Market Research

• Industry: a collection of businesses with a common line of products or services.
• Carrying capacity: the ability of industry to support new growth.
• Uncertainty is the degree of stability or instability in an industry.
• Complexity: the number and diversity of contacts with which a business must deal.
• Stage of life cycle:
• Birth
• Growth
• Maturity
• Decline
• market: a group of people or companies who have a demand for a product or service and are willing and able to buy it.
• target market: a specific group of customers whom a business wishes to reach
• market segmentation: the process of grouping a market into smaller subgroups defined by specific characteristics.
• market segments: subgroups of buyers with similar characteristics, segmented by geographics, demographics, psychographics, and buying characteristics.
• geographics: the study of the market based on where customers live, including region, state, country, city, and/or area.
• psychographics: the study of consumers based on social and psychological characteristics, including personality, values, opinions, beliefs, motivations, attitudes, and lifestyle elements.
• industrial markets: customers who buy goods or services for business use.
• the target market for your product or service should be:
• measurable
• large enough to be profitable
• reachable
• responsive
• market research: the collection and analysis of information aimed at understanding the behavior of consumers in a certain market.
• exploratory research: the initial collection and analysis of information used when very little is known about a subject; it forms a foundation for later research.
• focus group: a group of people whose opinions are studied to determine the opinions that can be expected from a larger population.  
• descriptive research: the collection of information to determine the status of something, such as in developing a customer profile.
• historical research: the study of the past to explain the present circumstances and predict future trends.
• secondary data: infortmation that has already been collected by someone else.
• primary data: information that is collected for the first time, is current, and relates directly to the collector's study.

Blue Ocean Strategy

Blue Ocean
Businesses that are unique in their own way, and learn to be different from other competing businesses and become successful and careful with their profit and products.
Examples:
Apple - introduces new products every year that other competing companies are still trying to live up to.
Tasimo - first product that makes instant coffee with a simple bar code scan and makes the coffee right on the spot.
Nintendo Wii - the first interactive video game that gives humans more control over the game with motion and body movements with the game control.

Red Ocean
Businesses that compete in existing markets and already work on existing demand instead of thinking above the expected.
Examples:
Playstation 3: This video game console only follows the big names, and doesn't come up with anything but replicas of the big products of other businesses.
Skin ID: This business is only following into the steps of Proactiv, by same tv advertisements and offering similar products.

6 Principles of Blue Ocean Strategy
1. Reconstruct Market Boundaries
2. Focus on the big picture, not the numbers
3. Reach beyond existing commant
4. Get the strategic sequence right
5. Overcome Key Organizational Hurdles
6. Build execution into strategy

Levi Giebrecht

• Entrepreneur tip: Generate a concept in your mind and become able to execute it.
• Lots of creativity, and do something with it.
• learn the skills, or surround yourself with the skills.
• didn't have any formal business education, didn't finish high school.
• the more skills you can have to utilize, the better off you are.
• 1984, started a company.
• learn from your experiences.
• be surrounded by your strengths.
• make sure your partner is someone you can get along with or someone you like.
• you don't want to have a partner that has a lot of money, but someone who has different values and different perspectives.
• started out with an investment of $6,000
• feel good and look good and do it in such a passionate way.
• 20,000 people came in the month of December.
• find a way to be the best
• their mandate was to be the best spa in the industry.
• takes 2 and a half years to become profitable.
• had a determination to succeed.
• just had employees, but wanted to find a way to make his employees feel special.
• every year took his employees down to Mexico.
• has the opportunity to choose the destiny of the company.
• must be passionate about your business, passion carries you through tough times.