and how to fix the problems they are facing for them to have a better experience with the app. I will be watching the amount of active users on the app or count the number of downloaders we get within each month, to know if we are at an increase in customers or decrease. 

      Customer Segment.

The Private tutor app is focused on Undergraduate and graduate students or people who are done with university but preparing for external exams such as CPS, CFA, COMPTIA. I believe these are the people that need it the most because they need every little help they can get to understand what is being taught in their classes and to pass their exams with the help of private tutors. 

Unique Value Proposition.

For our optional users, we have to have unique features that are different from other tutoring apps. We want an efficient and effective app that will be able to serve both tutors and students from different colleges. I came up with a new mode of payment, instead of paying a monthly fee like every other tutoring app, students and tutor can pick their mode of payment, either by paying cash, buying the tutor breakfast, lunch or dinner and avoid paying taxes. The app will be a session where tutors are allowed to share previous exams for various classes, this will help students be more prepared for their exams and have an idea of what to expect. 

Channels.

For our channels we want to focus on reaching out to our potential customers through school website newsletters, sending out emails to students, creating blog posts on schools websites. As we get new customers, they can refer other students in exchange for a free tutoring session. I will be showing ads on educational youtube videos and social media posts through instagram, twitter, facebook and tikok. These will help make our business known and grow with more valuable customers.

Two assumption that must be true to make the idea succeed;

  1. To find a tutor that will be able to fit student schedule.
  2. Tutors that will be well trained to meet students needs. 
Posted in MGT 5985 Product

Updated Problem-Solution Concept.

I believe we all like when we can do things on our own time schedule, in our own space without any distraction. As a college student I have had problems with meeting up with professors during their office hours or staying after class to meet with them to explain something I might have not understood because their office hours doesn’t fit with my work or school schedule, it difficult for me to stay behind because I have another in ten minutes and the professor takes attendance early so I can afford to be late. These problems are why we get to have tutors who are capable of explaining and finding solutions to the problems you are struggling with at school providing different time slots that can work for you on both weekdays and weekends.

Group tutoring is very common in college, you book an appointment through the school website to meet up with a certain tutor that qualifies in the class you are having difficulty with. Tutors attend to you and about three other students with only two hours availability, personally I don’t think that is sufficient or convenient enough for students who are struggling or lagging behind class especially when they have midterms or final to prepare for. With all these problems we are facing, I have decided to come with an idea that will work better for a good amount of college students who are in this boat. In order to find the right time, the best tutor, one on one meet-ups without distractions and at your own conveniences, building a digital private tutor App will be the best solution.

A private tutor app will be available for all college students in multiple schools, it will allow students to search for a tutor that teaches the class they need help with, it could either be a tutor from their school or from a different college, giving students the flexibility to choose what works best for them. There will be multiple time slots available everyday, both online and in person, giving the student options. Online Tutoring will have the option for students to record the session in case they need to reference back to what their tutor taught. Students can drop reviews on the tutor to give other students an idea what it is like working with that tutor. The private teaching will help students who aren’t confident enough to ask more questions and be comfortable expressing themselves without any interruptions or side comments. The app can be designed to let you know if the tutor ones took the same professor as you and can teach you the way the professor teaches in order to pass exams. All tutors must be registered under a school and any in person meet ups will be strictly held within school premises for safety purposes. 

Image result for private tutor college students

Private tutor apps give students more room to have assistants in solving their academic problems, creating a safe space between the student and tutor. Students can pick the tutors that work with the time schedule, have enough time to meet with the tutor and go through their class difficulties.