Ideas Are Worth Nothing

So you decided to pursue your ideas after long hours of sitting down and pondering asking yourself is this the right time, is this the correct thing to do? Then a little voice in the back of your head (called fear) who should I tell it to, I'm scared they might take it and run with my precious ideas which is going to make me millions of dollars.

All first time entrepreneurs goes threw these delusions. We are all scared of people stealing our ideas but the truth is that ideas are worth nothing. It all comes down to your experience in the market. You're going after and the execution behind that idea. Your experience determines your success of how well you're going to execute it.

Ideas are worth nothing, its the level of execution behind your ability to execute with the right timing, the right people and the right amount of revenue, but please don't let this scare you, follow your gut, and pursuit it with passion, go out and tell people about your idea. You need to get concrete feedback from others.

If you find that its already in the market and other businesses to compete with don't be disappointed. That's great, which means you have a market you can go after. Remember you need competition to motivate yourself to be better and be able to innovate in your market.

A Look Into How Smartphone & Consumer Startups Have Disrupted Local Communities - November 12,2012

Over the years, I've observed how communities have been disrupted with the introduction of  improved technologies like the modern smartphone. For example: Apple, among other smartphone manufacturers, have had a profound influence on communities around the world. What I find enthralling is the opportunities these platforms provide not only the developer, but the user alike.

Entrepreneurs and developers stationed in the U.S are currently creating mobile applications that grant the ability to discover new restaurants or a local service, all from their very familiar, mobile smartphone. Some even reward the user  for discovering the aforementioned. A prime example of this would be the service Foursquare: Upon check-in to a bar or newly discovered restaurant, the user is rewarded with  badges. Multiple check-ins earn you more badges and if you become a regular, you get deemed the "mayor" of the restaurant, or local bar.

One question that came up whilst writing this essay was, do these applications possess the power to affect our habits and behavior over time? And if so, how?

My thoughts: Ever notice how most applications implement game mechanics to reward your actions? This sensation causes your brain to release a chemical stimulant called Dopamine. Every time you accomplish a goal via mobile application you feel a sense of accomplishment, right? Lets take a look at the social networking medium in regards to Instagram and Facebook. Almost everyone at some point is guilty of periodically (or perhaps even habitually) searching for a comment or like after posting a picture, status, update, whatever. Whether you're quietly muttering "I wonder if anyone liked the picture I uploaded on Instagram.." Or celebrating that shiny new like, by fully understanding how these mechanics influence our behavior and habits, we empower ourselves with the ability to  practice applying these techniques in other areas of our life.

Take a look at a few web-based and mobile applications. Applications like FourSquare, Airbnb and Labortopia connect their users with people within the same community and other small businesses, restaurants, freelancers, etc. In return, these applications encourage exploring and discovery, and welcomes  users to visit other communities.  To reference a particular personal experience, I recall  using Foursquare for a number of weeks. After accumulating hundreds of check-ins, I slowly started to realize how Foursquare brought my  daily and otherwise normal, routine to light. I witnessed first hand how some aspects of life can become repetitive  or even, dare I say, mundane. 

In contrast, these platforms have figured out ways to reward you for using their services. This  "risk and reward" type approach stimulates their customers emotions by rewarding their efforts. This delivers a fresh, new way to experience life and explore without fear or constraint. Prior,  people had to explore their communities on their own and risk greatly impacted decision making. Whether it had been by walking, biking, or riding a car around town until finally spotting a restaurant, auto repair shop, local laundry, etc. The means of discovering these small businesses hasn't changed, but rather,  the method of discovering this new business or service. However, some companies are still deploying old marketing tactics, such as mail marketing and TV ads to bring you to their business, but the best and most effective way of marketing remains,  as most of us know, word of mouth.

Startup corporations like Groupon, Facebook, and Labortopia have deployed social marketing or, inbound marketing, to find new customers and   aid existing customers in the discovery/connection of small businesses and people who provide their own services.

Most of the time, we ask our close friends and family to provide us with such information and we trust their judgement, but slowly these applications are changing the way we go about obtaining information from our social network and friends. As mentioned, The application ecosystem hasn't completely changed the way we discover or explore a new restaurant, but has added a new layer from the experienced.  

Foursquare, Yelp, Google, and Apple have captured and continue to capture,  an abundance of data  from their users to analyze and search for certain patterns that would further help developers improve customer experience. This aided the introduction and appeal of the first iphone, which was then followed by Google's Android platform. These titans are responsible for the majority of the growth in the smartphone market. And they continue to contribute to this growing market, which has reached 1.038 billions units worldwide and  continues to grow at a rapid rate yearly.  

Entrepreneurs are capturing and using this information to recreate or, re-package, an age old idea: deliver simple experience. At the moment, services like Yelp, Uber, Airbnb, and other competing startups, are all disrupting old services like the yellow pages and restaurant review magazines (yeah, they exist)  by reintroducing the services that were once absent of technological intervention . We   witness it already happening with Amazon and Apple. Both have disrupted the standard of how books were sold and distributed. They have designed a compelling business model to sell books for a cheaper price and deliver this  content via iPads or the Amazon hd tablets and kindles.

Netflix, on the other hand, has disrupted movie rental and offers their users a  more compelling way to rent movies and  stream content to their users. Brick and border businesses like Blockbuster and "mom n' pops" video rental have over the years, started disappearing overnight. Blockbuster and small businesses were too late to recognize the changes occurring around them.  You can also witness the same scenario happening with companies like Comcast and Directv (among other content providers) which are worried and currently firing back with their own content delivery solutions.

Other startups are slowly disrupting other markets and outdated business models, by use of technologies already in the creation process by entrepreneurs. A handful of startups are creating interesting new markets like TaskRabbit and Airbnb. Other startups are creating similar ideas or entering the market  in a slightly different manner than their competitors. This ripple effect, if you will, hasn't completely disrupted every market segment yet, but as technology keeps improving, smartphone access will become even more available to those around the world. Over time, we will experience a complete shift in technology.

Point Of No Return

 

In my last article The Battle For Your Living Room I discussed my thoughts on how Netflix would become the “winning company” competing for your living room space. And how those corporate titans, new and old, are under the assumption that they may possess the winning strategy. In this article, I want to focus on how I think Apple may have the winning strategy this time around.

The invention of the television has truly captured our imagination; it enabled us to explore a multitude of fantasies and gave rise to a new medium for transmitting different ideas. And when TV technology became widely affordable to the mainstream, cable providers saw the potential to capitalize on their business models; prices started to increase and cable providers started creating price packages featuring gazillions of channels. This myriad of channels was soon met with consumers endlessly flicking through their content library. Suddenly, people started to realize they didn’t need all these channels to enjoy cable. Their frustrations mounted until they decided it was time to seek out an alternative.

Now fast forward to the present and cable television is showing a sign of decline. Not because people are tired of watching TV, but because they are getting fed up with over priced subscriptions.

“Personally, I haven't subscribed to any cable providers in years. As I try to look for an excuse, as to why I should pay comcast, dish network, or any other local cable providers for dozens of channels when I only really watch a handful. I still haven't found that excuse to pick up the phone and place the order. At this point, I don't want to see Comcast or any major cable providers succeed in their current form. while innovative companies are re-creating a better platform to consume media.”

With that said, Apple has spearheaded into the market and can be seen as one of the leaders in this revolution; causing disruption in the current cable model. Apple’s winning strategy? it’s simple, they are allowing sub-ecosystem (Netflix, Hulu, and others) into their already growing ecosystem, which already consists of about 250 million users who entrust them with their precious credit card information via iTunes. However, as simple as this strategy may sound, it wields a deeper, thought-provoking veil.

One illusion which is clouding most customers is the strong belief that Apple is going to disrupt the cable sector by designing a new type of TV. Don’t get me wrong I do believe Apple is going to release their own TV, but I don't believe a TV is the right strategy; I think Apple has already implemented their strategy and it’s right in front of our eyes. We already know that cable providers like Comcast are the so-called market leaders, In order for these tech giants to bring innovation to the current model is by entering the existing (cable model) the traditional way. 

The only way to achieve this is by using the same strategy cable provider use: provide a cable top-box to customers in order for them to watch their content. Apple and Google, among a few others have created a miniature hardware box which acts like a bridge, allowing them to connect their users to other companies videos libraries. These boxes are most likely are collecting user behavioral data or some other metrics in order to better understand how the current cable business strategies work and use this information to hopefully create the right winning strategy.

Apple and Other players like Google taking notice how Netflix done it and taking the right action and deploying their own strategy base on (Netflix) model, but I feel Apple is ahead of their competitors; they are adding more content. Another thing is that most Apple customer own multiple Apple product in which you can also watch any content delivered to you via itunes. You don't simply have access in one single devices but all of Apple devices.

“I own multiple devices made by Apple and over the years I’ve truly enjoyed switching my content from one device to the other with ease”.


With Apple TV you can buy or subscribe to other services like Netflix and using their leverage to pull in the study stream of customer canceling their cable subscription Apple offering this services can easily appeal not just their own customer but also gain new customers to their mighty ecosystem. As the number of people buying Apple TVs increase, so does the accessible content on their platform. As time passes Apple, Netflix, hulu and others will possess the upper hand. Cable providers won't have any other choice but to give in and reduce the cost of their content . Allowing Apple (among others) to deliver their TV shows, movies, and other programs to the consumer who isn't looking to buy an overpriced subscription just to simply experience handful of TV channels.