Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Sales & Marketing
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby
UrbanBaby is a newly developed smartphone application (app) that allows users to address the difficult task of finding activities, restaurants and other forms of entertainment for newborns to young teens. A number of issues must be addressed if it is going to be profitable. First, the app's creators, Alex and Pavel, are unsure how to characterize the large potential target market, parents, or if there are other target markets that might be interested. This is critical, as the success of the app depends on the cultivation of a strong online community that will contribute content. Second, they have to find a reliable source of data to populate the app. Third, they must decide whether to focus on Apple's operating system, which is popular in North America, or put more of their energy into competing operating systems that are much more popular in the rest of the world. Finally, they have a number of strategic marketing choices to make and to prioritize, including whether to keep the UrbanBaby brand name and risk the ire of similarly named competitors, how to price the app, how to position and promote the app and how to time the rollout. How these initial choices will affect subsequent strategic and tactical decisions is also a matter of concern.
Swot Analysis of "Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby" written by Andrew Perkins includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Urbanbaby App facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Entrepreneurship, Mobile, Product development and Sales & Marketing.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby casestudy better are - – increasing energy prices, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, technology disruption, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, wage bills are increasing, supply chains are disrupted by pandemic , challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies,
central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, there is increasing trade war between United States & China, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Urbanbaby App, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Urbanbaby App 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Urbanbaby App
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 Urbanbaby App
Strengths Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Urbanbaby App in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby Harvard Business Review case study are -
Learning organization
- Urbanbaby App 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 Urbanbaby App is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Strong track record of project management
– Urbanbaby App is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Effective Research and Development (R&D)
– Urbanbaby App 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby - 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 Urbanbaby App in the sector have low bargaining power. Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Urbanbaby App to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Urbanbaby App is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Urbanbaby App has built up over years in its products and services combo offer has resulted in high retention of customers, lower marketing costs, and greater ability of the firm to focus on its customers.
Training and development
– Urbanbaby App has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby Harvard Business Review case study comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the industry, building diversified operations across different geographies so that disruption in one part of the world doesn’t impact the overall performance of the firm, and integrating the various business operations and processes through its digital transformation drive.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Sales & Marketing industry
– Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Urbanbaby App to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Urbanbaby App to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
Organizational Resilience of Urbanbaby App
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Urbanbaby App does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Urbanbaby App 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Innovation driven organization
– Urbanbaby App is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Weaknesses Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby are -
Need for greater diversity
– Urbanbaby App 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.
Compensation and incentives
– The revenue per employee as mentioned in the HBR case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby, is just above the industry average. Urbanbaby App 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.
Slow to harness new channels of communication
– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Urbanbaby App is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication mentioned in marketing section of case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby can help to provide better information regarding products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby, 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.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby has high operating costs in the. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract Urbanbaby App 's lucrative customers.
Ability to respond to the competition
– As the decision making is very deliberative, highlighted in the case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby, in the dynamic environment Urbanbaby App has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Urbanbaby App has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Urbanbaby App is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Sales & Marketing segment. Urbanbaby App needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Urbanbaby App to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Interest costs
– Compare to the competition, Urbanbaby App 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Urbanbaby App 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 - Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Urbanbaby App 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Urbanbaby App is planning to shift buying processes online.
Opportunities Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby | 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby are -
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Sales & Marketing industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Urbanbaby App can take advantage of these changes in consumer behavior to build a far more efficient business model. For example consumer regular ordering of products can reduce both last mile delivery costs and market penetration costs. Urbanbaby App can further use this consumer data to build better customer loyalty, provide better products and service collection, and improve the value proposition in inflationary times.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Urbanbaby App 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 Urbanbaby App to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Urbanbaby App has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Urbanbaby App to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby case study. Urbanbaby App can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Manufacturing automation
– Urbanbaby App 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Urbanbaby App 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.
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, Urbanbaby App can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Urbanbaby App operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Sales & Marketing sector.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Urbanbaby App 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, Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Urbanbaby App to increase its market reach. Urbanbaby App 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Urbanbaby App is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Urbanbaby App 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.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Sales & Marketing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Urbanbaby App can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Urbanbaby App 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Urbanbaby App can develop new processes and procedures in Sales & Marketing industry using technology such as automation using artificial intelligence, real time transportation and products tracking, 3D modeling for concept development and new products pilot testing etc.
Threats Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby are -
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 Urbanbaby App business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Urbanbaby App with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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 Urbanbaby App.
Environmental challenges
– Urbanbaby App 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. Urbanbaby App can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Sales & Marketing industry.
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. Urbanbaby App 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Urbanbaby App 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.
Increasing wage structure of Urbanbaby App
– 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 Urbanbaby App.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Urbanbaby App can face lack of demand in the market place because of Fed actions to reduce inflation. This can lead to sluggish growth in the economy, lower demands, lower investments, higher borrowing costs, and consolidation in the field.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– Urbanbaby App 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 Urbanbaby App 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Urbanbaby App is facing in Sales & Marketing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Urbanbaby App 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Developing a New Smartphone Application: UrbanBaby 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 Urbanbaby App needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
