Any Warriors get inspiration from Dragons Den

I love the show.

I just watched the Irish version about 20 mins ago but that's not much cop.

I do agree that the "Dragons" can be quite naive in the sense that they assume to know everything about everything because of their bank balance.

It's all played up too much for the camera too, in a Simon Cowell style form of harsh critique. They are tearing up a person patronizing them and in the next instance they are shaking hands with smiles all round. That type of attitude doesn't work in the business and its no way for a person to conduct themselves. As Napolean Hill highlights, people need to work in harmony - this includes striking up initial agreements.

With that said there isn't always attitude and some people do admitedly need waking up a little!

I was quite surprised by that statement too - I suppose they are looking for scalable ideas for return on investment but it's certainly possible to make a living online

Usually when I see the Dragons get an online business pitched to them they shoot it down. None of them are really into the online business, nor do they have it in their portfolios.

I as well love the show. It makes me happy to see smart pitches win over the Dragons and the get the deal they want. It also upsets me though when I see a smart business idea get snagged up for cheap by the Dragons because the owners don't know how to negotiate properly.

A little known fact. Any deals that are made on air usually don't end up being the end result. The papers get signed in the back with the lawyers and most deals end up getting changed, mostly in favor of the Dragons, and many deals actually fall through. They tend to be pretty greedy and play off the desperation of some people.

deleted - double posted.

We have a similar show in the US called the "Shark Tank". One of my favorite episodes was about a guy pitching custom energy bars called "Element bars". Look it up on youtube...the sales pitch is amazing and inspiring.

I don't disagree with you, but I think they'd be the first to acknowledge that and attribute it to the context within which they're making investment decisions. (Peter Jones and Theo Paphitis, even if not the others, you can be sure are well aware that mega-lucrative online businesses can be set up with virtually no start-up capital. And I wouldn't want the other three investing in my business anyway).

Online businesses can be built up by substituting work for investment, but that isn't really the context within which they're being asked for finance.

They're looking at situations in which they have to envisage fast and secure enough returns to make the return of their capital foreseeable/probable while leaving them with a shareholding in something with enough turnover to interest them. And they're effectively being asked to invest time/support (to varying degrees) as well as money.

I love the dragons den! it gets your mind working overtime!

I even watch the repeats when they on on "watch"

Yes, I love Dragon's Den and you can learn a lot from that show.

And they do know a lot about building online businesses. Robert Herjavic runs an online security firm. The new Dragon this year made his fortune by founding Lavalife.

Most people here are building web sites, not online businesses. A big difference. Sites like Lavalife and facebook are built on custom platforms with serious software development on the back-end. They are not built on WordPress with a nifty theme....

Here are the biggest things I have learned from seeing them come up repeatedly on the show:

1. Know your market
It is shocking how many people show up asking for 6 figures and don't know the size of their market or who their top competitors are.

2. Know how much your business is worth
I laugh (along with the Dragons) at people with $10,000 in revenue over 2 years asking $500,000 for 10% of the company.

3. Don't become emotionally attached to your business
Many people get excellent "shoot from the hip" advice from the Dragons and ignore it.

Last season (I think) a couple came in a with a doll to teach very young children how to bathe. It is an ELECTRIC doll that you put IN THE WATER with your CHILD that lights up to show where to wash.

The Dragons ALL said "bad idea", no mother is going to put an electric doll in water with their child. After spending over $50,000 on the prototype, the couple ignored the Dragons and in the post-presentation interview said "We still think it is a good idea and will keep going."

4. Retail will kill you
Many people come in with an idea or invention and they want to start marketing it retail. The Dragons usually say this is a bad idea and they should, instead, license their idea for royalties. Many of these people reject the Dragons' advice and go on looking for a way to sell their product themselves.

They also have no idea how ruthless it gets for shelf-space in retail. You show one blip of being a threat and the "big boys" will buy your shelf space right out from under you.

5. Expanding to the US is not the answer
Many entrepreneurs with near failing businesses are looking for money to expand to the US market with no idea how difficult this will be with an unproven business.

6. Without a patent it is useless
If you have an idea that can be patented, you better already have the patent or you are screwed. If it isn't patentable, then someone bigger with more resources will do it for 1/10 the cost and you are dead in the water.

7. You are not your market
Many people think because they like the game they invented for their grandkids, it will automatically be liked by everyone in the world. This kind of stuff is discussed on WF all the time...

Really entertaining and informative show.

It gets exciting when there really is a "million dollar idea" on the floor and the Dragons start fighting over it.

It is hilarious to watch some of the delusional people get ripped to shreds by the Dragons too.

Mahlon

I cant stand that Deborah Meadon she is just a money grabber (whenever she offers she at least doubles and sometimes quadruples the equity she wants) and always assumes she knows more about the pitchers business than they do. I would never accept an offer from her.

I do watch the show but I dont really like it. A lot of the due dilligence should be done beforehand by the shows producers so the Dragons get a clear picture of what the business is worth - just having a spreadsheet or a document to hand out would do it

Yeah, I think the producers often choose presenters who will be most "entertaining", but not necessarily have the best business idea.

Like American Idol producers letting mentally ill people into the auditions so the judges can make fun of them. Kinda sick, IMHO.

Mahlon

I applied one seaons for their online entries. I won too because I had a couple thousand people vote for my video, but they didn't take it because I didn't follow their rules. (I broke their voting system imho).

I'll try again some other time.

absolutely brilliant show. The Canadian and the American (Shark's Tank) are the best one's, and the Irish one is pretty good too if you look at the latest season. The British version is pretty crap though, and the investors on that show are some of the lamest show hosts you could choose.

Some of the most educational episodes are the ones where they do a follow-up on past businesses that have pitched and failed. You learn so much about how the owner/owners of these ventures try different approaches and end up finding success.

Great real-life lessons about preserverance...and creativity!

Great show - both Dragon's Den and Shark Tank...you just have to look beyond the Entertainment to the real lessons, each show I learn (or remember) some key principle.

One of the biggest lessons Kevin O'Leary pushes over and over is the scaling advantage of licensing deals with bigger players - even though you may get a small cut, a small cut of something massive is much larger than a big cut of something small.

Still, most entrepreneurs can't do those type of deals. Interesting.

I've used this lately in the information product space where I have started licensing my content (very carefully) for very defined and specific use (not PLR) - the result are some pretty large deals...still learning the full potential.

Jeff

I tune in from time to time to both Dragon's Den and Shark Tank. I often wonder how much of the show is scripted and even if some of the pitches are staged for deliberate easy target put-down laughs, like the first rounds in American Idol sort of. That's how dumb some of the ideas seem to me.

I never watched Dragon's Den, but I know about the show - I watch Shark Tank (a very similar show in the US) and love it!

These type of shows inspire me sooooooooooooooooo much!!!

I checked up a little on this show. Is this the same as 'Shark Tank' I just watched about 6 episodes of it yesterday. I think im going to watch a couple episodes.

Anyway, when someone with deep pockets are investing in something such as an internet business have to remember they already have money. There not looking for the 5k 10k a month or even 20k a month. They are looking for a return on their investment x100 so to take an online business to the 'scale' that they are looking for would seem to cost a lot of money. They want branding authority and probably so much more rich people are greedy

edit: Just read the post above me . Guess it is the same as shark tank

I. LOVE. THIS. SHOW.

My favorite version is the UK one.

I also love this show!!! But never thought about finding niches from it. Good idea will bear this in mind for the future as could be potential goldmines if the products take off