Blueground: Innovation Challenge.
How it all Started:
During the sixth semester of AD&PRLAB, due covid-19, lessons had to continue online. Our task was to choose as a team and follow the lectures between two start up companies. We eventually followed Blueground’s innovation challenge to work with, mentored by Eleni Aktipi and Manos Kavarnos.
Blueground is a real estate company (start-up) that offers furnished and luxury apartments. Their vision is to make people feel at home wherever they choose to live.
Step 1: Choose a City.
Our mission was to expand into a new city. We had to choose between eight cities. As a team we did our research for each one, found the most important information about them so that we could compare and in the end decide the city that is easier to open a business and invest in it.
And….Zurich!
Since we chose our city to expand, Zurich, next step was to find the basic information about the city because it was necessary to know what we need before we start a business, such as GDP, Taxes, cost of living in Switzerland, the language they speak, the Swiss law, fees and of course all about renting (e.g: average cost of renting).
Step 2 : Competitors/Business Model
Moving on the most important thing of this challenge, was to find the main competitors and build a business model around it. The business model includes basic information about the companies, for example: SWOT analysis where we put in order the opportunities, strengths, threats and weaknesses of the companies, the main goals, social media presence , etc. After a lot of research, we have found our three main competitors which was ‘’Apartment Accommodation Service’’, ‘’Hit Rental’’ and ‘’UMS’’.
Apartment Accommodation Service rents furnished and serviced apartments in the City of Zurich.
HIT-rental offers comfortable unique business and vacation apartments for rent in different cities in Switzerland.
UMS offers the greatest choice of temporary housing spaces in Switzerland.
Step 3: Set up a city
Next step, was to set up a city. The main purpose was to 1) rent an office and 2) Identify the neighborhoods that would be more attractive to our clients. Our office headquarters will be placed in Olten, a city in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland outskirts Zurich. We chose this city because of its location, it’s an hour away from the center of Zurich and the transportation is very convenient. We wanted to avoid the extremely high rents of the center but also to ensure an easy access to it. Many companies are also located there and there is a wide range of restaurants, cafes, bars and activities in general. The top 5 neighborhoods we found: Old Town, Bahnhofstrasse, Lake Zurich, Paradeplatz and Seefeld.
Step 4: Localize the message
To localize the message we have to know the official language they speak, find partners and pay attention to the local language and how it’s being used. For example, in Switzerland flats are referred as ‘’Apartments’’ and the kitchen does not count as a room. Having in mind that the official formal language of Switzerland residents is German, our language site must be in German and English. Our message is: ‘’help people feel at home wherever they choose to live’’. It is our responsibility to mention what’s included such as, parking, if its pet friendly, family friendly, it is accessible for people with disabilities, and public transportation near the building. After research we found our five partners which are: ‘’Parachute’’, ‘’Korres’’, ‘’Wayfair’’ and ‘’Article’’.
Step 5: Launch the city.
Last step but not least, is to launch the city. Last mission was to map the top 3 classifieds and develop successful PR plan where it includes , map of
the top 10 Media and a draft newsworthy press release.
The 3 top classifieds that were chosen are:
Easy to Navigate (UX)
Web Design
Secure websites/Reliability
Presence in over 60 countries worldwide
Variety of apartments and classifieds
Top 10 Publications:
1.https://www.handelszeitung.ch/,
4.https://www.startupticker.ch/en/home,
5.https://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/,
10.https://www.bluewin.ch/de/index.html
Press Release
Our press release will be printed in English and German in the 10 top publications mentioning above. Moreover, in the article we included some general information about Blueground to prepare customer what to expect to see.
See the full presentation here
See the small presentation here
Special Thanks to Ms Betty Tsakarestou for making this semester creative despite the difficulties we all been through.
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