eEntrepreneurship
TH Köln - Master Programme / WebScience
Online session 214.06.2016
Schedule
❖ 21.04.2016 - 1st online meeting
❖ 08.05.2016 - Submission of assignment "Roadmap"
➢ Project groups will create a roadmap containing the steps to validate your business idea. This document will be a part of final
project documentation. Roadmap will be sent to lecturer via email. Each group will get a written feedback via email.
❖ 25.05.2016 - Extra online meeting
❖ 12.06.2016 - Submission of assignment "Project Documentation Version 1"
➢ Project groups will send a draft project documentation to the lecturer via email. This draft should contain performed activities
and results which was planned by the group before in the Roadmap. Project groups will get a personal feedback during 2nd
online session.
❖ 14.06.2016 - 2nd online meeting
➢ Feedback slots: Several feedback time slots will be offered on the WIKI. Each group will book a time slot to get a personal
feedback to the delivered draft project documentation. Groups will present their project status and get feedback.
❖ 23.06.2016 - 3rd online meeting (optional)
➢ Feedback slots: Several feedback time slots will be offered on the WIKI. Each group can book a time slot to get a personal
feedback. Groups will present their project status and get feedback.
❖ 08.07.2016 - On-site meeting
➢ Group presentations containing business idea, business model, results of the project incl. MVP, and learnings. Furthermore final
project documentation and presentation slides will be sent to the lecturer via email. See the deadline below.
❖ 15.07.2016 - Submission of "Presentation Slides" and "Final Project Documentation"2
Agenda
❖ Minimum viable Product (MVP)
❖ Discourse: Basics of Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
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MVP
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What we did
The first (and probably the easiest) step of being an entrepreneur is coming up with an
idea. Transforming it into a business is not trivial. Even if you have an innovative idea, an
entrepreneur is the one who successfully execute a viable idea.
● You started with an idea
● You captured early version of business model and gained an overview on one-sheet canvas
● You analyzed different components (blocks) of your business model and validated your
assumptions by means of online sources and web tools
● Now you know more about your target group, competitive landscape, possible sale/marketing
channels
● If you think it is worth to realize your idea, next step will be creating a tangible “thing”, so called
MVP, in order to get feedback from investors and potential customers. (Creating an MVP is part of
the course, but getting feedback by means of that is not!)
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Hints: Acting as an entrepreneur
You may become emotionally attached to your idea. And refuse to accept that it is not
valuable.
The same passion that sets you off on a path of hard working and taking high risks, that
keeps you going until you reach success, is the one that can blind you to the fact that you
have made a mistake.
An ideal entrepreneur needs to know when it’s time to withdraw from an idea and move
on to the next. A viability study will help for doing that before you have invested a lot of
time and money in an idea.
If you’re thinking about copying an existing idea then you also need to do a viability study.
This will help to decide you need to change the existing business to make it workable and
innovative.6
Go for your MVP
❖ Identify the components of your product
❖ Identify the resources needed
❖ Identify the resources available
❖ Develop a strategy with deadlines (and responsibilities)
❖ Get it done
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MVPIdentify the components
MVP: Minimum needed thing to test your business idea
● Create a list of all features you want in your product
● Prioritize that list by demand of the market and your results from analysis
(competitors, target group, etc.)
● Categorize your list as “must to have” and “nice to have”.
● Create a list of tasks to deliver your product
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MVPIdentify the resources needed
● Evaluating your must have list what are the resources you need
● Resources could be people, technologies, money, …
● Create a list of all these resources
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MVPIdentify the resources available
● What resources do you currently have?
● This could be talent, money, technology, connections, …
● Create a list of the resources available and who is providing that resource
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MVPMatching
● Match the list of resources needed with the list of resources available
● See how the available resources can fill the need
● Determine how to satisfy the other required resources with no available
resources
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MVPExample table of tasks
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Task Resources required
Resourcesavailable
Responsible Comments
Sketch a landing page One with design talent or experience
No one in the team is designer. But one is talented and know some web tools to sketch prototypes
John Doe John will use online tool Lucidchart to sketch a landingpage and the entire team will adjust it afterwards.
Programming a landing page
Developers with senior skills
No resources. Outsourcing.
John Doe John Doe will contact to digital agencies and get offerings
MVPCreate/Promote your idea
● Your table of tasks is just for you in case an investor might ask
● Now it is time for MVP.
○ Promoting: Create something that present your product/service idea and its “must to have”
features
■ E.g. a sketch/prototype/functional landingpage, flyer, FB page, infographic
○ Create early (beta) version of your product (optional)
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SEO
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SEO
Making web pages search engine friendly. We will focus on Onpage SEO measures.
SEO should be considered from the start. Some general measures:
● Domain name
● Site structure
● SIte design
● Site navigation
● Site topics
● Headings
● Usability
● Accessibility
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SEO: General measures
Domain name: Get a domain name that is memorable and contains your keywords
Usability: It doesn’t matter how well the content is if the site is frustrating to use
Design: It’s tempting to build a website and then think about SEO. Better to design with
SEO in mind
Navigation: Bots (crawlers) will rarely index deeper than the top 2-3 levels of a website. So
possibly they won’t index lower level pages. Sitemaps can still lead bots to lower level
content. For more: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/156184
Content: Bots use the content to know where to categorize each page. A page with lots of
text on lots of topics and keywords is hard to categorize. Don’t forget to place your right
keyword for a page as heading.18
SEO: General measures
Links: The link text is just as important as the link. Consider keywords in the link text too as
TITLE text..
Images: Always add an ALT text to image tags
Page title: This should be appealing, inviting clicks, contain keywords and consist of 60
characters
Page description: This should be appealing, inviting clicks, contain keywords and consist of
120 characters
File names: Try to name your files (e.g. PDFs) with your keywords
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SEO: Some other ranking factors
Link popularity
Webpage age
Number and quality of competition
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SEO: The most important factor is Keywords
Before starting SEO, you need to know what keywords you target. You can use tools
introduced during last meeting
Each webpage should concentrate on:
● One keyword matching the page content
● Most frequently used by the target audience (see competitors)
● Target keywords with little competition or modify frequently used keywords wisely
● Sprinkle the keyword throughout the page to remind the bot that the page is
important for that keyword
● The ratio of keywords appears in the page text should be important. c.a. 1-3%.
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SEO: Tools
Google Webmaster Tools: It provides reporting that tells you what you are doing right and
wrong
Analytics: It shows site’s traffic on an hourly, daily, weekly, monthly basis
● Tools: Google Analytics, Piwik
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Next meetings
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3rd online meeting
❖ Optional. No plenary session.
❖ Several feedback time slots will be offered on the WIKI. Each group
can book a time slot to get a personal feedback. If you are interested,
please book slots gapless in sequence. You don’t need to submit your
documentation beforehand. In a feedback session you will present
your project status and get feedback.
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On-site meeting
❖ Group presentations containing business idea, business model, results
of validation, go-to-market strategy incl. MVP.
❖ Each group will have max. 15 minutes for the presentation.
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