Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
Strategy & Execution
Strategy / MBA Resources
Case Study SWOT Analysis Solution
Case Study Description of Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market
In the dynamic online travel industry, the founders of mygola.com (mygola) needed to decide on the company's future growth trajectory. The online travel industry was booming, but online travel planning was at a relatively nascent stage. In the travel-planning space, mygola's initial service offering had been well received but the need to scale up was pressing. The existing product leveraged technological efficiencies and human judgment to provide customized answers for users' travel queries. The new product, on the other hand, could change mygola's way of doing business going forward. Though it was untested, it had the potential to put mygola on a higher growth path. The choice of product would mean that mygola would have to make a host of other decisions regarding the business. The decisions that the co-founders had to make could very well turn out to be the most important in mygola's growth story. Supriya Sharma is affiliated with Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Rajesh Nanarpuzha is affiliated with Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Pinaki Roy is affiliated with Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.
Authors :: Supriya Sharma, Rajesh Nanarpuzha, Pinaki Roy
Swot Analysis of "Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market" written by Supriya Sharma, Rajesh Nanarpuzha, Pinaki Roy includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Travel Mygola facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Internet and Strategy & Execution.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market casestudy better are - – talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, banking and financial system is disrupted by Bitcoin and other crypto currencies, geopolitical disruptions, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing energy prices, digital marketing is dominated by two big players Facebook and Google, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Travel Mygola, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Travel Mygola 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Travel Mygola
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Strategy & Execution field.
4. Making a Strategy & Execution topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Travel Mygola
Strengths Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Travel Mygola in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market Harvard Business Review case study are -
High brand equity
– Travel Mygola has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Travel Mygola to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Analytics focus
– Travel Mygola 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 Supriya Sharma, Rajesh Nanarpuzha, Pinaki Roy 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.
Innovation driven organization
– Travel Mygola is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
Diverse revenue streams
– Travel Mygola is present in almost all the verticals within the industry. This has provided firm in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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.
Digital Transformation in Strategy & Execution segment
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Travel Mygola digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Travel Mygola 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– Travel Mygola is one of the leading recruiters in the industry. Managers in the Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market are in a position to attract the best talent available. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.
Learning organization
- Travel Mygola 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 Travel Mygola is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Travel Mygola in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Strong track record of project management
– Travel Mygola is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.
Highly skilled collaborators
– Travel Mygola 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market HBR case study have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Training and development
– Travel Mygola has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market are -
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, firm in the HBR case study Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Travel Mygola 's lucrative customers.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Travel Mygola is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Strategy & Execution segment. Travel Mygola needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Travel Mygola to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, Travel Mygola 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of Travel Mygola products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Travel Mygola needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Need for greater diversity
– Travel Mygola 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.
High dependence on star products
– The top 2 products and services of the firm as mentioned in the Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Travel Mygola has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Skills based hiring
– The stress on hiring functional specialists at Travel Mygola has created an environment where the organization is dominated by functional specialists rather than management generalist. This has resulted into product oriented approach rather than marketing oriented approach or consumers oriented approach.
Slow decision making process
– As mentioned earlier in the report, Travel Mygola 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. Travel Mygola 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.
Aligning sales with marketing
– It come across in the case study Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Travel Mygola is planning to shift buying processes online.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
Travel Mygola 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.
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market, it seems that the employees of Travel Mygola 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.
Opportunities Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market | 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market are -
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at Travel Mygola 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 Strategy & Execution segment.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Strategy & Execution industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Travel Mygola 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. Travel Mygola 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, Travel Mygola is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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.
Developing new processes and practices
– Travel Mygola can develop new processes and procedures in Strategy & Execution 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Travel Mygola 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.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, Travel Mygola 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 Travel Mygola can not only reduce the costs of the project but also help it in integrating the projects with other processes within the organization.
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. Travel Mygola 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, Travel Mygola 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, Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Travel Mygola has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Travel Mygola to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market case study. Travel Mygola can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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, Travel Mygola can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that Travel Mygola operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Strategy & Execution sector.
Finding new ways to collaborate
– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Strategy & Execution industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Travel Mygola can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.
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 Travel Mygola in the consumer business. Now Travel Mygola can target international markets with far fewer capital restrictions requirements than the existing system.
Threats Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market are -
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 Travel Mygola in the Strategy & Execution sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Environmental challenges
– Travel Mygola 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. Travel Mygola can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Strategy & Execution 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.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry in the industry are lowering. It can presents Travel Mygola with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the sector.
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. Travel Mygola needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Strategy & Execution industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.
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 Travel Mygola business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Regulatory challenges
– Travel Mygola 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 Strategy & Execution industry regulations.
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 Travel Mygola.
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, Travel Mygola 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market .
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Travel Mygola in the Strategy & Execution industry. The Strategy & Execution 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.
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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Travel Mygola 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Strategy & Execution field will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. Travel Mygola can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Mygola.com: Deciding Its Place in the Online Travel Market 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 Travel Mygola needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.