Introduction to Entrepreneurship

Identify a business problem and brainstorm solutions using four approaches: improve efficiency, increase accessibility, modify existing services, or create a new service. Explore market research to evaluate ideas.

Learn how to assess the feasibility of business ideas through primary and secondary market research, including surveys, interviews, and focus groups, to identify customers, trends, competitors, and pricing.

From a problem to a viable business idea, this lecture guides you through brainstorming, market research, and weighing passion, resources, costs and benefits, and feasibility to finalize your startup idea.

Identify direct, indirect, and replacement competitors; evaluate performance and strategies, including distribution methods, to beat them. Align price with quality, promote, innovate, and build brand loyalty via a value proposition.

Discover how a strong value proposition differentiates your business, explains benefits to customers, and guides advertising and website messaging to win customers.

Identify your customer base and segment it to tailor marketing and product offerings, then create a user persona through interviews, surveys, and focus groups based on age, location, and income.

Create a user persona by examining how customers view your business, their needs, and buying behavior, using market research and a clear value proposition to guide marketing.

Explore how entrepreneurial risk arises from consumer trends, competition, market conditions, and government regulations, and learn to identify, assess, and mitigate strategic, compliance, operational, financial, and reputational risks.

Learn to assess and overcome business risks by identifying and categorizing strategic, compliance, operational, financial, and reputational risks, then create mitigation plans and regularly evaluate outcomes.

Evaluate business feasibility through a structured study that analyzes market conditions, competitors, user personas, resources, risks, and timelines to guide launch decisions.

Learn to create a business mockup to test a product in the market, gather feedback, and iterate toward the final design using physical, digital, and still or moving image mockups.

Publish your mockup online or in person, collect feedback through surveys, forums, interviews, and focus groups, and iterate based on usability and your customer base to refine your product.

Learn what a minimum viable product is, how it maximizes validated learning with minimal effort, and how to iterate with customer feedback to test market viability.

Learn to incorporate mockup feedback into a minimum viable product using forums, surveys, and usability testing to better meet customer needs and refine the mvp.

Iterate the MVP by collecting and analyzing user feedback, implementing improvements, and following up with customers to refine features and drive market success.

Explore pricing strategies and revenue models to maximize profit by balancing costs and demand, including underpricing, economy pricing, premium pricing, price skimming, bundle pricing, promotions, and psychological pricing.

Discover how revenue models profit from products or services, clarify the difference from revenue streams, and review common models such as transactional, advertising, affiliate, subscription, online, direct, indirect, and freemium.

Learn to craft concise elevator pitches that persuade investors and customers, by highlighting your background, business goals, how you solve a problem, and a clear audience-focused call to action.

Learn to build rapport to connect with customers and investors, establish credibility, and boost loyalty through authentic communication, empathy, and positive body language.

Learn how marketing differs from advertising and how the four ps—product, politics, price, promotion—drive customer acquisition. Use online, social media, print, and broadcast strategies to reach the right audience.

Explore exit strategies for leaving a business, including selling to family or investors, merging or being acquired, or pursuing an ipo. Use liquidation or bankruptcy as last resorts.