Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean
In 2015, having led Hillside Beach Club (HBC) for 21 successful years, Edip Ilkbahar, HBC's founder and CEO, was looking over the plans for a new branch in Cyprus. For over two decades, Ilkbahar's company had enjoyed high occupancy, high guest satisfaction, and high return-visitor rates, not to mention increasing profits from HBC's single location in Fethiye, Turkey. Although branching out had been on the agenda for a couple of years, Ilkbahar was feeling the pressure to recreate HBC's culture in a new location to live up to and even surpass its established success. In parallel, Ilkbahar also needed to make sure that employee motivation at HBC's original Fethiye location did not drop and the employees continued to deliver wholehearted service to live up to HBC's reputation. 2015 certainly looked like it would be a tough year. How could Ilkbahar both try to extend HBC's special formula for success to Cyprus while maintaining high motivation at the Fethiye installation? The case describes the forces that shape the hotel industry's structure, raising the issue of how HBC established itself a sustainable niche for competitive advantage. The case provides the context for the students to identify the design elements underlying HBC's success and helps them explore the link between guest satisfaction and employee training, empowerment, feedback culture, continuous product development as well as social media and marketing. The case challenges the students to ponder what it takes for a company to repeatedly increase customer satisfaction rates and profitability with the same product over the years.
Swot Analysis of "Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean" written by Rajiv Lal, Gamze Yucaoglu includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Hbc's Ilkbahar facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Customer service, Customers, Developing employees, Emerging markets, Growth strategy, Motivating people, Organizational culture, Product development, Supply chain and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean casestudy better are - – increasing household debt because of falling income levels, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, increasing transportation and logistics costs, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, there is backlash against globalization, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
wage bills are increasing, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Hbc's Ilkbahar, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Hbc's Ilkbahar
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar
Strengths Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Hbc's Ilkbahar in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean Harvard Business Review case study are -
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean - 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 Hbc's Ilkbahar in the sector have low bargaining power. Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Hbc's Ilkbahar to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Hbc's Ilkbahar is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hbc's Ilkbahar in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Strong track record of project management
– Hbc's Ilkbahar is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Diverse revenue streams
– Hbc's Ilkbahar is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Hbc's Ilkbahar is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Hbc's Ilkbahar digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
Analytics focus
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Rajiv Lal, Gamze Yucaoglu 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.
Training and development
– Hbc's Ilkbahar has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean are -
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, it seems that the employees of Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Rajiv Lal, Gamze Yucaoglu suggests that, Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes mentioned in the HBR case study - Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, it is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Hbc's Ilkbahar vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hbc's Ilkbahar has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean HBR case study mentions - Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Hbc's Ilkbahar, firm in the HBR case study Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Hbc's Ilkbahar has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the industry over the last five years. Hbc's Ilkbahar even though has strong showing on digital transformation primary two stages, it has struggled to capitalize the power of digital transformation in marketing efforts and new venture efforts.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, 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, Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, in the dynamic environment Hbc's Ilkbahar has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Hbc's Ilkbahar has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 - Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean | 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar in the consumer business. Now Hbc's Ilkbahar can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Hbc's Ilkbahar to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Hbc's Ilkbahar to increase its market reach. Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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. Hbc's Ilkbahar can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Hbc's Ilkbahar 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, Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Hbc's Ilkbahar can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Hbc's Ilkbahar operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Hbc's Ilkbahar is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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.
Reforming the budgeting process
- By establishing new metrics that will be used to evaluate both existing and potential projects Hbc's Ilkbahar can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Hbc's Ilkbahar has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Hbc's Ilkbahar to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean case study. Hbc's Ilkbahar can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
Threats Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean are -
Environmental challenges
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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. Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean, Hbc's Ilkbahar 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 .
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Hbc's Ilkbahar with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar.
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.
Increasing wage structure of Hbc's Ilkbahar
– 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 Hbc's Ilkbahar.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Hbc's Ilkbahar is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
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. Hbc's Ilkbahar can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Hbc's Ilkbahar has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Sales & Marketing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Hbc's Ilkbahar 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.
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 Hbc's Ilkbahar business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hillside Beach Club: Delivering the Ultimate Family Vacation in the Mediterranean 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 Hbc's Ilkbahar needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
