Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid
In June 2001, Empresa Editora El Comercio (EEEC) had launched a new popular newspaper, Trome, for low-income families. Although several studies had preceded this launch, sales in following months failed to reach expected levels and actually displayed a decreasing trend. Trome embodied the company's effort to expand its news coverage to new population segments that were not served by its other newspaper, El Comercio, a market leader that had served as the foundation for the company itself. Six months after Trome's launch and faced with dropping sales, company managers had met to discuss their options. This case describes management team members' dilemmas at that meeting: "Should the new paper's style and contents be changed? Should Trome focus more on sex and violence-related issues, as its competitors did? Would it be convenient to replace the silverware promotion chosen to support launching? Was the channel conflict adequately managed? Were intended readers' needs truly and fully understood? Should the company re-launch Trome or would it be wiser to just give up on this project?
Authors :: Guillermo D'Andrea, Javier Jorge Silva, Maricruz Prado
Swot Analysis of "Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid" written by Guillermo D'Andrea, Javier Jorge Silva, Maricruz Prado includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Trome Comercio facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Product development, Sales and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid casestudy better are - – supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, increasing energy prices, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, there is backlash against globalization, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Trome Comercio, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Trome Comercio 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Trome Comercio
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 Trome Comercio
Strengths Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Trome Comercio in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid Harvard Business Review case study are -
Strong track record of project management
– Trome Comercio is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Organizational Resilience of Trome Comercio
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Trome Comercio does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Trome Comercio are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Trome Comercio 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Trome Comercio has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Trome Comercio 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Trome Comercio in the sector have low bargaining power. Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Trome Comercio to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Training and development
– Trome Comercio has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Trome Comercio digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Trome Comercio has successfully integrated the four key components of digital transformation – digital integration in processes, digital integration in marketing and customer relationship management, digital integration into the value chain, and using technology to explore new products and market opportunities.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Trome Comercio to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Trome Comercio to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Learning organization
- Trome Comercio is a learning organization. It has inculcated three key characters of learning organization in its processes and operations – exploration, creativity, and expansiveness. The work place at Trome Comercio is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Trome Comercio has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Trome Comercio to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Weaknesses Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid are -
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Trome Comercio 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Trome Comercio is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Trome Comercio needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Trome Comercio to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Trome Comercio is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Lack of clear differentiation of Trome Comercio products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Trome Comercio needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Trome Comercio 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Trome Comercio 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Trome Comercio has taken concrete steps on diversity, equity, and inclusion. But the efforts so far has resulted in limited success. It needs to expand the recruitment and selection process to hire more people from the minorities and underprivileged background.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid HBR case study mentions - Trome Comercio takes time to assess the upcoming competitions. This has led to missing out on atleast 2-3 big opportunities in the industry in last five years.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Trome Comercio 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Trome Comercio has not been able to do capital spending to the tune of the competition. This has resulted into fewer innovations and company facing stiff competition from both existing competitors and new entrants who are disrupting the industry using digital technology.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Trome Comercio is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid | 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid are -
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Trome Comercio can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Trome Comercio 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. Trome Comercio 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Trome Comercio can still utilize the low interest rates to borrow money for capital investment. Secondly it can also use the increase of government spending in infrastructure projects to get new business.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Trome Comercio can leverage digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the production process, customer analytics to get better insights into consumer behavior, realtime digital dashboards to get better sales tracking, logistics and transportation, product tracking, etc.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Trome Comercio 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Trome Comercio can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Trome Comercio operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Developing new processes and practices
– Trome Comercio 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.
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. Trome Comercio can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Trome Comercio has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Trome Comercio to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid case study. Trome Comercio can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Trome Comercio has focused on building a highly responsive customer relationship management platform. This platform is built on in-house data and driven by analytics and artificial intelligence. The customer analytics can help the organization to fine tune its loyalty marketing efforts, increase the wallet share of the organization, reduce wastage on mainstream advertising spending, build better pricing strategies using personalization, etc.
Buying journey improvements
– Trome Comercio can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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.
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 Trome Comercio 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Sales & Marketing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Trome Comercio can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Threats Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid are -
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 Trome Comercio.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Trome Comercio has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Trome Comercio 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.
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.
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 Trome Comercio business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
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 Trome Comercio in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Trome Comercio can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Trome Comercio 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Trome Comercio with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
Increasing wage structure of Trome Comercio
– 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 Trome Comercio.
Regulatory challenges
– Trome Comercio needs to prepare for regulatory challenges as consumer protection groups and other pressure groups are vigorously advocating for more regulations on big business - to reduce inequality, to create a level playing field, to product data privacy and consumer privacy, to reduce the influence of big money on democratic institutions, etc. This can lead to significant changes in the Sales & Marketing industry regulations.
Environmental challenges
– Trome Comercio needs to have a robust strategy against the disruptions arising from climate change and energy requirements. EU has identified it as key priority area and spending 30% of its 880 billion Euros European post Covid-19 recovery funds on green technology. Trome Comercio can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid, Trome Comercio 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 .
High level of anxiety and lack of motivation
– the Great Resignation in United States is the sign of broader dissatisfaction among the workforce in United States. Trome Comercio needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome: News for the Base of the Pyramid 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 Trome Comercio needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.