SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix for PMX Communities (United States)
Based on various researches at Oak Spring University , PMX Communities is operating in a macro-environment that has been destablized by – central banks are concerned over increasing inflation, technology disruption, customer relationship management is fast transforming because of increasing concerns over data privacy, cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models, talent flight as more people leaving formal jobs, increasing government debt because of Covid-19 spendings, increasing inequality as vast percentage of new income is going to the top 1%,
increasing commodity prices, increasing transportation and logistics costs, etc
SWOT stands for an organization’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats . At Oak Spring University, we believe that PMX Communities can use SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool to assess the current internal strengths and weaknesses of the PMX Communities, and to figure out the opportunities and threats in the macro environment – technological, environmental, political, economic, social, demographic, etc in which PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities can be done for the following purposes –
1. Strategic planning of PMX Communities
2. Improving business portfolio management of PMX Communities
3. Assessing feasibility of the new initiative in United States
4. Making a Gold & Silver sector specific business decision
5. Set goals for the organization
6. Organizational restructuring of PMX Communities
Strengths of PMX Communities | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Strengths in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The strengths of PMX Communities are -
Ability to lead change in Gold & Silver
– PMX Communities is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver industry in United States. Over the years it has not only transformed the business landscape in the Gold & Silver industry in United States but also across the existing markets. The ability to lead change has enabled PMX Communities in – penetrating new markets, reaching out to new customers, and providing different value propositions to different customers in the international markets.
Cross disciplinary teams
– Horizontal connected teams at the PMX Communities are driving operational speed, building greater agility, and keeping the organization nimble to compete with new competitors. It helps are organization to ideate new ideas, and execute them swiftly in the marketplace.
Analytics focus
– PMX Communities 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 Gold & Silver industry. The technology infrastructure of United States is also helping it to harness the power of analytics for – marketing optimization, demand forecasting, customer relationship management, inventory management, information sharing across the value chain etc.
Learning organization
- PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities is open place that encourages instructiveness, ideation, open minded discussions, and creativity. Employees and leaders at PMX Communities emphasize – knowledge, initiative, and innovation.
Digital Transformation in Gold & Silver industry
- digital transformation varies from industry to industry. For PMX Communities digital transformation journey comprises differing goals based on market maturity, customer technology acceptance, and organizational culture. PMX Communities 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.
High brand equity
– PMX Communities has strong brand awareness and brand recognition among both - the exiting customers and potential new customers. Strong brand equity has enabled PMX Communities to keep acquiring new customers and building profitable relationship with both the new and loyal customers.
Low bargaining power of suppliers
– Suppliers of PMX Communities in the Basic Materials sector have low bargaining power. PMX Communities has further diversified its suppliers portfolio by building a robust supply chain across various countries. This helps PMX Communities to manage not only supply disruptions but also source products at highly competitive prices.
High switching costs
– The high switching costs that PMX Communities 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.
Ability to recruit top talent
– PMX Communities is one of the leading players in the Gold & Silver 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
– PMX Communities has launched numerous new products in last few years, keeping in mind evolving customer preferences and competitive pressures. PMX Communities 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.
Innovation driven organization
– PMX Communities is one of the most innovative firm in Gold & Silver sector.
Highly skilled collaborators
– PMX Communities has highly efficient outsourcing and offshoring strategy. It has resulted in greater operational flexibility and bringing down the costs in highly price sensitive Gold & Silver industry. Secondly the value chain collaborators of PMX Communities have helped the firm to develop new products and bring them quickly to the marketplace.
Weaknesses of PMX Communities | Internal Strategic Factors
What are Weaknesses in SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The weaknesses of PMX Communities are -
Aligning sales with marketing
– From the outside it seems that PMX Communities needs to have more collaboration between its sales team and marketing team. Sales professionals in the Gold & Silver industry have deep experience in developing customer relationships. Marketing department at PMX Communities can leverage the sales team experience to cultivate customer relationships as PMX Communities is planning to shift buying processes online.
High dependence on PMX Communities ‘s star products
– The top 2 products and services of PMX Communities still accounts for major business revenue. This dependence on star products in Gold & Silver industry has resulted into insufficient focus on developing new products, even though PMX Communities has relatively successful track record of launching new products.
Increasing silos among functional specialists
– The organizational structure of PMX Communities is dominated by functional specialists. It is not different from other players in the Gold & Silver industry, but PMX Communities needs to de-silo the office environment to harness the true potential of its workforce. Secondly the de-silo will also help PMX Communities to focus more on services in the Gold & Silver industry rather than just following the product oriented approach.
High bargaining power of channel partners in Gold & Silver industry
– because of the regulatory requirements in United States, PMX Communities 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 Gold & Silver industry.
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 PMX Communities supply chain. Even after few cautionary changes, PMX Communities is still heavily dependent upon the existing supply chain. The existing supply chain though brings in cost efficiencies but it has left PMX Communities vulnerable to further global disruptions in South East Asia.
High operating costs
– Compare to the competitors, PMX Communities has high operating costs in the Gold & Silver industry. This can be harder to sustain given the new emerging competition from nimble players who are using technology to attract PMX Communities lucrative customers.
No frontier risks strategy
– From the 10K / annual statement of PMX Communities, it seems that company is thinking out the frontier risks that can impact Gold & Silver industry. 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.
Lack of clear differentiation of PMX Communities products
– To increase the profitability and margins on the products, PMX Communities needs to provide more differentiated products than what it is currently offering in the marketplace.
High cash cycle compare to competitors
PMX Communities has a high cash cycle compare to other players in the Gold & Silver industry. It needs to shorten the cash cycle by 12% to be more competitive in the marketplace, reduce inventory costs, and be more profitable.
Capital Spending Reduction
– Even during the low interest decade, PMX Communities 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 Gold & Silver industry using digital technology.
Products dominated business model
– Even though PMX Communities has some of the most successful models in the Gold & Silver industry, this business model has made each new product launch extremely critical for continuous financial growth of the organization. PMX Communities should strive to include more intangible value offerings along with its core products and services.
PMX Communities Opportunities | External Strategic Factors
What are Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The opportunities of PMX Communities are -
Increase in government spending
– As the United States and other governments are increasing social spending and infrastructure spending to build economies post Covid-19, PMX Communities can use these opportunities to build new business models that can help the communities that PMX Communities operates in. Secondly it can use opportunities from government spending in Gold & Silver sector.
Buying journey improvements
– PMX Communities can improve the customer journey of consumers in the Gold & Silver 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.
Leveraging digital technologies
– PMX Communities 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.
Better consumer reach
– The expansion of the 5G network will help PMX Communities to increase its market reach. PMX Communities 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.
Learning at scale
– Online learning technologies has now opened space for PMX Communities 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.
Using analytics as competitive advantage
– PMX Communities has spent a significant amount of money and effort to integrate analytics and machine learning into its operations in Gold & Silver sector. This continuous investment in analytics has enabled PMX Communities to build a competitive advantage using analytics. The analytics driven competitive advantage can help PMX Communities to build faster Go To Market strategies, better consumer insights, developing relevant product features, and building a highly efficient supply chain.
Loyalty marketing
– PMX Communities 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.
Creating value in data economy
– The success of analytics program of PMX Communities has opened avenues for new revenue streams for the organization in Gold & Silver industry. This can help PMX Communities to build a more holistic ecosystem for PMX Communities products in the Gold & Silver industry by providing – data insight services, data privacy related products, data based consulting services, 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 PMX Communities 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.
Lowering marketing communication costs
– 5G expansion will open new opportunities for PMX Communities in the field of marketing communication. It will bring down the cost of doing business, provide technology platform to build new products in the Gold & Silver industry, and it will provide faster access to the consumers.
Building a culture of innovation
– managers at PMX Communities 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 Gold & Silver industry.
Low interest rates
– Even though inflation is raising its head in most developed economies, PMX Communities 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.
Redefining models of collaboration and team work
– As explained in the weaknesses section, PMX Communities is facing challenges because of the dominance of functional experts in the organization. PMX Communities can utilize new technology in the field of Gold & Silver industry to build more coordinated teams and streamline operations and communications using tools such as CAD, Zoom, etc.
Threats PMX Communities External Strategic Factors
What are Threats in the SWOT Analysis / TOWS Matrix / Weighted SWOT Analysis
The threats of PMX Communities are -
Increasing international competition and downward pressure on margins
– Apart from technology driven competitive advantage dilution, PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities prominent markets.
Barriers of entry lowering
– As technology is more democratized, the barriers to entry to Gold & Silver industry are lowering. It can presents PMX Communities with greater competitive threats in the near to medium future. Secondly it will also put downward pressure on pricing throughout the Gold & Silver sector.
High dependence on third party suppliers
– PMX Communities 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.
Shortening product life cycle
– it is one of the major threat that PMX Communities is facing in Gold & Silver sector. It can lead to higher research and development costs, higher marketing expenses, lower customer loyalty, etc.
Technology acceleration in Forth Industrial Revolution
– PMX Communities has witnessed rapid integration of technology during Covid-19 in the Gold & Silver industry. As one of the leading players in the industry, PMX Communities needs to keep up with the evolution of technology in the Gold & Silver 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.
Trade war between China and United States
– The trade war between two of the biggest economies can hugely impact the opportunities for PMX Communities in Gold & Silver industry. The Gold & Silver 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.
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. PMX Communities 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.
Easy access to finance
– Easy access to finance in Gold & Silver industry will also reduce the barriers to entry in the industry, thus putting downward pressure on the prices because of increasing competition. PMX Communities can utilize it by borrowing at lower rates and invest it into research and development, capital expenditure to fortify its core competitive advantage.
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 PMX Communities.
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.
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.
Consumer confidence and its impact on PMX Communities 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 Gold & Silver industry and other sectors.
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 PMX Communities in the Gold & Silver sector and impact the bottomline of the organization.
Weighted SWOT Analysis of PMX Communities Template, Example
Not all factors mentioned under the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats quadrants in the SWOT Analysis are equal. Managers at PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities 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 PMX Communities needs to make to build a sustainable competitive advantage.
