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Lesson 13: Weekly Reflection

As this semester is reaching its conclusion I have the opportunity to look back and see where I went wrong with this course long project. I don’t consider my business a complete failure, it fulfilled its purpose in regards to the curriculum; but I do see some major flaws. The biggest mistake was me. While LEGO art is sold pretty regularly for high-profit margins across the internet, I don’t feel I created the infrastructure required for success. For most aftermarket LEGO stores try to attract an audience within the community; I caste too broad a net. Sites like B3 offer pop culture related sets; brick arms appeals to a more historical audience. My site suited just me. I build for me and sold things I liked, that’s not enough. As far as errors in site management I feel it would have been beneficial to keep a closer eye on analytics. The course teaches us about the importance of fine-tuning and adjusted; I did this but not to the required extent. I have a lot more I ha...
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B 250: 09 Lesson 11 Weekly Reflection

After each week of completing the course curriculum, I find myself so excited to work on my website and create a better e-commerce learning experience for myself. I find the course setup pretty interesting, we learn the basics, build the site, and then implement what we learned. It’s a pretty unique process, but I find it very rewarding. Perhaps is because it inducing a sense of competitiveness against myself; I want to do better and my site to perform better than it did in the previous weeks. It gives me the opportunity to see where I made mistakes rather and learn from that rather than to try and circumvent them entirely. This week focused on SEO or Search Engine Optimization. I found this topic very fascinating and a great deal more nuanced than I anticipated. According to the reading, each search engine utilizes a “secret” algorithm that is constantly being updated.   It seems the best we can do is theorize what will best affect the optimization of a site. Despite this, th...
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B 250: 09 Lesson 10 Weekly Reflection

This week was very eventful! A good deal of progress has been made regarding my business. This week’s curriculum focused on the improvement of our ads. By working through the material I learned a great deal about maximizing the effectiveness of the ads to my site. The tool I found most useful was the info graph letting me know which searched resulted in my ad coming up. There were a couple of common searches that let me know about a few negative keywords I should add. It really is something to keep your eye on if you are working with Google ads. This week also resulted in a few orders being made, which I was quite worried about. My site offers pretty niche goods, so I was concerned my business wouldn’t make a profit. It was now reached a point where money is being made! Very happy news. I also found a digital building service that has allowed me to provide 3D prototypes to customers and give me a better idea of the cost of inputs.
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B 283: 06 Lesson 10 Weekly Reflection

Response to Reading In this weeks reading there was a particular paragraph that stood out to me, new information was added to a principle I was very familiar with. In Elder L. Tom Perry’s April 1987 General Conference talk, “United in Building the Kingdom of God”, he said: Now, we see that often this turning away from the Lord comes with prosperity… Although Jacob does not say it, this process can also work the other way. Those who are less fortunate begin to feel deprived. They become consumed by what they do not have, blaming others for their predicament and blaming the Lord. They, also, turn their hearts away from Him. In many teaching of the church, we are advised to avoid extremes and instead be moderate. This principle can be interpreted in politics, parenting styles, commitment to work, and many others. I, however, have never seen how being financial unfortunate can lead to turning your ear against the Lord. This very obvious, in fact, I have experienced similar...
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B 283: 06 Lesson 9 Weekly Reflection

As I was finishing up my report on “E-Myth” I was reminded of some of the crucial myths many small business owners believe. Myths so dangerous, they have resulted in the staggering failure rate. One of the key principles Michael Gerber discuses was the difference between a technician and a entrepreneur. Being good at something does not inherently mean you can successfully lead a business within that industry. I experienced this myself this week. The business I have been operating this semester is an aftermarket LEGO set retailer and a commissionable builder. On the website and in the ads and posts I have always used the term “LEGO”. Turns out I should not have been doing that. I received a message from my friend, Kevin, who actually works for LEGO as a community manager. He informed me that some of the contents of my site and subsequent ads were not entirely legal. My website is in no way affiliated with The LEGO Group in any capacity, however, I had used their name in my ...
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