Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
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Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation
Although it is well accepted that corporate communication has a direct impact on corporate reputation, little is known about the link between firms' social media communication strategies and the formation of firms' reputations in an online environment. This article contributes to this body of knowledge by studying the impact of social media communication strategies on firms' reputations. The setting for our study is the hotel industry. The results offer insights regarding the challenges of developing online communication strategies that affect corporate reputation.
Authors :: Paola Barbara Floreddu, Fransesca Cabiddu, Roberto Evaristo
Topics :: Sales & Marketing
Tags :: Public relations, Social platforms, SWOT Analysis, SWOT Matrix, TOWS, Weighted SWOT Analysis
Swot Analysis of "Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation" written by Paola Barbara Floreddu, Fransesca Cabiddu, Roberto Evaristo includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Communication Reputations facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Public relations, Social platforms and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation casestudy better are - – increasing energy prices, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, technology disruption, increasing transportation and logistics costs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Communication Reputations, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Communication Reputations operates in.
According to Harvard Business Review, 75% of the managers use SWOT analysis for various purposes such as – evaluating current scenario, strategic planning, new venture feasibility, personal growth goals, new market entry, Go To market strategies, portfolio management and strategic trade-off assessment, organizational restructuring, etc.
SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix
SWOT analysis of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Communication Reputations
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Sales & Marketing field.
4. Making a Sales & Marketing topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Communication Reputations
Strengths Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Communication Reputations in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation Harvard Business Review case study are -
Organizational Resilience of Communication Reputations
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Communication Reputations does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Communication Reputations in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Communication Reputations to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Communication Reputations to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Communication Reputations in the sector have low bargaining power. Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Communication Reputations to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Communication Reputations has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Communication Reputations has effective processes in place that helps in exploring new product needs, doing quick pilot testing, and then launching the products quickly using its extensive distribution network.
Innovation driven organization
– Communication Reputations is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Communication Reputations is one of the leading players in its industry. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in its segment but also across the whole industry. The ability to lead change has enabled Communication Reputations in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Communication Reputations has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Diverse revenue streams
– Communication Reputations is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study a diverse revenue stream that has helped it to survive disruptions such as global pandemic in Covid-19, financial disruption of 2008, and supply chain disruption of 2021.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Communication Reputations has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive segment. Secondly the value chain collaborators of the firm in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Training and development
– Communication Reputations has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation Harvard Business Review case study by analyzing – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.
Weaknesses Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation are -
Lack of clear differentiation of Communication Reputations products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Communication Reputations needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Communication Reputations has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation, it seems that the employees of Communication Reputations don’t have comprehensive understanding of the firm’s strategy. This is reflected in number of promotional campaigns over the last few years that had mixed messaging and competing priorities. Some of the strategic activities and services promoted in the promotional campaigns were not consistent with the organization’s strategy.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Communication Reputations has borrowed money from the capital market at higher rates. It needs to restructure the interest payment and costs so that it can compete better and improve profitability.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Sales & Marketing strategy. But it has very little resources allocation to manage the risks emerging from events such as natural disasters, climate change, melting of permafrost, tacking the rise of artificial intelligence, opportunities and threats emerging from commercialization of space etc.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Communication Reputations needs to come up with a strategy to reduce the workers concern regarding automation. Without a clear strategy, it could lead to disruption and uncertainty within the organization.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Paola Barbara Floreddu, Fransesca Cabiddu, Roberto Evaristo suggests that, Communication Reputations is facing high bargaining power of the channel partners. So far it has not able to streamline the operations to reduce the bargaining power of the value chain partners in the industry.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation that the firm needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department in the case Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Communication Reputations is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation HBR case study still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though Communication Reputations has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Communication Reputations has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Communication Reputations, firm in the HBR case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Opportunities Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities highlighted in the Harvard Business Review case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation are -
Developing new processes and practices
– Communication Reputations can develop new processes and procedures in Sales & Marketing industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Communication Reputations is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study suggests that firm can utilize new technology to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Communication Reputations to expand its talent hiring zone. According to McKinsey Global Institute, 20% of the high end workforce in fields such as finance, information technology, can continously work from remote local post Covid-19. This presents a really great opportunity for Communication Reputations to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Communication Reputations can build a diversified supply chain model across various countries in - South East Asia, India, and other parts of the world. This reconfiguration of global supply chain can help, as suggested in case study, Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Manufacturing automation
– Communication Reputations can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Sales & Marketing segment. It can use CAD and 3D printing to build a quick prototype and pilot testing products. It can leverage automation using machine learning and artificial intelligence to do faster production at lowers costs, and it can leverage the growth in satellite and tracking technologies to improve inventory management, transportation, and shipping.
Reconfiguring business model
– The expansion of digital payment system, the bringing down of international transactions costs using Bitcoin and other blockchain based currencies, etc can help Communication Reputations to reconfigure its entire business model. For example it can used blockchain based technologies to reduce piracy of its products in the big markets such as China. Secondly it can use the popularity of e-commerce in various developing markets to build a Direct to Customer business model rather than the current Channel Heavy distribution network.
Use of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies for transactions
– The popularity of Bitcoin and other crypto currencies as asset class and medium of transaction has opened new opportunities for Communication Reputations in the consumer business. Now Communication Reputations can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Communication Reputations in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Sales & Marketing segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Buying journey improvements
– Communication Reputations can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation suggest that firm can provide automated chats to help consumers solve their own problems, provide online suggestions to get maximum out of the products and services, and help consumers to build a community where they can interact with each other to develop new features and uses.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Communication Reputations to increase its market reach. Communication Reputations will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Communication Reputations can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Communication Reputations can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Communication Reputations can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Communication Reputations has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Communication Reputations to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation case study. Communication Reputations can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Threats Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation are -
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Communication Reputations is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Communication Reputations has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Communication Reputations needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Sales & Marketing sector. According to Mckinsey study top managers believe that the adoption of technology in operations, communications is 20-25 times faster than what they planned in the beginning of 2019.
Aging population
– As the populations of most advanced economies are aging, it will lead to high social security costs, higher savings among population, and lower demand for goods and services in the economy. The household savings in US, France, UK, Germany, and Japan are growing faster than predicted because of uncertainty caused by pandemic.
Backlash against dominant players
– US Congress and other legislative arms of the government are getting tough on big business especially technology companies. The digital arm of Communication Reputations business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Capital market disruption
– During the Covid-19, Dow Jones has touched record high. The valuations of a number of companies are way beyond their existing business model potential. This can lead to capital market correction which can put a number of suppliers, collaborators, value chain partners in great financial difficulty. It will directly impact the business of Communication Reputations.
Increasing wage structure of Communication Reputations
– Post Covid-19 there is a sharp increase in the wages especially in the jobs that require interaction with people. The increasing wages can put downward pressure on the margins of Communication Reputations.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Sales & Marketing field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Communication Reputations can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Instability in the European markets
– European Union markets are facing three big challenges post Covid – expanded balance sheets, Brexit related business disruption, and aggressive Russia looking to distract the existing security mechanism. Communication Reputations will face different problems in different parts of Europe. For example it will face inflationary pressures in UK, France, and Germany, balance sheet expansion and demand challenges in Southern European countries, and geopolitical instability in the Eastern Europe.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Communication Reputations high dependence on third party suppliers can disrupt its processes and delivery mechanism. For example -the current troubles of car makers because of chip shortage is because the chip companies started producing chips for electronic companies rather than car manufacturers.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation, Communication Reputations may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Sales & Marketing .
Technology disruption because of hacks, piracy etc
– The colonial pipeline illustrated, how vulnerable modern organization are to international hackers, miscreants, and disruptors. The cyber security interruption, data leaks, etc can seriously jeopardize the future growth of the organization.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Communication Reputations in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Communication Reputations with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers in the HBR case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation needs to zero down on the relative importance of each factor mentioned in the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants.
We can provide the relative importance to each factor by assigning relative weights. Weighted SWOT analysis process is a three stage process –
First stage for doing weighted SWOT analysis of the case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation is to rank the strengths and weaknesses of the organization. This will help you to assess the most important strengths and weaknesses of the firm and which one of the strengths and weaknesses mentioned in the initial lists are marginal and can be left out.
Second stage for conducting weighted SWOT analysis of the Harvard case study Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation is to give probabilities to the external strategic factors thus better understanding the opportunities and threats arising out of macro environment changes and developments.
Third stage of constructing weighted SWOT analysis of Inside your social media ring: How to optimize online corporate reputation is to provide strategic recommendations includes – joining likelihood of external strategic factors such as opportunities and threats to the internal strategic factors – strengths and weaknesses. You should start with external factors as they will provide the direction of the overall industry. Secondly by joining probabilities with internal strategic factors can help the company not only strategic fit but also the most probably strategic trade-off that Communication Reputations needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
