Today we attended the first lecture for the Innovation Norway course in entrepreneurship.
To start the course, we did a brief overview of the Rice Alliance Life Science Technology Ventures Forum. We discussed the best and the worst elevator pitches.
In general, the highest rated elevator pitches were all very personable and relatable. They each stated what the product was, who the target audience was, why their audience would want it, and finally they all clearly stated what they wanted as far as investors and money. The lowest rated speeches tended to be difficult to understand. This was either because they were too technical or simply poorly explained. Most of these forgot to mention what they wanted or how there product would be useful. One of the speeches even failed to mention what he sold. It is also interesting to note that the top and bottom three were the same for both the professional judges as well as the student judges.
This main lecture in this course went into detail about how to write a business plan. This included all of the topics that should be mentioned. In writing a business plan it is also important not only to write it for the well being of the company, but also to appeal to any possible financers. In making a business plan there are two big rules of thumb to follow. The first is that you must ensure credibility. This includes referrencing your entire business plan and making sure that all of your referrences are reliable and recent. Secondly no matter what business you are going into or how new your product is, you must always have competition. Competition, although it appears to be a bad thing, it is possibly one of the best things for your company. Competition shows that your idea and business is a good one that there is already a need for what you are selling, only your business is going to make it better. Along with all the necessary mechanics of the business plan, these two rules of thumb contribute to making your business look attractive to financers as well as giving you a strong guide to where your company is and where it is going.