23A- Your Venture's Unfair Advantage

1. Entrepreneur Experience: I took a class last year during the summer for one of my innovation academy classes.
• Valuable: I feel as if this is moderately valuable because having this experience could be beneficial to starting up my service.
• Rare: This isn't exactly rare, since many people have this kind of experience.
• Inimitable: Many people can get this experience through different ways but it is shaped depending on the person who gains.
• Non-Substitutable: In terms of experience I could always find someone with more experience on entrepreneurship that could help me with this area of the service.
2. Proof: Since my service involves homeless people it is not that difficult to locate them since each time I go out shopping it feels like I always see somebody with a cardboard sign asking for money.
• Valuable: I feel that this is very important because this is what is basically going to start up the business since I will have proof that shows homelessness being a problem.
• Rare: I guess it would consider rare when compared to the amount of normal people but common seeing as the number of homeless people is increasing.
• Inimitable: If there are other people interested in the matter they could end up finding the same homeless people who are seen by people who are taking action.
• Non-Substitutable: Seeing as the resource or in this case the proof is homeless people I don't feel as if it can be substituted.
3. Information: Information gathered on the subject I decided to pursue to start a business on since the first assignment on this matter.
• Valuable: I think this is very valuable since there is very little chance I could replicate three months of information gathering so easily.
• Rare: It is rare since its my own findings as well as some information I looked up so it is very individualistic.
• Inimitable: It really depends, for if I had everything on a flash drive or on paper it could be copied, but since most of the information is scattered across my blogs it could be difficult.
• Non-Substitutable: Unless the replacement or the substitution for the info is as good I don't really see there being a substitution.
4. Social Capital: Domain Expert: Knowing a director for a homeless shelter gives me someone to turn to for advice on how to run my business.
• Valuable: Having someone who has years of experience on this topic is valuable to have on starting up a business where it focuses on their area of expertise.
• Rare: Really depends because I am pretty sure that I am not this person's only acquaintance. But there might be some people who are thinking of doing a business like the one I am doing and it could be difficult for them to have this kind of expert in their social capital. Also it could depend on where they live because someone starting a business might not live near a homeless shelter so it could be rare.
• Inimitable: It is not that hard to be copied by others since it mainly involves getting this kind of person in their social capital but to some that could be easier said than done.
• Non-Substitutable: If I ever lose this person in my social for some unknown reason there is always hope that I find some other director of a homeless shelter that could give me knowledge on how to go for my business.
5. Social Capital: Market Expert: Having someone in this field will be useful because it can give me more insight on homelessness.
• Valuable: This person's connections and knowledge on the matter are very valuable and could become a great asset to what I am aiming for.
• Rare: Its not rare since there are possibly lots of people with this kind of background. When you have the career this person has you make lots connections.
• Inimitable: Since this is person with their own unique experiences then it would be almost impossible to find someone with the exact capabilities.
• Non-Substitutable: It won't be easy but I could always find someone who fit in the slot of market expert, although their background on the homeless matter will be different.
6. Social Capital: Industry Supplier: Having this person in my social capital will be beneficial because it could help provide resources for the homeless that use my service.
• Valuable: I will say that this person is very valuable because having resources to help the homeless on a just starting up business is useful.
• Rare: There are probably many people who work for the company this person works for or there other companies who also help homeless people and there will be people who hold the same position as them.
• Inimitable: Other people could possibly have this supplier as an acquaintance as well so it shouldn't be to hard to copy.
• Non-Substitutable: Since this is a supplier of resources it would be extremely difficult to find another one that would be willing to help the homeless since there may or may not be a lot of these kind of companies.
7. Local location: Since the service will be mainly focusing on the homeless in Gainesville being local is a key factor because it would be much more difficult if the service to eliminate or reduce homeless in Gainesville if the service took place somewhere else.
• Valuable: It is moderately valuable since it would be difficult to run the business if the location was far away.
• Rare: being local is not rare because I could live anywhere in Gainesville to be local.
• Inimitable: It is not that hard to be copied by others since its just a local location.
• Non-Substitutable: If its a location in Gainesville then it could substituted but any where else can't be used.
8. Presenting Experience: I have the experience of presenting a product or service so I can use that to my advantage when presenting my product to potential businesses who are willing to fund this business.
• Valuable: It is somewhat valuable because it could help me convince people that my service could help people benefit from it if they were to use it.
• Rare: If you an upcoming entrepreneur you would probably have this so it might not be rare, but since it is individualistic there is some uniqueness to it.
• Inimitable: Ones own experience isn't something that some random person can easily copy or imitate.
• Non-Substitutable: The only way I see this experience being substituted is if I gain even more experience on presenting that it replaces the old experience.
9. No competition: Since this service is mainly created to help the homeless I don't see there being a competitor to help homeless since its not a competition.
• Valuable: It is very valuable because no competition means no people to get in your way and people who have the common goal of reducing homeless are welcome to bring any assistance.
• Rare: I suppose its rare when a business doesn't have competitors because it leads to who can outdo the other and gain customers.
• Inimitable: Having no competition isn't something that can be imitated, you just have a business where nobody bothers or can't compete.
• Non-Substitutable: Can't be substituted since no competition is needed or required here.
10. Adaptability: Since this business is just starting it up I am open to any ideas that could improve these ideas since there is still much I probably don't know on the matter.
• Valuable: Being able to change to better improve is something that is very valuable in a business because it could only lead to improvement.
• Rare: I suppose it could be considered rare since there are some companies in the world that are resistant to change.
• Inimitable: It could imitated rather easily if a product or service is willing to adapt to improve for the sake of its customers.
• Non-Substitutable: Not exactly something that can be substituted since its just the concept of changing a service or product to better the needs of their customers.

       Once the VRIN analysis was done it was difficult to choose which one of these resources I would consider to be on the top. But if I had to choose one I would think having entrepreneur experience would have to be the one since without it I would be a lot more lost on how to approach creating this service. Its unique because its my own experiences and no one can take that away from me. Your experiences can determine if you can manage to make your business a reality.