Strategic Entrepreneurship: Journal Entries, BMC, and SWOT Analysis

This assignment delves into the realm of strategic entrepreneurship, encompassing personal journal entries, an analysis of Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook, and a business model canvas (BMC) framework. The project begins with self-assessment of entrepreneurial traits and personality, followed by journal entries reflecting on an inspiring entrepreneur (Mark Zuckerberg) and their company (Facebook). The core of the assignment lies in dissecting Facebook's business model using the BMC, evaluating its customer segments, value propositions, channels, customer relationships, revenue streams, key resources, activities, partnerships, and cost structures. Furthermore, the assignment includes a SWOT analysis of Facebook, identifying its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, along with a discussion of the Blue Ocean Strategy. The student's reflections on entrepreneurship, market competition, and the evolving business landscape are also incorporated throughout the assignment.

STRATEGIC ENTREPRENEUERSHIP

Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................3
2.0 First personal journal entry set..................................................................................................4
3.0 Second personal journal entry set..............................................................................................5
Poster entrepreneur: Mark Zuckerberg........................................................................................5
4.0 Third personal journal entry set.................................................................................................7
Poster entrepreneurial company..................................................................................................7
5.0 Fourth personal journal entry set...............................................................................................9
Poster Company’s BMC..............................................................................................................9
6.0 Fifth personal journal entry set................................................................................................15
7.0 Conclusion...............................................................................................................................17
References:....................................................................................................................................18
Page 2 of 20

1.0 Introduction
Entrepreneurship represents the capacity of a unit to establish and successfully lead a start-up
business. In the opinion of Johannisson (2017), entrepreneur definitely needs to have few
positive traits to conduct a successful business that includes, optimistic nature, positive body
language, transparent communication, leadership, team handling, correct allocation, sales and
marketing and finance management. The initial section of the current project deals with the
evaluation of entrepreneurial abilities within self through traits and personality analysis
examination. The second section highlights a discussion over an individual selection of
entrepreneur aspiring life. The third section underscores the company or business run by the
entrepreneur and the final part is linked to self-reflection and beneficial aspects gathered from
the project.
Page 3 of 20

2.0 First personal journal entry set
Strength
 Motivating
 Energetic
 Easy-going
 Approachable
Weakness
 Short-tempered
 Lacking good interpersonal skills
Opportunity
 Mobilising people in research and survey
 Conducting programs and thereby improving interpersonal and group skills
Threat
 Other group members being more aggressive in terms of behavioural skills
 Tend to be more close ended in terms of leadership skills
Page 4 of 20

3.0 Second personal journal entry set
Poster entrepreneur: Mark Zuckerberg
Mark Elliot Zuckerberg was born on 14th May 1984 in New York into well educated and
financially stable family. Zuckerberg developed his interests in computers since he was 12, he
used Atari BASIC to establish a messaging program named ‘Zucknet’ (Biography.com Editors.,
2018). The program was used by his father in his dental office to maintain a smooth
communication between receptionists and patient. Zuckerberg enrolled at Harvard University in
2002 and created a program named CourseMatch, which helped students to select their class on
the basis of course selections. He also invented Facemash, which went popular for a short time
span (Biography.com Editors., 2018). In 2005, he received a high boost from the venture capital
firm, Accel Partners. The firm invested $12.7 million into the new invented network Facebook
and granted its access to high schools, international schools and other colleges, which
contributed the site with 5.5 million user base by the end of that year.
As per the records of Forbes, Mark Zuckerberg believes in the philosophy of speed. He considers
it as the key component, which people needs to have behind their work (Reynolds, 2018). If the
sense of urgency is missing, the possibilities of development and growth would slow down.
Following this philosophy, he had managed the rise and steady progress of Facebook. Moreover,
Zuckerberg also claimed the fact that Facebook has never guessed on any fact, rather it always
has undergone all possible tests to measure the security, web access programs and every
innovation (Huspeni, 2018). During the creation of Facebook, he had the vision of creating a site
that his peer would find useful. He along with his friends had created a side that allowed users to
Page 5 of 20

create their individual profile, upload pictures and communicate with one another. However, the
financial support and interest received from the venture capital firm have boosted the rapid
expansion of Facebook all over the world. Although Zuckerberg has also come across several
philanthropic challenges and legal accusations from the very onset, yet his determination and
zeal have been his strength, which helped him to overcome all hurdles (Mosakowski, 2017). As
per my observation, all aspects of Zuckerberg’s including his personal and professional life is
truly aspiring. This has been the reason why I chose him under poster entrepreneur, the
enthusiasm and creativity he brings within Facebook has no doubt in turning it into the most
iconic and accessible brand.
Page 6 of 20

4.0 Third personal journal entry set
Poster entrepreneurial company
The company Mark Zuckerberg has invented was named as TheFacebook, which was established
in the year 2004 as a messenger application by him along with other friends in Harvard
University named Dustin Moskovitz, Eduardo Saverin and Chris Hughes (Hall, 2018). At the
very onset, he was only opened to the members of Harvard through their college email address
and within the very first month 50% of the students had signed up the site. From the very initial
stage, TheFacebook has been an instant hit that grew at a rapid pace with the passage of time.
The membership was opened to all most every university of Canada and US, where users were
clamouring to sing up. In 2005, the brand receives the further financial support of $ 12.7 million
from Accel and $1 million from Jim Breyer, the personal venture capitalist (Boyd, 2018).
In August 2005, ‘The' was dropped and the brand was officially named as Facebook, which
encouraged it to move beyond the student base. The mission and vision statement of the brand
was to allow people with the power of building community and bring the world more closely
(Smithson, 2018). Zuckerberg usually emphasised on the term “empowering people”, which
signifies his goals of making it online social networking service as the means of making people
more digitally capable. At present, Facebook is not only used for the communication purpose
but also to stay connected to family, friends, discovering the world's social affairs and sharing
the news to other channels. It shows that Mark Zuckerberg has not only restricted Facebook as a
small basic online social site. Instead, the business models are improvised on a constant basis to
Page 7 of 20

facilitate knowledge acquisitions and valuable communications of every user (Birley & Stockley,
2017).
The reason that led me to choose the company is its strong brand image and the impact it has
created all over the globe. The tremendous innovation and user-friendly access Zuckerberg and
his team had framed are just highly aspiring. The tremendous innovation and user-friendly access
to Facebook have been the most appealing factor for me. The simple steps to create a profile
interest in every segment of the world ranging from urban to rural users to access the social
networking site. Hence, I believe that Zuckerberg is truly a charismatic personality, who is
standing by his ideology of “empowering people”. I believe his focus, determination and
innovation had been his driving factor towards his success. This would definitely a learning
factor for me to evolve in my career aspects.
Page 8 of 20

5.0 Fourth personal journal entry set
Poster Company’s BMC
Business model canvas
Customer segments
Internet users, advertisers, marketers and developers are the usual customer's segment of
Facebook. However, Kumar & Reinartz (2018) argued that nowadays the brand is constantly
changing its business model to successfully gain a global access, which covers the teenagers of
13 years to elderly people.
Value propositions
Connecting with friends, discovering, learning and getting a platform to express oneself have
been the major value proposition of the selected brand (Lin, 2017). Reach, relevance,
engagement and social context have also been its proposition factor.
Channels
Facebook specifically rely on channels like websites, mobile applications, Facebook adverts,
Facebook pages, developer tools and APIs.
Customer relationships
From the very initial phase, Facebook has managed to form a strong engagement with its
customers, whether through negative allegations or positive appealing (Muhammad et al. 2018).
The brand has always managed a strong relationship with its users. It enabled the brand to
Page 9 of 20

generate a monthly active user base of 2.23 billion by the second quarter of 2018 since the time
of 2008 (Statista., 2018).
Figure: Facebook monthly active users worldwide as of 2nd quarter 2018
(Source: Statista., 2018)
Revenue streams
Facebook usually uses three types of revenue streams that include free posting and access,
revenues earned through ads and also the payment forms. Users are also given the change to post
or promote their website content at a minimal rate and get wider visibility of the digital traffic.
Key resources
Page 10 of 20

The online portal and the social media platform of Facebook has been its most efficient resource.
And on the other side, its technological infrastructure has been it’s another key resource. The
brand entirely thrives on the mode of innovation and creativity (Tuten & Solomon,).
Key activities
Platform developmental actions and data centre operation management had been its key
activities. The brand usually allows its users with the online space, where they have uploaded
their data to utilise the space to get digital advantages.
Key partnerships
The content partners have been the key partners of Facebook. It includes all kinds of TV shows,
movies, music, new based articles, social campaigns, recent event and community-based events,
etc (Gerbaudo, 2018).
Cost structures
The cost structure involves ever possible costs associated with the running of the online business
(Thirumalai et al. 2017). The brand specifically counts on the factors like data centre costs, sales
and marketing, general and administrative and research and developmental activities.
Page 11 of 20

Figure: Facebook’s Business Model Canvas framework
(Source: Businessmodelinnovation., 2018)
SWOT of Facebook
Strength
Andreassen et al. (2017) determined that Facebook’s social networking popularity comes
alongside its sturdy brand image. The brand has enabled to establish its business as the trustable
social media service provider. It also simultaneously contributed it with the large numbers of
active members who readily accept every innovation of Facebook and access the profile.
Weakness
The company suffers from numerous weaknesses due to the nature of its business. The social
media and digital advertising technologies are imposing weakness on the brand to enable steady
competition (Yousef, 2018). It also exerts a considerate force on the brand's industrial position.
Page 12 of 20