Week 10: The End

Well, this is the end of my time at Game CoLab, and my first real experience working with a startup (especially more interesting because Game CoLab is relatively small).

Before I add my final thoughts, I just want to talk about where we got with the work I did at Game CoLab.

In terms of the booklet, I was able to get a basic layout done, but we have decided that it may not be best to print it out at this time. I have the PDF version of the booklet to turn in as my deliverable.

We ended up with a total of 28 responses out of 54 on the surveys. That is about a 52% turnaround, which is awesome! I initially thought I had emailed more people, but I then quickly realized that some of contacts on my list were not actually in the Arizona gaming industry, so my survey did NOT apply to them.

Moving onto my thoughts on my experience at Game CoLab..

This was more than just an "internship" for me. For those that are more aware of the personal changes in my life over the past ~six months or so, the experience at Game CoLab was just a little peek into the entrepreneurial world and getting some experience with different tasks at a startup, things that I had never done before. I have never done an actual survey nor an actual booklet, so it was a real experience in lateral thinking. There is a long way to go on this journey but I am glad that I was able to provide some value to a startup in the area and again, just get a little exposure in this realm.

I am glad that BASIS has allowed seniors the opportunity to get out of school the last trimester of senior year to go work on projects that they are interested in. It gave me time to do a lot of learning, reading, watching videos, and real exposure with Game CoLab.

I had a lot of fun being here!

With that said, that is the end of this blog. If you are interested in seeing my presentation, you are welcome to come on May 7th at BASIS Chandler!

Keep Swimming,

--
Anirudh Ravichandran

Week 9: Last Stretch

Hi everyone, and welcome back to week nine!

During the ninth week, we discussed more about the Phoenix Comicon as usual, and getting people that mentioned wanting to sign up on the survey to actually signing up.

It appears we will not get to the video in the week we have left. I spent pretty much all of this week working on the booklet. The booklet is actually coming out a lot better than I had expected. The booklet will also contain the relevant survey responses. Here's a couple more pages to peek at.

To build the booklet, I am using a free and open-source tool called scribus (https://www.scribus.net/). It has worked well with no hitches up to this point. The booklet dimensions are actually not letter (8.5 x 11) but are actually A5 (basically half of A4). We want to get it printed on quality A5 paper, but I am not sure if I will have a print of it by the day of my presentation, so I will probably just have a printed copy on normal letter paper so you can see what the booklet looks like. It is just not feasible in terms of cost to print out a bunch of A5 booklets without thinking through the cost and number we need. We are considering having advertising in the booklet if possible.

We have gotten to 28 responses on the surveys. It is not as much as I had hoped, but it is more than last year's survey! The most important thing to remember with surveys and information in general is not to make any assumptions; the data shows you the actual numbers behind what you think is the case. I stopped the survey a couple days ago so I could start compiling the results together. Although I'd like to booklet to have polished survey results, it appears I will not have time to make the survey results look good in the booklet so I am just making sure that I have a rudimentary layout of the survey results in the booklet and making sure that everything else in the booklet looks on point.

My time with Game CoLab is almost up, and it is time to wrap up the booklet and get started on my presentation.

With that said, that's it for week nine, come back for more for my final week! Thanks!

Week 8: #AskGaryVee

Hi everyone, and welcome back to week eight!

During the eighth week, we discussed more about the Phoenix Comicon as usual, but there was more focus on the booklet that I am doing. The showcase is in early June.

I am not sure we will be able to get to doing our short video (hopefully we will but it seems unlikely). I spent pretty much all of this week working on the booklet, because that will be my focus in the short time I have left here at Game CoLab. The booklet will also contain the relevant survey responses. In the interest of not showing you the entire booklet, here's just a couple mockups I've been working on!

To build the booklet, I am using a free and open-source tool called scribus (https://www.scribus.net/). It has worked well with no hitches up to this point, so as long as I get everything together, this booklet is going to be pretty awesome!

We have gotten to 23 responses on the surveys. It is not as much as I had hoped (we still have a little time before I have to stop the survey and put the results together), but it is more than last year's survey and still has information that is useful to us. The most important thing to remember with surveys and information in general is not to make any assumptions; the data shows you the actual numbers behind what you think is the case.

Early skims over the data show that there is some varied data across the board, so it is not just skewed in one direction (aka the questions relating to revenue or things of that nature). As a result (no pun intended), the data in itself is more interesting and relevant because it is not just the same across the board.

The reason I titled my post #AskGaryVee is because I finally got around to purchasing Gary Vaynerchuk's new book (http://www.amazon.com/AskGaryVee-Entrepreneurs-Leadership-Social-Self-Awareness/dp/0062273124). I am unsure of whether I will get it in time to read it and blog about it but I have no doubt that I will get around to reading it.

My time with Game CoLab is almost up; although this post is about week 8, I mentioned that I would be blogging a week behind so we are at week 9 today and I have one more week left to finish everything I need to finish and get working on my presentation.

With that said, that's it for week eight, come back for more next week! Thanks!