Week 3 Kill Two Birds with Zoom, Hair & VC

I had many tasks that required me not only to inquire of clients, but to also address their concerns for future booking. I came up with a Zoom panel discussion. After attending a hoard of Zoom birthday parties and conferences, I felt this was the best way to “kill two birds with one stone”. The Zoom discussion consisted of a panel of licensed professionals and a moderator that did a lot of the work. I came up with an outline of discussion subjects and hired a moderator that specialized in making Zoom events interactive. I invited professionals and clients to join the dialogue and answer interactive questions that were also customer discovery questions. I incorporated questions like: When do you think we will return to the salons, do you think COVID-19 is airborne, what services do you miss the most... All the questions were used as talking points for panelists and attendees. I got some awesome customer discovery feedback, broadened my network with potential future team members and collaborators, created promo (by having cash app prized and giveaways for promotion), engaged with social media promoted my online workshop and really killed a lot of birds with this event. But more importantly, I know more about what stylists

and clients will be looking for in respect to the Livid Lash Pro app as it pertains to COVID-19.

My takeaway is that the personal appearance industry was affected by an epidemic like COVID-19 in the past with the Spanish Flu. People will eventually return to services as normal, but the return maybe slow. This was an awesome way to find out the information I needed, because my Facebook status questions were only generating a light and dry response. I still used Facebook customer discovery questions to prepare for the event, but this way was more interactive.

I took Jeff’s advice and created a more forward ad for my online workshop promo campaign. While I didn’t get any new sales, the insights showed more improvement with 33 likes, 0 comments, and 9 bookmarks and 63 direct clicks to the website. I will brief with him on May 22nd to find out how we can use this data for to improve the impact of the ad.

I completed the paper for the comparison of the two accelerators and am beginning to research identify two sources of capital that focuses on female founders and women of color. I chose to research Black Girl Ventures and Women VC. I hope the research will help me market myself to funders. I found that tech people weren’t interested in hair, but I look at that as a challenge. Hopefully, the research can help me rise to the occasion as I look toward digital transformation. 

The SBA loan was sent on Monday May 18th, so I will be

discussing plans with Jeff on how to make the best use of the loan. 

I revised the Lean Canvas by organizing and creating hashtags to highlight segmentations. I also used the narrative voice of the Customer and Service providers. This made the entire Canvas make more sense to me, so I am sure it will help others understand it better. 

Progress during prior week

• Increased social media engagement

• Pivoted based on results from previous marketing pilot

• Addressed customer concerns, executed customer discovery and engagement through Zoom panel event

• Finished the paper for the two accelerators comparison

• Heard back from SBA

• Made Lean Canvas revision based on segmentations and Zoom customer discovery

Plans for the coming week

• Use customer discovery from Zoom and implement it into customer engagement and Livid Lash Pro Lean Canvas

• Figure out how to get more impact out of the online workshop ad

• Complete research and paper on two sources for capital on Black Girl Ventures and Women VC

• Plan out the use of the SBA PPP Loan

• Revise Lean Canvas and move to the next stage of Maurya’s Process

• Track imports of products, packaging and update website and marketplaces

Questions/Issues/Concerns/Observations

• The Zoom discussion was awesome, but how much of the Lean Canvas needs to change based on the results from the customer discovery?

• How can I get more impact without wasting money on pilot marketing? Can I switch to funnel marketing with someone who specialized in results so I can designate more time in other places?

• I want to make use I have the proper documentation to make sure that the SBA loan is completely forgivable.

• How can I align the products, once received to the proper marketplaces?