From left to right: E.J. Haralson, Curtis L. McKinnon, Stephanie Belcher, Jeff Ponders II and Shawn Smith share their experiences and answer questions to help students be successful as entrepreneurs. Lily Merritt | Washtenaw Voice
By Brian Babcock
Staff Writer
A panel of five local entrepreneurs visited campus recently to help students understand what it takes to be successful in the sports and entertainment industry.
Panelists included Shawn Smith, an NFL referee; Curtis L. McKinnon, CEO of CrowdFreak Inc.; Stephanie Belcher, practice leader at Cole Newton & Duran; E.J. Haralson, founder of EJ Signature Collection; and Jeff Ponders II, founder of The Better Company.
The event, organized by professor Anthony Terry in partnership with the Entrepreneurship Center took place on Oct. 9. The panel opened the floor to questions from students about the sports and music markets. After each panelist introduced themselves and their occupation, the mic was turned back to the near-60 students who attended.
“When we’re talking about young entrepreneurs, I wanted to give them a lot of different options to hear different types of entrepreneurs offering different things in multiple industries,” Terry said. “I wanted to give them the opportunity to see how sports and entertainment entrepreneurs work and to use their advice as a platform for our entrepreneurs.”
This type of event is the second of a series Terry is planning.
“I was amazed at how many people are so interested about the entertainment field, so that was fascinating and new to me,” Terry said. “We also wanted to put this on because we’re trying to make a joint effort with the Entrepreneurship Center to bring recognition to all the resources we provide [to students] here on campus . . . so the Entrepreneurship Center has been a helpful avenue for the entrepreneurship program.”
Many topics revolved around marketing. Attendees and panelists discussed marketing tactics such as building a website and using social media.
Other topics centered on how to start signature brands of clothing and how to gain popularity as a comedian or musician.
Haralson, who also works as an assistant basketball coach at Wayne State University, gave some advice to those looking to start their own signature clothing line: “With me personally, I just wanted to come out with something that I personally liked . . . at this time I think your generation is the best with regards to owning startup companies [so] gravitate toward your own niche.”
Belcher provided another insight into the beginning stages of marketing. She advised new entrepreneurs to focus on core values at the beginning, and then let the marketing evolve from there.
“I encourage all of my entrepreneurs to start the same way—by establishing a list of their core values. I find that if you identify anywhere between three and seven values that drive your decisions—and these are all different for each person—your marketing will tend to fall in place because then you have a whole list of values people will flock to like a magnet,” Belcher said.
