Remark (MARK) SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / MBA Resources

Introduction to SWOT Analysis

SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for Remark (United States)

Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , Remark is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – increasing commodity prices, there is backlash against globalization, technology disruption, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, wage bills are increasing, central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, increasing household debt because of falling income levels, etc

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Introduction to SWOT Analysis of Remark

SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that Remark can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the Remark, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which Remark 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.

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SWOT Objectives / Importance of SWOT Analysis and SWOT Matrix

SWOT analysis of Remark can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of Remark
2. Improving business portfolio management of Remark
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Printing & Publishing sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of Remark

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Strengths of Remark | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The strengths of Remark are -

Ability to recruit top talent

– Remark is one of the leading players in the Printing & Publishing industry in United States. It is in a position to attract the best talent available in United States. The firm has a robust talent identification program that helps in identifying the brightest.

Successful track record of launching new products

– Remark has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. Remark 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 Remark

– The covid-19 pandemic has put organizational resilience at the centre of everthing Remark does. Organizational resilience comprises - Financial Resilience, Operational Resilience, Technological Resilience, Organizational Resilience, Business Model Resilience, and Reputation Resilience.

Low bargaining power of suppliers

– Suppliers of Remark in the Services sector have low bargaining power. Remark has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps Remark to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.

Effective Research and Development (R&D)

– Remark has innovation driven culture where significant part of the revenues are spent on the research and development activities. This has resulted in – Remark staying ahead in the Printing & Publishing industry in terms of – new product launches, superior customer experience, highly competitive pricing strategies, and great returns to the shareholders.

Training and development

– Remark has one of the best training and development program in Services industry. The effectiveness of the training programs can be measured in – employees retention, in-house promotion, loyalty, new venture initiation, lack of conflict, and high level of both employees and customer engagement.

Learning organization

- Remark 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 Remark is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at Remark emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.

Operational resilience

– The operational resilience strategy of Remark comprises – understanding the underlying the factors in the Printing & Publishing 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 Printing & Publishing industry

– Remark has clearly differentiated products in the market place. This has enabled Remark to fetch slight price premium compare to the competitors in the Printing & Publishing industry. The sustainable margins have also helped Remark to invest into research and development (R&D) and innovation.

Diverse revenue streams

– Remark is present in almost all the verticals within the Printing & Publishing industry. This has provided Remark 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.

Strong track record of project management in the Printing & Publishing industry

– Remark is known for sticking to its project targets. This enables the firm to manage – time, project costs, and have sustainable margins on the projects.

Digital Transformation in Printing & Publishing industry

- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For Remark digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. Remark 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.

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Weaknesses of Remark | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The weaknesses of Remark are -

Aligning sales with marketing

– From the outside it seems that Remark needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Printing & Publishing industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at Remark can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as Remark is planning to shift buying processes online.

High cash cycle compare to competitors

Remark has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Printing & Publishing industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.

Low market penetration in new markets

– Outside its home market of United States, Remark needs to spend more promotional, marketing, and advertising efforts to penetrate international markets.

Capital Spending Reduction

– Even during the low interest decade, Remark 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 Printing & Publishing industry using digital technology.

Slow decision making process

– As mentioned earlier in the report, Remark has a very deliberative decision making approach. This approach has resulted in prudent decisions, but it has also resulted in missing opportunities in the Printing & Publishing industry over the last five years. Remark 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.

Interest costs

– Compare to the competition, Remark 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.

Ability to respond to the competition

– As the decision making is very deliberative at Remark, in the dynamic environment of Printing & Publishing industry it has struggled to respond to the nimble upstart competition. Remark has reasonably good record with similar level competitors but it has struggled with new entrants taking away niches of its business.

Lack of clear differentiation of Remark products

– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, Remark needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.

Workers concerns about automation

– As automation is fast increasing in the Printing & Publishing industry, Remark 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.

High dependence on existing supply chain

– The disruption in the global supply chains because of the Covid-19 pandemic and blockage of the Suez Canal illustrated the fragile nature of Remark supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, Remark is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left Remark vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.

Slow to harness new channels of communication

– Even though competitors are using new communication channels such as Instagram, Tiktok, and Snap, Remark is slow explore the new channels of communication. These new channels of communication can help Remark to provide better information regarding Printing & Publishing products and services. It can also build an online community to further reach out to potential customers.

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Remark Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The opportunities of Remark are -

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 Remark 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.

Finding new ways to collaborate

– Covid-19 has not only transformed business models of companies in Printing & Publishing industry, but it has also influenced the consumer preferences. Remark can tie-up with other value chain partners to explore new opportunities regarding meeting customer demands and building a rewarding and engaging relationship.

Creating value in data economy

– The success of analytics program of Remark has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Printing & Publishing industry. This can help Remark to build a more holistic ecosystem for Remark products in the Printing & Publishing industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, etc.

Using analytics as competitive advantage

– Remark has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Printing & Publishing sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled Remark to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help Remark to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.

Leveraging digital technologies

– Remark 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.

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. Remark 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 Remark to increase its market reach. Remark 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.

Building a culture of innovation

– managers at Remark 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 Printing & Publishing industry.

Buying journey improvements

– Remark can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Printing & Publishing industry by using analytics and artificial intelligence. It 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.

Manufacturing automation

– Remark can use the latest technology developments to improve its manufacturing and designing process in Printing & Publishing sector. 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

– Remark 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.

Lowering marketing communication costs

– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for Remark in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Printing & Publishing industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.

Harnessing reconfiguration of the global supply chains

– As the trade war between US and China heats up in the coming years, Remark 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 Remark to buy more products closer to the markets, and it can leverage its size and influence to get better deal from the local markets.

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Threats Remark External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis

The threats of Remark are -

High dependence on third party suppliers

– Remark 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.

Stagnating economy with rate increase

– Remark 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 Printing & Publishing industry.

Learning curve for new practices

– As the technology based on artificial intelligence and machine learning platform is getting complex, Remark may face longer learning curve for training and development of existing employees. This can open space for more nimble competitors in the field of Printing & Publishing 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.

Environmental challenges

– Remark 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. Remark can take advantage of this fund but it will also bring new competitors in the Printing & Publishing industry.

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. Remark needs to understand the core reasons impacting the Printing & Publishing industry. This will help it in building a better workplace.

Regulatory challenges

– Remark 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 Printing & Publishing industry regulations.

Barriers of entry lowering

– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Printing & Publishing industry are lowering. It can presents Remark with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Printing & Publishing sector.

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 Remark in the Printing & Publishing sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.

Shortening product life cycle

– it is one of the major threat that Remark is facing in Printing & Publishing sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.

Consumer confidence and its impact on Remark 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 Printing & Publishing industry and other sectors.

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. Remark 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

– Remark has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Printing & Publishing industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, Remark needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Printing & Publishing 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.

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Weighted SWOT Analysis of Remark Template, Example

Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at Remark 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 Remark 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 Remark 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 Remark 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 Remark needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.

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