CIS235:
PM10- Report
Title Page
Team Name:
VoiceAdvice
Team Number:
#5
Team Members Names:
Sindy Alejos
Ibrahim Alzubaidi
Xiaolian Bao
Taylor Lambie
Antonia Welton
Name of Company and Product
Company: Voice Advice
Product: VoiceAdvice
Elevator Pitch:
VoiceAdvice is an app that will help you solve computer problems verbally from the
comfort of your own home.
April 24, 2019, Spring 2019, CIS 235 - 9:40 a.m.
Title Page 1
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 1
Team Name: 1
Team Number: 1
Team Members Names: 1
Name of Company and Product 1
Elevator Pitch: 1
Executive Summary and Rationale 2
Opportunity and Feasibility 3
Competitive Strategy 3
Process: Diagram 5
As-Is Process 5
To-Be Process 5
Data and Security 6
Data Collection 6
Data Management 6
Data Security 7
Development 7
Look and Feel 7
Fundamental Decisions 8
Coordinating Development 8
Customer Engagement 8
Business Intelligence (BI) 9
Project Funding 12
Conclusion 13
References 13
Tool Reflection 14
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 2
Executive Summary and Rationale
In today’s society, many people own a computer. A problem is that people have
computers, but don’t know how to solve problems on them when they occur. Many
people become angry and this can lead to high-stress rates. With VoiceAdvice, a
computer user can simply click on their VoiceAdvice app when an error occurs and be
verbally walked through the steps to solve their problem. Unlike other tech support
companies, VoiceAdvice can be accessed from the comfort of one’s home in a matter of
minutes, with no phone call. Customers are able to solve computer problems in a
stress-free environment. Our product is different from other products or services
because our app walks you through a solution, and you don’t have to leave your house.
We can make this solution successful given the research that we have done and by
working closely with our target market (50+).
Opportunity and Feasibility
The goal is to create an app that the user can download on their phone or their
computer. The primary idea of the app is to help users who have limited technical
knowledge, to troubleshoot problems through a step-by-step process.
The problem that we are trying to solve is when something goes wrong on your
phone or computer, some people don't know how to solve the problem. This app aims to
help users by communicating by voice the process and steps of how to solve their
problem. Therefore, the app saves the users time instead of searching online to find a
solution to the problem. Simply put, the only thing they have to do is to run the app in
the background on their phone or computer.
When it comes to our competitors, two of the biggest companies that are in their
prime are Amazon and Google who have Alexa and Google Assistant respectively.
Other companies also have customer service and voice assistant technologies. Our
idea is the same when it comes to the voice assistant, but it goes in the opposite
direction as well. To illustrate, instead of only giving an order to the app; the app gives
the order to the user too. Accordingly, we believe that the voice assistant technology in it
arises and building an app that is related to it will make it relevant and rational.
Finally, the most crucial part of the project is how are we going to create an app
and how can we make it feasible. What we're going to do is use natural language
processing (NLP), which is a type of machine learning, and that allows the users to
have the ability to communicate with the app to troubleshoot the problem. The primary
programming language that we are going to use is Python because it is one of the high-
level programming languages. Besides, the English language is the only language to
communicate with the user in the first phase of this app.
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 3
Competitive Strategy
Figure 1:
There are three forces that present an immediate threat which include the
intensity of rivalry, the threat of new entrants and the bargaining power of buyers.
Overall, this is good news for our team because it will test how competitive our
VoiceAdvice app will be. These threats will probably not change within the next three to
four years because technology is improving every day, which makes it easier for more
rivals or new entrants to compete with us. As a result, there will be a high demand for
the service we are providing, but there will be more companies that provide this service.
Currently, there are companies like Best Buy that own services like Geek Squad, which
means even though we might think we are starting early we already have competition.
We don't have an advantage compared to our rivals but we hope to keep improving our
product on a weekly basis so we can remain competitive for them.
The first force that represents an immediate threat is the intensity of rivalry which
is that Alexa and Google Assistant that is our competitor that currently provides
something similar to what we want to provide to our customers. Our team strategy to
mitigate and maintain a competitive advantage to this threat is going in the opposite
direction of our competitors. Alexa and Google Assistant usually let the customer give
them orders but what we are trying to achieve by our service is that the app gives
orders to our customers as well.
Another force that represents an immediate threat is the threat of new entrants,
which is the result of the internet improving so rapidly. Like we mentioned above, we
know that we have competitors that have or are in the process of creating a product like
ours. In order to have a competitive advantage, our strategy is to keep updating and
making changes to our product based on the customer's needs. Also, we will make it a
priority to listen to the feedback that our customers will provide us with.
One other force that represents an immediate threat is the bargaining power of
buyers which is resulted by our service is relatively new. Our targeted audience will not
be as intrigued by our product because it is new so that they want an inexpensive price
for our service. The article “Impact of Celebrity Endorsement on Consumer Buying
Behavior”, says that “with celebrities vouching for or promoting their products, brands
can increase awareness, trust, and familiarity, which are important variables in the
purchase decision-making process.” Based on this our strategy to mitigate this threat is
to market our service/app with some famous people so it will become well-known.
Our team’s planned strategies for competitive advantage based on our Five
Forces Analysis are first to offer a service/app that is in the opposite direction of what
already exists. Next, take our time to develop service/app that will have continuous
updates so we are able to provide our customers what they need. Third, market our
product with famous people to make it well-known to our target audience and others.
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 4
Process: Diagram
As-Is Process
To-Be Process
Data and Security
Data Collection
First and foremost, we need to collect our user’s basic personal information, like
a username and password, email address, the city of residence, age, gender, and
educational background. Moreover, we need to establish our user’s personal identifiers.
Based on sensitivity, we will ask users to set up at least 3 security questions. As the
number of users grows, we will require them to provide their name and date of birth
yearly to protect user identity. We will not ask the customers for their Social Security
number(SSN) because we do not really need whatsoever to make a transaction.
Besides, since users need to pay a regular membership fee to maintain their accounts,
we need users to provide their financial data, like their credit card numbers, banking
information, etc. On the other hand, some customers do not want to provide their
banking information, so we will give them the option to pay with Paypal, Venmo, etc.
Finally, since our users include students, we also need to collect student records, such
as education level and majors to ensure that they are currently students.
Data Management
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 5
As to the method of collecting all the data we need, we will acquire data from a
variety of sources, depending on how sensitive the user’s information is. For that basic
personal information and personal identifiers, we will ask the user to provide them when
they create their accounts. However, for the user's financial data, we only require the
user to provide the necessary information, such as a credit card number, expiration
date, and CCV, while we will buy the advanced information such as their credit rating
from third-party vendors like banks.
For data storage, we will store and backup our users’ data in the cloud. All users
have access to their basic personal information. For example, when users forget their
passwords, they could retrieve passwords by receiving the verification code via email.
However, only our employees have access to user’s data we store. Moreover, we will
use public key encryption to encrypt our user’s data.
Data Security
When it comes to user personal safety, we need some more rigorous methods to
protect our user’s private information from being leaked. With the development of our
company and the increasing amount of users, we will adopt some more reassuring
methods to ensure user personal safety. For example, we will protect user data through
a certificate authority.
Development
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 6
Look and Feel
Top Left - The homepage of the application. There is a new user and returning user
selections
Top Right - Six different categories with different computer problems
Bottom Left - After making a selection of one of the six categories. Questions are listed
in that category and the user can use the search box to narrow down what they are
looking for or they can choose from one of the questions
Bottom Right - After selecting a question videos are present for Windows and MacOS
with a list of steps.
This simple application is made so that the user can experience less frustration
when they are having a problem with their computer. This simple layout and design are
used so users can find their answers quickly without having complicated navigation
problems.
Fundamental Decisions
For the operating system, we will use Windows and MacOS. The reason is that
we want our customers to be able to use our product and solve their problems through
both of those two operating systems. The data storage we will use is OneDrive for
Microsoft users and iCloud for MacOS users.
Coordinating Development
In order to build our app, we will hire a third-party developer with coding
experience to help us with building our application. The third party developer we choose
is IntellectSoft. When collaborating with this developer we will choose to use the scrum
approach to develop our app, because compared to the waterfall method it will cost us
less.
Customer Engagement
There are many techniques we recognize to make customers more engaged with
our app. First, we will create social media accounts for our app, and we will post
announcements about the app weekly. We will also ask customers to leave reviews that
may expand our app in the future.
There are several different methods that we are going to use on our app to make
it reach more people. The first method is through the “App store” because Apple has
more loyal customers than its competitors, which means that Apple loses less number
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 7
of users than its rivals. In 2017 Apple lost 30 million users to Android; on the other hand,
Android lost 112 million users to Apple (Jones 2018). That does not mean that Android
is not a big store. That is why we will choose both stores, and this will help us to acquire
more customers. The second way is through our website because we want the
customers to know more about our business and how we appreciate our customers. We
will use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) so that our website gets higher chances to
be seen by customers and drive more traffic to our website.
Also, we're not going to sell anything in a physical form because we believe that
in today’s technology era customers are less inclined to buy a physical technology
product. We want everyone to buy the product online in the comfort of their home. To
illustrate, our product is an app, that means it cannot be purchased in a physical form.
Marketing campaigns and social media influencers will be our two key factors to
maximize our ability to get new customers. When it comes to marketing, we will use
different tactics to test the market and see what works and what does not to help keep
costs down. Our first strategy is going to be email marketing. Email marketing has
numerous benefits such as reaching a large number of customers with low cost and
targeting a specific audience that might be interested in the product. Another benefit is
maximizing our return on investment (ROI). This is important because we can try a
variety of methods at the same time without hurting our budget. Besides, social media
plays a huge rule in marketing because most customers rely on online reviews and an
influencer who is credible. According to GroupHigh, “90% of consumers trust peer
recommendations. only 33% trust ads”
Next, getting new customers might be hard but keeping them is even harder. Yet,
our team will do the necessary steps to keep the customers satisfied. One of the best
ways to retain existing customers is by using affiliate marketing which can give the
customers a bonus for referring the app to the family and friends, and when someone
uses that link and downloads the app that is provided by the customer, the customer
then will get a discount on his/her next purchase.
Furthermore, in order to make the customer feel comfortable with our app, we will
follow up with them by email to see their satisfaction with the service. We will also
consider giving the customers the option of full money back guarantee. By this way, we
can show that we are unique and it is a good way to build trust. With that being said, our
team will stop at nothing to keep the app at a high level.
We are hoping to expand our business in the future to enhance different offers.
This would mean that we would partner with complementary businesses which will be a
big step in growing our business. Our current target customers are those over 50, but in
the future, our customer base will expand to the young people who have limited
technical knowledge. We will work with educational institutions because they can help
promote the app to some students who encounter some technical difficulties with a free
trial. If the student later decides to subscribe or buy the app then the institution will
receive a commission.
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 8
Business Intelligence (BI)
Like any new or old company, our VoiceAdvice app must have key performance
indicators (KPIs). The KPIs will allow our company to assess our VoiceAdvice app. The
hard part is being able to choose the best KPIs that align with our goals. We have
decided on a few that share our VoiceAdvice app’s values which will help us improve
the service for our customers and increase our revenues. Our KPIs will include aspects
from the following key areas which include profit, marketing, cost, customer
satisfaction/retention, number of customers and employee satisfaction/productivity.
We will have a total of eight KPIs from the different sections that were mentioned
above. Our KPIs will be listed from the most important to the least important even
though all of them are very significant to the future of our VoiceAdvice app. Our KPIs
are:
1. Customer Retention: 96% of customers from last month keep using our app the
following month
2. Customer Satisfaction: 98% of customers are satisfied with our app every month
3. Number of Customers: 5% increase or more every month
4. Profit: 5% increase or more every month
5. Cost: 5% decrease or be maintained at the same rate
6. Marketing: 97% of overall efficiency
7. Employee Satisfaction: 98% of employees are satisfied with the company
8. Employee Productivity: 15% of productivity is higher than last month
We will be able to measure most of our KPIs through Google Analytics, a web
analytics site that shows data from new subscribers to sales. Our startup will start with
the free version, but in the future; we will upgrade to the Google Analytics 360 version
that cost $150,000 dollars a year. As a startup company, we have a minimal amount of
money. Our KPIs that deal with our employees will be measured through mandatory
surveys that have our employees will take every month.
We will be able to track the KPIs through the template chart we found online. The
Key Result Area is the goals the company needs to accomplish. The Key Performance
Indicators are what we use to evaluate the performance level. The weight of the KPIs
show how important they are to us as a company and all add up to 100. The target is
what we hope we can meet based on historical data. The actual is the actual results we
obtained. The score is calculated by dividing the actual by the target and multiplying it
by 100. The final score is calculated by multiplying the score times the weight and then
dividing by 100. This chart will be posted in our office and updated every month. This
will tell us if we are meeting our goals or if we should change them so that they can be
more attainable. Also, the following chart will state what the KPIs measure. We know we
are successful if we meet our target for each KPI.
No. and What it Measures Key
Result
Area
Key
Performance
Indicators
Weight
of KPIs
Target Actual Score Final
Score
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page 9
1. How well we can keep
our customers from last
month to keep using our
VoiceAdvice app the
following month
Customer
Satisfactio
n &
Retention
% of customers
from last month
keep using our
app the
following month
15 96%
2. The satisfaction our
customers have while using
our app which will help us
make improvements
% of customers
are satisfied
with our app
every month
15 98%
3. The increase in
customers we want to
obtain
High
Number of
Customers
% increase or
more every
month
10 5%
4. Increase in profit we
want to obtain
High Profit % increase or
more every
month
15 5%
5. The decrease in the cost
we want to maintain
Low Cost % decrease or
be maintained
at the same
rate
10 5%
6. the marketing efficiency
we want to have every
month
Marketing % of overall
efficiency
10 97%
7. Employee satisfaction Employee
Satisfactio
n and
Productivit
y
% of
employees are
satisfied with
the company
15 98%
8. The increase in
employee productivity from
the last month
% of
productivity is
higher than last
month
10 15%
Total 100
Project Funding
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page
10
We want to crowdfund and raise a total of $250,000 to help us with costs, the first
two years. We are asking for more than we need in case of any unexpected
interruptions.
To fund our app, we have chosen to put our app on the Kickstarter website.
Kickstarter is a crowdfunding public website that allows people to put their new ideas
online and obtain future funding for their ideas. Over $4 billion has been collected on the
site since the opening of Kickstarter. This is the main reason that we chose this platform
to help fund our app. Given the amount of money collected since the start of the site, we
believe that we can collect a reasonable amount of money to help fund our app.
As for the success of projects put on Kickstarter, 40% of projects succeed and
are launched. This number shows us that we have a good chance of being successful
on Kickstarter than if we were to fund and start the app on our own. Within the first five
years of the business, there is a 66% failure rate. Therefore, We believe that Kickstarter
can help our app not be a failed business within its first years because of Kickstarter’s
success rate.
We are expecting the app to take anywhere from 4-6 months to develop. Our
own skills, along with the skills of new employees will help the app come to life. We are
expecting to hire two employees during the development stage and then more if
needed. We also expect to make updates to the app six times a year. There would be a
minimum of 30 new questions that VoiceAdvice could help with each year. We are
expecting these updates to take about a week each to make.
Costs that we have considered include the development of the app, customer
service, and support. We chose these costs because once the app is developed, there
will need to be people standing by to help with any customer needs. Legality costs were
also included because we want to work on getting a patent for our app along with the
updates. Included are advertising fees to share our app information with the market.
Last but not least are the costs of putting the app on the Apple and Microsoft app stores.
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page
11
Conclusion
In conclusion, VoiceAdvice will be able to solve almost any problem that occurs
on a phone or computer. At first, the app will only be available on computers but as time
passes it will become available on phones. We hope to have our app up and running
within a 6 month period after we use Kickstarter, where we will get the funds to create
our app. The app will offer unique features that the startup fee of $10 and $9.99 fee for
an upgrade will be worth the price. Through Google Analytics we will be able to observe
if we are meeting our KPIs. Our target audience is around the age of 50 but we are
targeting people that struggle with any computer problem. We will have our app
available both in the Apple and Microsoft app stores so that everyone that desires it is
able to obtain it. Overall, we hope our app makes our customers lives easier.
References
Guided Selling.org 2014. "Impact of Celebrity Endorsement on Consumer Buying
Behavior." Guided Selling. 15 Nov. 2018. 23 Apr. 2019 <https://www.guided-
selling.org/impact-of-celebrity-endorsement-on-consumer-buying-behavior/>.
“How Email Marketing Works for You and Your Business.” Digital Marketing Blog, 13
Sept. 2018, www.lyfemarketing.com/blog/how-email-marketing-works/.
“How Long Does It Take to Make an App?” Savvy Apps, 19 Mar. 2019,
savvyapps.com/blog/how-long-does-it-take-to-make-an-app.
“How Often Should You Update Your App.” BuildFire, 14 Feb. 2018, buildfire.com/how-
often-should-you-update-your-app/.
Jones, Chuck. “Apple's IOS Loyalty Rate Is Lower Than Google's Android, But Apple
May Steal More Users Each Year.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 12 Mar. 2018,
www.forbes.com/sites/chuckjones/2018/03/10/apples-ios-loyalty-rate-is-lower-
than-googles-android-but-apple-may-steal-more-users-each-
year/#66601af768a8.
“Machine Learning: What It Is and Why It Matters.” SAS,
www.sas.com/en_us/insights/analytics/machine-learning.html.
“Our Mission Is to Help Bring Creative Projects to Life.” Kickstarter,
www.kickstarter.com/about?ref=global-footer.
“Social Media Influencers - Find and Build Relationships.” GroupHigh,
www.grouphigh.com/social-media-influencers/.
Staff, Investopedia. “Top 6 Reasons New Businesses Fail.” Investopedia, Investopedia,
9 July 2018, www.investopedia.com/slide-show/top-6-reasons-new-businesses-
fail/.
“What Is Natural Language Processing?” SAS,
www.sas.com/en_us/insights/analytics/what-is-natural-language-processing-
nlp.html.
CIS235 Team #5 PM10-Report Spring 2019, page
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Tool Reflection
Taylor Lambie Reflection:
I thought Google Drive was a very useful tool for working on this group project.
We were able to communicate easily with one another and we didn’t have to meet up as
often to work on the PMs. I found PowerPoint had many more features that I liked to
work with. The problem with PowerPoint is that it’s harder to share with people and we
can’t work on it all at once. Slack was a very helpful tool, and I think all professors would
benefit from utilizing the app. This app made it very easy to communicate with the
professor and other students. I would suggest this app to future employers because I
think email is complicated and it can be stressful to sit around waiting for an important
email. I was not a big fan of the website Trello. I thought it was a little redundant. My
group stayed on top of all the assignments due and made sure to turn in everything
early. We didn’t need to use Trello because we made sure to remember dates and
components due for an assignment.
Antonia Welton Reflection:
Google Drive was a great tool to use especially when collaborating with people
you don’t see everyday. I found to be easy to use, helpful and a great collaborative tool.
I will definitely be using this in the future. Slack was very convenient when a problem
would arise. I also really liked Slack because many people normally have the same
question, but if one person asks in Slack, it answers the question for everyone. I prefer
using Slack over emailing as well because you don’t have to worry about finding email
addresses or ways to easily communicate with classmates. I did not find much use in
Trello. My team did a great job at staying organized so it wasn’t something we needed
to keep everyone on the same page. I probably wouldn’t use Trello in the future
because I do a good job organizing things already. I could see how if someone is
unorganized or doesn’t know how to make a schedule how Trello could be helpful.
Ibrahim Alzubaidi Reflection:
There are 4 tools that we use this semester: Slack, GroupMe, Google Drive, and
Trello. Slack and GroupMe are similar; we use Slack to communicate with the professor
and I recommend the app for formal messages. Also, we use GroupMe to communicate
with one another and set plans for the sake of the PMs, as well as Google drive, the
benefit of it is that can be shared; they are both helpful tools. The last one is Trello, we
did not use it to manage the project, but I started using it to manage the homework and
exams. However, I think it is fair to talk about the disadvantages(Perfectness is
unattainable). So, the only drawback that I encounter in the group is not getting a quick
response. it happens sometimes, and it makes me frustrated but at the end of the day
everyone has his/her own busy life, and that is something usual. Finally, the essential
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thing that the group members have done was sticking with the plans that we have put
for the project. Therefore, I can freely say that I am proud to be part of the group.
XIaolian Bao Reflection:
Our group used many tools during this semester. We used GroupMe for daily
discussions, including how to complete PMs and offline group meeting arrangement.
Compared to the email and message, GroupMe was a very convenient tool to
communicate. Once someone sent a message on it, all team members could see and
reply to this message. We also used Google Drive to complete PMs. Google Drive was
a great tool for our group members to share documents. Group members could edit the
documents and see the editing status at any time, which enabled our group to complete
the PMs more efficiently. As to Slack, it was a good tool to ask questions and share
information. I really learned a lot from many technology posts posted on Slack. And
whenever a student asked questions on Slack, other students and professor could help
to solve his problems. And students with this kind of questions could also get answers. I
will definitely use GroupMe, Google Drive and Slack in my future life. However, I may
not use Trello much, because I always plan my own schedule clearly and I do not need
to use Trello to list my assignments.
Sindy Alejos Reflection:
Throughout the semester there were four collaboration tools, Slack, Google
Drive, Trello, and GroupMe, that were used to help us as a team to communicate. Each
one was used for a different purpose but they all helped for our team to function
properly. GroupMe, our primary tool, was used for the team to ask and answer any
questions that we had. On the other hand, Slack was used to receive any information
that our professor wanted to share or inform us about. Trello let us know what
assignments we were doing, reminded us which assignments needed to be done and
which ones had already been done. Google Drive was the tool we used to get all our
group assignments done because we were able to all use it at the same time. Using all
these tools really helped my team thrive because they either helped us be on track,
gave us helpful information or they help us do our assignments together. I plan to use
Google Drive in my other group projects. I plan to use Slack and GroupMe to
communicate with my future coworkers. I plan to use Trello to plan personal events.
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