Zawada Entrepreneurial Journal

Weekly Reflection - The Unexpected Utility of Google Ads A valuable lesson I learned this week came from my completion of Project #1 – Choosing a Product. To complete the assignment students are required to familiarize themselves with the some of the basic tools in the Google Ads program. The site offers a great deal more than I had imagined! Valuable information about competitors and market research can all be obtained through this tool. When working through the assignment I made some interesting realizations. I could never have foreseen the difference in the level of clicks or CTR by changing just a word or omitting an article. By imputing keywords into a campaign, Google Ads estimates how well an ad will perform. These estimates allow business owners to optimize their ads ensuring the highest levels of accessibility and brand awareness. Here are some of the figures pulled from my project;   As you can see, changing one word will result in drasticall...

    Weekly Reflection This week I found particular interest in the HMM Module. The topic was Innovation and Creativity; More specifically how to create an environment that induces innovation. The module offers great advice to managers to “unleash creative potential”. One repeated principle is the importance of populating a workplace with “intellectually diverse” individuals. Filling a room with people who have the same opinion and thinking style will result in a stagnant environment where no innovation can take place. The module advises that a key to a continually innovative workforce is to bring new minds and thought processes to the table. This can include interns, short-term employees, mentors, and visits to other operations. New people bring new ideas, and more people to bounce ideas off of. Sometimes this will result in revolutionary ideas! Other times… not so much. Nonetheless, it is important to develop a team who are compa...

Weekly Reflection - Value of a Weighed Decision Making Matrix This week students were given multiple cases revolving around Joe, Trevor, and Amy, three entrepreneurs who are trying to find solutions to their important decisions. Through reading and external research we provide a response and opinion to their question. To assess each decision we have been asked to make a weighted decision matrix; a great tool that allows for unbiased decision making. These weeks I wanted to offer up a brief explanation of the process as well as important considerations. Below is an example of such a matrix While formatting can differ, in this example the different options are listed vertically under “alternatives”, and the chosen criteria are listed horizontally. Each criterion is given a “weight” or a level of importance. Perhaps the most import part of making a successful matrix is to assign weights  prior  to rating the alternatives; this prevents a bias from alte...

Weekly Reflection   A new semester has begun and that means the blog is active again! Despite my most popular post getting 4 views I am glad to be back. If all goes well this will be my last semester! The classes I am taking are extremely applicable to the industry I hope to enter, guiding me towards a path of success. I am highly anticipating the next 12 weeks. I am near the completion of my chosen book, “Do the Work” by Steven Pressfield. I won't go into much detail here, as it would render the coming report useless. So far: however, I have found great joy in reading this book. I find it very applicable to areas outside of business too. It is a great read for those with big dreams but are holding themselves back from completing them. The reading for this week consisted primary of entrepreneur blogs across the Internet. I have found a blog I particularly like, but the biggest lesson I learned was how fast an impression is made when someone loads up your site. I...

Weekly Reflection And so concludes the first who weeks of the semester! I believe I am off to a pretty good start and I am hoping that I maintain this level of dedication to my coursework in all of my classes. I plan to graduate at the end of the semester; I don’t want to jeopardize that. So far I have had a keen interest in the discussion boards; something I am typically very impartial towards. In most classes, I do not feel they induce valuable conversations. This has not been the case in this course.   I am genuinely excited to see responses to my posts. It is interesting seeing people come to different conclusions from the same inputs. I will have such confidence in my initial post, but will often find great value in the opposing opinions. To me, this proves the uncertainty in operating a small business. Everyone is making educated guesses and hoping for the best. Project Update Additionally, choosing my product has been an interesting endeavor as well. ...

Last Lecture Exercise I have tremendously enjoyed these past 14 weeks in B 183:08. Any college in the world can teach you the fundamental Entrepreneurship. Any “How to Get Rich” book can give you step by step instructions to profit off of your million dollar idea. However, as a student of Brigham Young University, you are blessed to receive the same temporal knowledge as the rest of the word, but also learn how God’s will for you relates to each endeavor. This course will guide you to greatness along a path of righteousness and integrity. The straight and narrow is not the easiest to follow at times; however, temporal greed is not worth the immense love of our Heavenly Father. All of our actions, including our professional endeavors should emulate the actions of Christ. The scriptures warn us about the pursuit of wealth. D&C 68:31 states Now, I, the Lord, am not well pleased with the inhabitants of Zion, for … they also seek not earnestly the riches of eternity...