Growing Your Social Capital

Social Capital Interviews:

1) Tina Dugan- She has over 20+ years of cleaning up beaches and is an expert on this issue located in South Florida

2) Domain Expert- Experiences the same problem and is engaged in the same main service I want to start.

3) I found Tina from a past interview with one of the residences I had interviewed. I also know of her from cleaning up the beaches, I received her number from the local residents and then reached out to her. She was very helpful and supported this service I am proposing.

4) Tina was very helpful and provided many key tips on the importance of starting this service. She thinks its a great idea and actually really wanted to support it. She helps all organizations that try to help the ocean and was very helpful when thinking of some ideas to help start this service. Her service is very similar to mine, she started a service that cleans up the Loxahatchee river and is very well known in Jupiter. She truly inspired me and is very interested in my idea. I will help her service as well to give back everything she will do to help me.

5) Including Tina in this service will help spread this idea through her connections and also her tips will advance my idea.

1) Jack Connolly- Years of helping Tina with her business of keeping the oceans clean. 

2) Market Expert- Tina uses Jack for her Instagram and advertising part of her service. Jack is very interested in my market and thinks it can be very helpful to our oceans not only in South Florida. 

3) I reached out to Jack because of Tina. Tina has given me a lot of connections to start this service since she is very well known in the South Florida area. Jack wants to help me market my service and also spread the awareness. 

4) Jack also gave me a lot of tips when it comes to spreading this service to more people and also wants to help me reach out to more people. He also gave me tips on what services are already similar to my idea and how I can make mine different than others. I think Jack is very interested in my business and truly wants to start it to help marine life and create this service to spread even more awareness in South Florida.

5) Jack provided me with a lot of information on how to create a unique service and how to make it different than the services already available in the South Florida area.

1) Christian Turdo- Has been working at an Intercoastal restaurant for years now in South Florida.

2) Supplier-  Since he surfs at the beach almost every day and views all the trash there and then goes to work and sees all the trash rushing through the intercoastal, He wants to help me spread the awareness to his restaurant and others. 

3) I reached out to Christian because he is a close friend of mine that works at a local waterway restaurant here in South Florida. He also works with Tina with her service and works with many organizations to help prevent pollution and thinks my proposal is a great idea.

4) Christian is the supplier because his restaurant will be the first one to stop providing non-degradable items. They think its a great idea and will make an impact but they know there are many other restaurants that need to stop using plastics as well. It is more expensive so Christian also has a lot of connections with businesses that help this cause and will support me as well. 

5) Including Christian will help my service through his connections with his restaurant and others, this will help exploit my opportunity and help spread awareness.

Reflection: In Conclusion, I think this exercise helped me figure out the best plan to help start my service and also has brought me lots of connections. I think that growing this social capital has already been super helpful so I am excited to see what the future holds. I now know who my competition is and what makes my idea different and also who to start working with to grow my service even higher.