Sylvi Imrem

There are obviously big differences in the way Shark Tank and The Profit function. For Shark Tank, the business owners stand in front of a few potential investors and ask them for a certain amount of money for a certain percentage of equity for their business. In The Profit, Marcus comes to the business, sees how it runs, and how he can help, and may or may not make an offer that includes money and a leadership role in the company, at least for a couple weeks to help make that business profitable. Either way, real people, with real success are investing in businesses with their own money, but the key difference is that Marcus comes into businesses that are failing, and tries to turn them around. In shark tank, the sharks will probably not bite at a business that is failing. Marcus looks at good ideas gone bad, invests in them when it’ll be cheap, and tries to turn them around to make a fast profit. The sharks, on the other hand, want businesses that are already doing well in their early years and will continue to do well, so they will continue to make the sharks money over time. Marcus also makes the first offer, and the only offer but in shark tank the entrepreneur makes the first offer, the sharks counter, and the entrepreneur may continue to negotiate with the sharks until they choose to take one of the offers, or leave them.

I don’t think I can say which style, or type of investment is better because it really depends on the business. Marcus is much more hands on than the sharks, which is great for a failing stores or restaurants, but most of the companies that come onto shark tank aren’t stores or restaurants. They are apps, websites, and physical products that are sold and distributed independently or through other retailers, the companies are not retail based. Marcus’s hands on approach probably wouldn’t do much, or be much better than Mark Cuban’s expertise in the dot-com world.

Because of this, I think shark tank would be better for my app, and Mark would be the best partner for me. He got his start with dot-coms, so he has experience with making money off of the internet and technology. In addition, I think shark tank is a much more popular show, so I would get some of the “shark tank affect” by going on the show, and would likely see an increase in users after going on the show. This is important because the main difficulty in growth for my business is recognition of the problem, and awareness of the solution. For my app to work, I need people to realize they are spending too much time counting, and find out there’s an app for that. Having these messages displayed to them one after the other on TV might make that connection for many people, in addition to the expertise that Mark Cuban could bring to the company if I made a deal with him.