| 1. Why do entrepreneurs get in trouble with the law? I had to look a little deeper to find out why entrepreneurs get in trouble. Our module informed us one of the first and foremost ways a business can get in trouble is choosing the incorrect business formation. New businesses can often fail to get the proper licensing as well. Employees can also be a source of legal problems when it comes to discrimination, harassment, and termination. Legalscoops.com cited that copyrights, patents, and trademarks are common legal issues for new businesses as well as lawsuits by dissatisfied customers. |
| 2. What does psychology have to do with marketing? Psychology may not seem pertinent to marketing, but psychology actually is at the very root of consumer decision making. Businesses use marketing to change the decision making of customers and convince those customers to purchase something. Tactics like using positive framing and having a strong central message can influence customers to make a purchase. The price, place, and promotion are also influencers to customers. Some customers just want to buy expensive things. Other customers will compare items and buy the cheaper item. By overpricing some items, you can make an escalated price on a cheaper product seem good by comparison. Even if the product has a good price, the consumer may be in the wrong place for that purchase. You can’t sell sand in a dessert, nor should the experience of buying and obtaining the purchase be a burden to the customer. 3. What types of marketing sway my decisions? I found a very good article about persuasion in marketing at businessnewsdaily.com. Writer Sean Peek introduced me to what he calls “the six universal principles of persuasion: reciprocity, commitment, pack mentality, authority, liking and scarcity.” People are likely to buy your product if they feel you have done them a favor, and they are likely to continue buying the product if they have a good experience. Some consumers are looking for a trusted authority to tell them which products are worth buying, and it helps if the authority you provide feels akin to the target audience. Other consumers will just buy whatever is popular, and some consumes desire to purchase things that are hard to come by. |
| 4. How can I pitch ideas better? In general, better pitches are short and sweet. Focus on selling points, and understand who you are pitching to and what the environment is. For an elevator pitch, make it short and sweet, but a long form pitch at a meeting or conference is much more convincing. A good pitch will be focused and memorable. The module advises us to use visuals, identify the target market, describe the competition, and highlight critical risks if we want a successful pitch. 5. What are my strengths and weaknesses in pitching? I have a few strengths in pitching that are worth mentioning. I am a strong writer as well as an eloquent orator with a polysyllabic lexicon. I am also the most humble person. But in all seriousness, I have been congratulated for my writing and narration on an infrequent basis. I was chosen as the favorite speaker 2 years in a row in advanced English class, I was singled out by my college instructor as a talented writer, and another professor called me a natural speaker with a pleasant tone. My most notable weakness is inexperience. I have never run a business before. I don’t know what I am doing, and I tend to be honest with people. I have a bad habit of accidental oversharing. If I can keep my presentations short, sweet, and on-topic, I know they will be successful . |