Case Study Description of MMI Product Placement, Inc.
The president of a national placement agency is preparing to make a final pitch to sign Greyhound Canada as a client. Greyhound wants to reposition its brand as a mainstream travel option, particularly for suburban commuters, and needs cost-effective ways to get its message to consumers. The company views product placement as a viable tool for building brand awareness, but worries about losing control over its brand image. Even more serious are concerns about the absence of reliable metrics to assess the overall effectiveness of product placement. The case covers fundamentals of product placement, particularly with respect to strengths and weaknesses, and provides an excellent basis for discussing its value as part of an overall marketing communications strategy.
Authors :: Robin Ritchie, Chandra Sekhar Ramasastry
Swot Analysis of "MMI Product Placement, Inc." written by Robin Ritchie, Chandra Sekhar Ramasastry includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Placement Greyhound facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in MMI Product Placement, Inc. case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Communication and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the MMI Product Placement, Inc. casestudy better are - – wage bills are increasing, geopolitical disruptions, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies,
challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of MMI Product Placement, Inc.
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in MMI Product Placement, Inc. case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Placement Greyhound, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Placement Greyhound 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in MMI Product Placement, Inc. case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Placement Greyhound
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 Placement Greyhound
Strengths MMI Product Placement, Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Placement Greyhound in MMI Product Placement, Inc. Harvard Business Review case study are -
Successful track record of launching new products
– Placement Greyhound has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Placement Greyhound 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.
Training and development
– Placement Greyhound has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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.
Diverse revenue streams
– Placement Greyhound is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– MMI Product Placement, Inc. firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Placement Greyhound to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Placement Greyhound to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Placement Greyhound
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Placement Greyhound does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Strong track record of project management
– Placement Greyhound is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Analytics focus
– Placement Greyhound is putting a lot of focus on utilizing the power of analytics in business decision making. This has put it among the leading players in the industry. The technology infrastructure suggested by Robin Ritchie, Chandra Sekhar Ramasastry can also help it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Placement Greyhound 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.
Learning organization
- Placement Greyhound 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 Placement Greyhound is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in MMI Product Placement, Inc. Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Placement Greyhound has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in, as mentioned in case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Placement Greyhound in the sector have low bargaining power. MMI Product Placement, Inc. has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Placement Greyhound to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Weaknesses MMI Product Placement, Inc. | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of MMI Product Placement, Inc. are -
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Placement Greyhound 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Placement Greyhound 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Placement Greyhound 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.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study MMI Product Placement, Inc., in the dynamic environment Placement Greyhound has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Placement Greyhound has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Placement Greyhound is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Placement Greyhound has some of the most successful products in the industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. firm in the HBR case study - MMI Product Placement, Inc. should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Placement Greyhound is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Placement Greyhound needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Placement Greyhound to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Robin Ritchie, Chandra Sekhar Ramasastry suggests that, Placement Greyhound 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Placement Greyhound 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Placement Greyhound is planning to shift buying processes online.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Placement Greyhound 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.
Opportunities MMI Product Placement, Inc. | 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. are -
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Placement Greyhound has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Placement Greyhound to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the MMI Product Placement, Inc. case study. Placement Greyhound can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Loyalty marketing
– Placement Greyhound 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Placement Greyhound to conduct training and development for its employees across the world. This will result in not only reducing the cost of training but also help employees in different part of the world to integrate with the headquarter work culture, ethos, and standards.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Placement Greyhound is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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.
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 Placement Greyhound 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Placement Greyhound has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in the sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled, as illustrated in the Harvard case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Placement Greyhound to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Placement Greyhound 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.
Manufacturing automation
– Placement Greyhound 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Placement Greyhound can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Placement Greyhound operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Buying journey improvements
– Placement Greyhound can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Placement Greyhound can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Placement Greyhound 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.
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. Placement Greyhound can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Threats MMI Product Placement, Inc. External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. are -
Regulatory challenges
– Placement Greyhound 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Placement Greyhound with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Placement Greyhound 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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Placement Greyhound demand
– There is a high probability of declining consumer confidence, given – high inflammation rate, rise of gig economy, lower job stability, increasing cost of living, higher interest rates, and aging demography. All the factors contribute to people saving higher rate of their income, resulting in lower consumer demand in the industry and other sectors.
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. Placement Greyhound 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.
Increasing wage structure of Placement Greyhound
– 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 Placement Greyhound.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Placement Greyhound in the Sales & Marketing industry. The Sales & Marketing industry is already at various protected from local competition in China, with the rise of trade war the protection levels may go up. This presents a clear threat of current business model in Chinese market.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study MMI Product Placement, Inc., Placement Greyhound 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 .
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Placement Greyhound 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.
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.
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. Placement Greyhound needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Placement Greyhound can face downward pressure on margins from increasing competition from international players. The international players have stable revenue in their home market and can use those resources to penetrate prominent markets illustrated in HBR case study MMI Product Placement, Inc. .
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Placement Greyhound is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 MMI Product Placement, Inc. 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 Placement Greyhound needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
