Jakob Wikenstål - Serve24
Jakob Wikenstål - Serve24
Describe yourself and your project. How did you get the idea?
We are sport enthusiasts with the dream of working in the sports industry. During our third semester we had an entrepreneurship course where our group plus one person more made a few ideas and when Jacob mentioned the problem of the big usage of tennis balls but with few courts to offer them, we came up with this idea of Serve24. A service to provide 24/7 access for purchase a tennis ball at your court.
Who are you? Previous education/jobs/ experiences etc.
Jacob Johansson is 24 years old who studying Sport Sciences with emphasis in Sport Management and he is a former professional tennis player who wants to develop the tennis.
Jakob Wikenstål is 23 years old with great interest in football and innovation, who also studying Sport Management and has also studied for a year in entrepreneurship in California.
Erik Månsson is 22 years old, likewise studying Sport Management and also a football and marketing enthusiast.
What will you do during these three months? How will you spend the time?
We will use this summer to create a big survey for the potential customers and end users and hopefully identify the right needs and what the different opinions are so we can make sure our service provide right features. One of our goals of doing this is that it can provide us enough information of creating a prototype and know who our target persona is.
What do you expect to achieve during Leapfrogs?
We hope to achieve the previous answers and expanding our network and of course have an awesome time as a real entrepreneur. We also like to pivot the idea and come closer to the real life as an entrepreneur.
Jakob Wikenstål - Serve24 #2
Tell us what you have done on your project so far during the Leapfrogs time.
So far we have had a lot of fun with the work both as within the team when discussing different decision, as well as, when we got a lot of help and fun from the latest workshop. We have now been able of reaching to our first two surveys that we are hoping will be a great step to understanding our target personas. And right now when we will launch the surveys, we are still not completely sure to which channels to go through but since we have one in our team with great tennis experience and network, we will try to go from there.
Has everything gone according to the plan? Has anything unexpected occurred? Has something been easier/harder than expected?
The hardest part so far has been with typing the right questions that can take us to the next step by receiving the answers we hopefully are waiting and looking for. Since we are three people in the team, there are a lot of different opinions, which is good though, because then we could really make sure we are thinking in different directions. We did thought we would be able of receiving a lot of answers already with our surveys, but since it took a little bit longer to decide the right questions, we might be a few days behind the planned schedule. But that´s something you always learn, you can’t always stick to your schedule, there are always something that will change the path.
What will you focus on during the remaining time? Will you follow your original plan or has anything changed along the way?
Like we told in the previously questions, we might be a little bit behind the planned schedule but we won’t be negative or sad because of that. No, now we have a great set up with our surveys and will strive to gather as much answers as we can. We have already different groups and areas in the country within the tennis industry where we could get out the surveys and start receiving answers. So a bit of a change, but we know where we want to go and will go for launching the surveys in a week. And then try to spread the word out and after that we hope we are able of knowing if our ideas of the right prices are, which lifestyles of the target persona have and so on. Maybe we need to pivot our business model, maybe not. Lets find out!
Jakob Wikenstål - Serve24 #3
How did you experience the three months?
These three months could be summarizing as “WOW”! The time just flew by and here we are, three months later and we couldn’t have done this without the help from you guys at Leapfrog and all the people around us who have supported us and believed in us. It all started with a lot of energy and a hope to kick-start everything. But during the start we soon noticed that the survey wasn’t totally good and a few days went to rearranging that.
Through the summer we have had a lot of fun, a lot of work and of course we are very happy to have been able of doing this.
What has been hardest/most enjoyable?
To start of with the whole summer, I think we are very pleased with the platform we have created. We have developed and started up our brand at LinkedIn and Facebook to reach out to our target customer. This is something we really enjoy to see kick off and considering it has been summer were Tennis is pretty low in activity, we feel please and enjoying being at the moment and situation we have come to so far. Regarding the tennis during the summer, that has been the hardest part to connect and get in contact with the right people.
Did it go as expected? Will you continue working on your project in the future?
We had in the beginning an objective of creating two surveys and gathering a lot of answers to understand our target market. When we summarize the result at this moment, we could say that it didn’t really go as we thought. We still gathering answers and have increased our platform where we can meet more people in the tennis industry, so that’s good. Right now at the moment we will just continuing on the surveys and see were it goes for a few months. We still believe in this so hopefully we have come far during the end of this year.
What would you say is the most important lesson learnt while working on your project?
One of the most important things that we have learnt during this summer should be that it is really hard to gathering answers during a summer when it is regarding tennis. It could be because of the structure of the surveys. Since they are online we might miss out a lot of participants or, they could be on vacation at the moment. A team that is always easy to communicate within is also a big thing to have. We thought we had everything in our hands but there is always a unexpected travel or similar that shows up.
Do you have any tips to other ”new” entrepreneurs?
Some ideas to think of is:
Do you have the right team? Are you all have different interests and knowledge?
Are you in good trust within your team? Can you also trust other people? Don’t hold on to your thoughts or ideas, go and talk with a friend or the family. Go out an network! It is important to speak and maybe next time, the one you talk to could be your future investor or similar!
Try to do have a vision and also a plan of how to get there. Make sure you have time, because there is never time.
Have passion, and believe in you and your idea.