4A - Forming An Opportunity Belief

1. I believe that it is very unsafe to turn into my neighborhood off of Dale Mabry Highway.
2. The unmet need is a safe way to get into the neighborhood. The people who have the need are the people who live in my neighborhood that drive. The need came from the development of the neighborhood, which has been here for 3 years now. To meet this need now, people are putting their turn signal on and trying to turn into the neighborhood off of a 55mph road. I believe there is a 70% chance this opportunity exists.
3. The prototypical customer refers to the people who live in my neighborhood who drive.
4. Neighbor #1: The exact nature of the need is safety. They become aware of the need all the time, but especially during times when many people are on the roads. They have had the need since they moved into the neighborhood about 1.5 years ago. They first became aware of the need on the way home from picking up their children from school one day and trying to turn into the neighborhood. As they were turning into the neighborhood, the person driving behind them did not brake and almost rear-ended them. They are currently addressing the need by putting their turn signal on almost 100ft before the turn. They are not very satisfied with this solution because it does not prevent them from being in a car accident.
   Neighbor #2: The exact nature of the need is prevention of accidents from occurring. They become aware of the need all the time, but especially during rush hour. They have had the need since they moved into the neighborhood about 2 years ago. They first became aware of the need on their way home from work when they had to quickly turn into the neighborhood when they realized the person behind them was not braking. They are currently addressing the issue by quickly turning into the neighborhood instead of safely turning in like they should, to try and prevent rear-ending. They are not very satisfied with this solution because even though it is lowering the risk of getting rear-ended, they could lose control as they're turning in because they're trying to get off the highway so fast.
   Neighbor #3: The exact nature of the need is their fear for the safety of their children driving. They become aware of the need all the time. They have had the need since their oldest child started driving 6 months ago. They first became aware of the need when they were teaching their child how to drive on the highway and noticed that the car behind them was not slowing down when they went to turn in to the neighborhood. This immediately started a sense of panic in the mother as she was sitting in the passenger seat. They are currently addressing the problem by praying and constantly reminding their child to be safe while turning into the neighborhood. They are not very satisfied with this solution because it does not fix the problem at hand. 
5. I learned that people feel the same about the issue that I originally though they would and they think about the issue all the time, not just at a specific time. All 3 of the people I interviewed had very strong opinions that it is unsafe the way it is now, and the things they are doing to try and help the situation are temporary and there should be a more permanent fix to the problem. The most surprising thing I learned about the opportunity is that 2/3 neighbors that I interviewed have sent emails to the county to try and get a turn lane or a light put in where the turn is for my neighborhood.
6. All of my original opportunity is still there, this was a very large problem to people and they had very strong opinions that there needs to be a change. Since talking to the people, I have realized that a traffic light would work as well as the turn lane I previously talked about, so I think there is a more diverse way of fixing the problem than I had originally anticipated. I believe that having this added information from the people I interviewed allows me to have a more accurate opportunity than what I had in the beginning. I believe entrepreneurs should take feedback very seriously and should adapt their opportunities accordingly. If people in the target market do not see the problem as important as the entrepreneur, then it might not do as well as they think it will. I think the more they adapt to the feedback, the better their solution to the problem will do in the market.