Kiai Marketing Group is a start-up advertising company providing innovative marketing solutions to businesses in London, Ontario. The company's first undertaking is aimed at reaching the post-secondary student demographic by attaching a business's advertising to laptop computers by means of a laptop "skin." The proprietor needs an overall strategic marketing plan to secure his first client. The proprietor must decide what clients to target, how to reach the student market, what to charge clients and what to pay the team of students displaying the laptop skins.
Swot Analysis of "Kiai Marketing Group" written by Elizabeth M.A. Grasby, Eric Janssen includes – strengths weakness that are internal strategic factors of the organization, and opportunities and threats that Laptop Kiai facing as an external strategic factors. Some of the topics covered in Kiai Marketing Group case study are - Strategic Management Strategies, Marketing, Pricing and Innovation & Entrepreneurship.
Some of the macro environment factors that can be used to understand the Kiai Marketing Group casestudy better are - – increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing transportation and logistics costs, challanges to central banks by blockchain based private currencies, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation,
competitive advantages are harder to sustain because of technology dispersion, increasing energy prices, etc
Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Kiai Marketing Group
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University , we believe that protagonist in Kiai Marketing Group case study can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Laptop Kiai, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Laptop Kiai 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 Kiai Marketing Group can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning using facts provided in Kiai Marketing Group case study
2. Improving business portfolio management of Laptop Kiai
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in Innovation & Entrepreneurship field.
4. Making a Innovation & Entrepreneurship topic specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Laptop Kiai
Strengths Kiai Marketing Group | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of Laptop Kiai in Kiai Marketing Group Harvard Business Review case study are -
Training and development
– Laptop Kiai has one of the best training and development program in the industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in Kiai Marketing Group 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.
Learning organization
- Laptop Kiai 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 Laptop Kiai is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders in Kiai Marketing Group Harvard Business Review case study emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Operational resilience
– The operational resilience strategy in the Kiai Marketing Group 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)
– Laptop Kiai 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 Kiai Marketing Group - staying ahead in the industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.
Sustainable margins compare to other players in Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry
– Kiai Marketing Group firm has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Laptop Kiai to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Laptop Kiai to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that Laptop Kiai 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.
Analytics focus
– Laptop Kiai 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 Elizabeth M.A. Grasby, Eric Janssen 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.
Successful track record of launching new products
– Laptop Kiai has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Laptop Kiai 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.
Organizational Resilience of Laptop Kiai
– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing that Laptop Kiai does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.
Innovation driven organization
– Laptop Kiai is one of the most innovative firm in sector. Manager in Kiai Marketing Group Harvard Business Review case study can use Clayton Christensen Disruptive Innovation strategies to further increase the scale of innovtions in the organization.
High brand equity
– Laptop Kiai has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled Laptop Kiai to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Superior customer experience
– The customer experience strategy of Laptop Kiai in the segment is based on four key concepts – personalization, simplification of complex needs, prompt response, and continuous engagement.
Weaknesses Kiai Marketing Group | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of Kiai Marketing Group are -
Employees’ incomplete understanding of strategy
– From the instances in the HBR case study Kiai Marketing Group, it seems that the employees of Laptop Kiai 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 cash cycle compare to competitors
Laptop Kiai 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.
No frontier risks strategy
– After analyzing the HBR case study Kiai Marketing Group, it seems that company is thinking about the frontier risks that can impact Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of Laptop Kiai is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment. Laptop Kiai needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help Laptop Kiai to focus more on services rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners
– Because of the regulatory requirements, Elizabeth M.A. Grasby, Eric Janssen suggests that, Laptop Kiai 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 Laptop Kiai products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Laptop Kiai needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
Low market penetration in new markets
– Outside its home market of Laptop Kiai, firm in the HBR case study Kiai Marketing Group needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.
Slow to strategic competitive environment developments
– As Kiai Marketing Group HBR case study mentions - Laptop Kiai 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.
Workers concerns about automation
– As automation is fast increasing in the segment, Laptop Kiai 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.
Need for greater diversity
– Laptop Kiai 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.
Products dominated business model
– Even though Laptop Kiai 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 - Kiai Marketing Group should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
Opportunities Kiai Marketing Group | 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 Kiai Marketing Group are -
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Laptop Kiai in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship segment, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– Laptop Kiai 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 Kiai Marketing Group - to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Laptop Kiai to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Changes in consumer behavior post Covid-19
– Consumer behavior has changed in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry because of Covid-19 restrictions. Some of this behavior will stay once things get back to normal. Laptop Kiai 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. Laptop Kiai 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.
Loyalty marketing
– Laptop Kiai 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.
Remote work and new talent hiring opportunities
– The widespread usage of remote working technologies during Covid-19 has opened opportunities for Laptop Kiai 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 Laptop Kiai to hire the very best people irrespective of their geographical location.
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. Laptop Kiai can explore opportunities that can attract volunteers and are consistent with its mission and vision.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help Laptop Kiai to increase its market reach. Laptop Kiai 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.
Buying journey improvements
– Laptop Kiai can improve the customer journey of consumers in the industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. Kiai Marketing Group 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for Laptop Kiai 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of Laptop Kiai has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in the industry. This can help Laptop Kiai to build a more holistic ecosystem as suggested in the Kiai Marketing Group case study. Laptop Kiai can build new products and services such as - data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.
Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains
– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Laptop Kiai 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, Kiai Marketing Group, to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.
Developing new processes and practices
– Laptop Kiai can develop new processes and procedures in Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
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 Laptop Kiai 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.
Threats Kiai Marketing Group External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats mentioned in the HBR case study Kiai Marketing Group are -
Regulatory challenges
– Laptop Kiai 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 Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry regulations.
Learning curve for new practices
– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, as highlighted in case study Kiai Marketing Group, Laptop Kiai may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Innovation & Entrepreneurship .
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. Laptop Kiai 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.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– Laptop Kiai has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Laptop Kiai needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Stagnating economy with rate increase
– Laptop Kiai 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 Laptop Kiai.
Increasing wage structure of Laptop Kiai
– 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 Laptop Kiai.
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 Laptop Kiai business can come under increasing regulations regarding data privacy, data security, etc.
Consumer confidence and its impact on Laptop Kiai 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.
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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that Laptop Kiai is facing in Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
New competition
– After the dotcom bust of 2001, financial crisis of 2008-09, the business formation in US economy had declined. But in 2020 alone, there are more than 1.5 million new business applications in United States. This can lead to greater competition for Laptop Kiai in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for Laptop Kiai in the Innovation & Entrepreneurship industry. The Innovation & Entrepreneurship 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.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of Kiai Marketing Group 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 Kiai Marketing Group 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 Kiai Marketing Group 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 Kiai Marketing Group 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 Kiai Marketing Group 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 Laptop Kiai needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.