BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand
In 2012 BabyCenter was the largest parenting platform and parenting media company in the world. It provided expert advice to pregnant women and new mothers while connecting these women to each other online and in person. The company had 110 employees, with operations in 23 regions around the world in 14 languages. The case provides students with a practical, real world example of how to create and grow a social brand. It details how BabyCenter evolved as a social brand through implementing several mechanisms: cultivating employee innovation, creating customer communities, empowering influencers, and enabling great storytelling. BabyCenter cultivated employee innovation through its three-day "BabyCenter Innovation Days," held every six weeks. These days involved brainstorming sessions, breaking into cross-departmental and intra-departmental teams, and presenting innovative business ideas to the rest of the company. These ideas directly benefited the company, as 60 to 70 percent of them went to market. BabyCenter created customer community online through an interactive website, and in the real world through "BabyCenter Birth Clubs." Using the customer data it collected, the company connected women in the same stage of pregnancy to each other to form the clubs, which served as social organizations and support networks. Through its robust web analytics and surveys, BabyCenter identified its most active and trusted online users, the "influencers,'' and worked deliberately to cultivate its relationships with them. One way the company did this was through launching a social campaign highlighting several influencer moms who worked with charitable organizations. BabyCenter also understood and embraced the power of stories to create brand value, and it gave customers the opportunity to tell their own stories through the website and beyond.
Swot Analysis of "BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand" written by Jennifer L. Aaker, Debra Schifrin includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Babycenter Parenting facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Marketing, Social platforms and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand casestudy better are - – challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, technology disruption, competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, wage bills are increasing, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, geopolitical disruptions,
banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Babycenter Parenting, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Babycenter Parenting 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Babycenter Parenting
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 Babycenter Parenting
Strengths BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Babycenter Parenting in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand Harvard Business Review case study are -
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Babycenter Parenting in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Training and development
– Babycenter Parenting has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Babycenter Parenting 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the Babycenter Parenting 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.
Digital Transformation in Sales & Marketing segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Babycenter Parenting digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Babycenter Parenting 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.
Learning organization
- Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
High brand equity
– Babycenter Parenting has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Babycenter Parenting to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Babycenter Parenting has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting in the sector have low bargaining power. BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Babycenter Parenting to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Strong track record of project management
– Babycenter Parenting is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Ability to lead change in Sales & Marketing field
– Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Babycenter Parenting to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Babycenter Parenting to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Weaknesses BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand are -
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Jennifer L. Aaker, Debra Schifrin suggests that, Babycenter Parenting 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Babycenter Parenting products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Babycenter Parenting needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Babycenter Parenting 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.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand HBR case study mentions - Babycenter Parenting 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Babycenter Parenting 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 - BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand, 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.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Babycenter Parenting 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. Babycenter Parenting 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 Babycenter Parenting has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Babycenter Parenting is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand, is just above the industry average. Babycenter Parenting needs to redesign the compensation structure and incentives to increase the revenue per employees. Some of the steps that it can take are – hiring more specialists on project basis, etc.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Babycenter Parenting 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.
Opportunities BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand | 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand are -
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Babycenter Parenting 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.
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 Babycenter Parenting 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Babycenter Parenting 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Babycenter Parenting can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 Babycenter Parenting can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
Manufacturing automation
– Babycenter Parenting 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Babycenter Parenting to increase its market reach. Babycenter Parenting will be able to reach out to new customers. Secondly 5G will also provide technology framework to build new tools and products that can help more immersive consumer experience and faster consumer journey.
Identify volunteer opportunities
– Covid-19 has impacted working population in two ways – it has led to people soul searching about their professional choices, resulting in mass resignation. Secondly it has encouraged people to do things that they are passionate about. This has opened opportunities for businesses to build volunteer oriented socially driven projects. Babycenter Parenting can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Babycenter Parenting has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Babycenter Parenting to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand case study. Babycenter Parenting can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Babycenter Parenting 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Babycenter Parenting to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– Babycenter Parenting 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– Babycenter Parenting 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.
Threats BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand are -
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand, Babycenter Parenting 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. Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting 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.
Regulatory challenges
– Babycenter Parenting 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.
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. Babycenter Parenting can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Babycenter Parenting 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand .
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Babycenter Parenting 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.
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 Babycenter Parenting.
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. Babycenter Parenting 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 Babycenter Parenting is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Increasing wage structure of Babycenter Parenting
– 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 Babycenter Parenting.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Babycenter Parenting 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 BabyCenter: Creating a Social Brand 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 Babycenter Parenting needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.