Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix
The emergence of Internet-based social media has made it possible for one person to communicate with hundreds or even thousands of other people about products and the companies that provide them. Thus, the impact of consumer-to-consumer communications has been greatly magnified in the marketplace. This article argues that social media is a hybrid element of the promotion mix because in a traditional sense it enables companies to talk to their customers, while in a nontraditional sense it enables customers to talk directly to one another. The content, timing, and frequency of the social media-based conversations occurring between consumers are outside managers' direct control. This stands in contrast to the traditional integrated marketing communications paradigm whereby a high degree of control is present. Therefore, managers must learn to shape consumer discussions in a manner that is consistent with the organization's mission and performance goals. Methods by which this can be accomplished are delineated herein. They include providing consumers with networking platforms, and using blogs, social media tools, and promotional tools to engage customers.
Swot Analysis of "Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix" written by W. Glynn Mangold, David J. Faulds includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Media Social facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, IT, Marketing, Social platforms and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix casestudy better are - – wage bills are increasing, increasing energy prices, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy,
there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Media Social, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Media Social 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Media Social
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 Media Social
Strengths Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Media Social in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix Harvard Business Review case study are -
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Media Social 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 Media Social in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Media Social digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Media Social 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.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of Media Social in the sector have low bargaining power. Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Media Social to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Media Social is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Media Social 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
- Media Social 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 Media Social is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Media Social 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Media Social has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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.
Analytics focus
– Media Social 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 W. Glynn Mangold, David J. Faulds 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Media Social 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
High brand equity
– Media Social has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Media Social to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Media Social in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix are -
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, W. Glynn Mangold, David J. Faulds suggests that, Media Social 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Media Social is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Media Social 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.
High dependence on existing supply chain
– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Media Social supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Media Social vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix, in the dynamic environment Media Social has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Media Social has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix, 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.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Media Social 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Media Social is planning to shift buying processes online.
Lack of clear differentiation of Media Social products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Media Social needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Media Social, firm in the HBR case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Media Social 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.
Opportunities Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix | 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix are -
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Media Social 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Media Social can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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 Media Social 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Media Social 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.
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. Media Social can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Media Social 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Media Social to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
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 Media Social in the consumer business. Now Media Social can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Media Social can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Media Social operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Loyalty marketing
– Media Social 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 Media Social 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Media Social 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Media Social 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 Media Social to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Media Social can make experimentation a productive activity and build a culture of innovation using approaches such as – mining transaction data, A/B testing of websites and selling platforms, engaging potential customers over various needs, and building on small ideas in the Sales & Marketing segment.
Threats Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix are -
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. Media Social 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Media Social is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, 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 Media Social in the Sales & Marketing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Media Social has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Media Social 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.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix, Media Social 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 .
Increasing wage structure of Media Social
– 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 Media Social.
Environmental challenges
– Media Social 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. Media Social can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
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.
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 Media Social.
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. Media Social can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Regulatory challenges
– Media Social 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.
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. Media Social needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Sales & Marketing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Media Social 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix 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 Media Social needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
