In the mini Dragon Den exercise that we had made in our class, Ecem, Oya, Yigitcan and I were the Business Angels. The reason I volunteered to be one was because I thought that analysing a business, and deciding whether it is worth lending money or not is fun. And actually, it was. After reading both case studies about Soundmap, and Ice Cream, I had some questions in my mind, and actually I kind of decided which one I preferred. However, talking to the entrepreneurs, my ideas become neater. The questions that we asked were:
· What is your business about?
· What are your backgrounds?
· What is the structure of your business?
· What is your customer market?
· Do you have any customers right now, or have you spoken to potential customers?
· Do you have any competition?
· How are you different?
· What is makes your business preferable?
· How will you understand that your business is successful?
· What is your marketing strategy?
· What is your cash flow?
Actually, I was amazed at the end of the exercise. I realized that by asking some general questions, which includes both the external and internal factors about the business, one could have a sense about the whole business. For instance, the customer market, and the competitors are some external factors, social and economic factors respectively. Or the question about the structure of the business, gives an idea about the internal factors of the business. As a result, I understood that the SWOT analysis of a business is very significant. Without settling down the external and internal factors, an entrepreneur will not be able to answer, every detailed question of the business angels. However, settling the SWOT analysis is not enough as well. The idea should be innovative, or different from its competitors. In other words, by this exercise, I kind of grasped in what point should a business be to start it.
