With an uncertain job market, many students are looking for new ways to be successful in finding a future career.
Last Thursday the College of Business held its annual entrepreneurship conference to teach business students how to be profitable in the 21st century.
Tim Todd, dean of the Bauernfeind College of Business, said the conference was designed four years ago to be an afternoon where students could gain knowledge on how to be profitable entrepreneurs.
Todd started the conference by demonstrating a sales tactic students could use with potential customers.
The exercise involved Todd auctioning off a dollar bill and seeing how much money students were willing to pay for it.
Todd said with the right tactic he could make a profit from selling the dollar bill, but there will always be a winner and a loser.
He said students might not realize as entrepreneurs they have the opportunity to graduate and create their own job instead of having to find one.
“I hope their eyes were open to areas of entrepreneurship that they hadn’t thought of,” he said. “They could be their own boss.”
Students were also asked to take a poll on what sales approach they thought worked best.
They were able to answer using their cell phones and the results were shown immediately on the screen.
Todd demonstrated cell phones can be useful when trying to get customers to buy your product because they allow for immediate feedback.
Glenn Mangold, professor of marketing and emerging technologies, gave a presentation to educate students on how to effectively communicate with customers using social media.
“We are in the midst of a communication revolution,” Mangold said.
He said social media allows for entrepreneurs to get customers to engage, think and buy their products.
“The power in the market place has shifted,” Mangold said.
He said social media such as Facebook, Twitter and blogs can stimulate conversations online and offline.
By engaging customers in conversations it makes them feel as if they are not being talked at, but talked to, Mangold said.
Mangold said there is more to selling a product than just promoting it.
He said students must communicate with their customers in order for them to buy.