SWOT Analysis: Definition, Process, Elements & Examples

SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool employed to analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities & threats included in any business venture, project, or even in any particular situation. SWOT analysis was first time used by Albert Humphrey, who performed a research project in 1970 at Stanford University.

SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) is a special game-changer technique that lets one plan ahead for his business by keeping the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the particular field in mind.

Well! At first, you might think this technique to be as complicated as the Periodic Table, but believe us, it’s a lot simpler than cramming that whole thing up. The credit for the creation of this technique goes to C. Roland Christensen, William D, Edmund P, Learned, and Kenneth Andrews.

Despite being of 1960’s origin, this technique stood the test of time and had proved worthy to be used as the analytical framework of almost all of the most popular brands of today. O.K. That’s enough of the formal introduction to our efforts savior (THE technique).

Now, let’s dissect this thing into simpler steps to be easily understood even by those who are new here.

How to do SWOT Analysis?

How to do a SWOT analysis by yourself? This is a question that is probably asked by people, especially business students. Here the first step is to identify the objective or end-state result. All the participants of the process should approve the objective.

Also, the first step should be performed with great care because all the resultant activities are based on the identified objective and if the elected objective is incorrect, then it would seriously affect the organization in the shape of wastage of resources.

When the objectives are selected then the discovery & listing of SWOT”s is made precisely as follows.

1. Strengths are those features of the organization that support the accomplishment of the objective.
2. Weaknesses are those features of the organization that limit the accomplishment of the objective.
3. Opportunities are the features of the external environment of the organization that support the accomplishment of the objective.
4. Threats are the features of the external environment of the organization that limit the accomplishment of the objective.

Also, the SWOT”s should be effectively pointed out so that the resultant steps are properly performed.

Elements of SWOT Analysis

This technique takes a four-sided approach while focusing on just one thing – the goal. On the surface, this technique deals with four basic factors about an organization, but their effects are deeply rooted and related to the gains and losses.

Internal Factors

1. Strengths

The strong points of the business strategy of any business are directly linked to the resources and experience level available to it. The greater the number and power of resources, the greater the chances to do some business (and yeah, to earn a lot of bucks too)! Resources include financial resources (sources of income), physical resources (importance of location, natural factors), and human resources (employees).

2. Weaknesses

Weaknesses are those negative factors that will hinder the progress being made by your organization. Just like strengths, these are also internal factors and are under your control. Be careful! Once your competitors know your weaknesses, then there is a huge possibility that they will try to use your weaknesses as their strengths.

The following elements are included in the category of strengths & weaknesses.

• Intellectual, financial, and location resources
• Customer Services
• Competitive Advantages
• Efficiency
• Price
• Management
• Infrastructure
• Quality
• Staff
• Transportation & delivery time
• Hours of operations & distribution channels
• Product line & multiple services, diversified fields
• Sales promotion techniques & after-sale services etc.

External Factors

1. Opportunities

These are the events and situations that your organization can take advantage of like the trends, economic factors, etc. These are the positive externalities and are out of your control.

Therefore, once an opportunity shows itself up, then don’t turn your back on it.

2. Threats

Another external factor, a negative one, which if not handled correctly is capable of making your business bite the dust, is the threat to your business and marketing strategy. Threats can cause total failure of your planning and therefore, are extremely necessary to be avoided or at least be minimized by some procedures.

Following elements can be regarded as opportunities & threats to the organization.

• Actions of competitors
• Interest rates
• Increasing market saturation
• Economic conditions
• Changes in laws & regulations

When to Use SWOT Analysis?

SWOT provides a potential strategic point to an organization and acts as a precursor to the goals. It becomes part of planning, just right from the start, and moves on the side by side with logic, and ends with the execution of the plan.

You might have a business, and it might be up and running, but without any precursor to any company actions, it will not stand long enough. It comes into play when either you are planning your business, just, right from the start, or setting new initiatives, making decisions, creating new policies, and any other perspective that can lead your business.

Steps to do SWOT Analysis

1. Performing a thorough Elemental Analysis

The first and foremost step to a comprehensive analysis is the identification of different factors affecting your business and listing them down on either a piece of paper or you can devote a full whiteboard for this purpose. Once listed, it’s time to classify those factors as strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

2. Creation of a Matrix

After a thorough analysis, create a SWOT matrix by dividing a piece of paper or a whiteboard into four quadrants and label the quadrants as strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. After labeling, list down those classified factors to their respective elements. This matrix will help you in the creation of final strategies.

3. Creation of Final Strategy

In the last step, use the matrix created above to shape up your final strategy based on mutual relationships of the listed factors like the focusing strengths by taking advantage of opportunities or planning to avoid the potential weaknesses caused by a specific threat.

Such strategies are named S-O and W-O strategies respectively. There are also S-T and W-O strategies in which you plan to increase the strengths while avoiding certain threats or diminishing the weaknesses with the help of opportunities.

In the end, list your policies and focus on the method of implementation of these strategies.

SWOT Analysis Example

Although, you don’t need to be a professional market expert to put up a SWOT analysis for your brand, a small push in the right direction can surely make huge differences. Well! There are many resources SWOT Analysis Tools on the web to help you get that push, but using your time in following lengthy and complicated tutorials may not be worth it when just a simple SWOT analysis example can do.

As an example, we are going to provide a general example of a SWOT done for a brand for predicting how that new product is going to perform in the market. Since SWOT also depends on the event type, so it is not necessary to put those long intros to the brand which do not affect the product’s performance.

A closer look at SWOT Analysis Example

First of all, the SWOT pulls apart the positive sides of your brand and the negatives one. The positive sides are either the strengths of your brand and the opportunities that the brand can take advantage of while the negativities involve the weakness and threats, which suffers the brand a lot.

Creation of a SWOT matrix takes place, and all of the factors get listed down on the matrix as:

Internally Affecting Factors

The brand observes and lists down the following strengths and weaknesses as internally affecting factors.

Strengths

1. Physically, the company exists in high-traffic areas.
2. Existing products of the company have strong relations with customers which leads to trust between the two.
3. Active internal linking has enormously increased the combined outcome of the efforts of the workers.
4. The past marketing strategies of the brand have generated incredible results each time, and the brand name always played an influential role in the purpose.

Weaknesses

1. The brand already has too much workload and is having a tough time meeting deadlines.
2. The research data of the market is entirely outdated and does not affect the present.
3. The company is facing high rental costs causing huge cash flow problems.
4. Furthermore, the record-keeping system of the company is weak.

Externally Affecting Factors

Moreover, the following opportunities and threats are supposed to affect the product’s performance externally, according to the company’s SWOT analysis example.

Opportunities

1. The customers are loyal to our product and cause.
2. A special event is nearby that can give a huge boost to our product thus leading to an enormous number of sales if promoted through proper strategy.
3. Even though a lot of similar products are available in the market but none of them can cover customers’ needs or is expensive, and there are a lot of demand requests, by the customers, for the new product.

Threats

1. The greatest threat the brand faces is the existence of other similar products by competitors. Although, not comparable to our brand but still, they are there and therefore, can cause a trickle to our profits.
2. One of our competitors is going to launch a new shop near ours or has launched a new marketing campaign that can cause our customers to become theirs’.
3. There has been a downturn in the economy for a while that has caused customers to spend less.

So, What does Company Decide?

For the above SWOT analysis example, what would you have decided if you were that company’s CEO? Well! It depends on what your mind thinks is perfect for your interests.

According to our mindset, the company should cover up its weaknesses first. Since even the trust is there between the customer and the brand, weak record keeping will not let this up for longer periods.

Because even a small leakage in the information will fire up the conditions of distrust. Furthermore, even if the demand is there, without proper market research; there will be no way for the company to find what, exactly, the customers need.

Final Words for the SWOT Analysis Example

The ideas of assessing the factors are not limited to the above SWOT analysis example. Since each business has its strengths or weakness, furthermore, the external conditions that every business faces also vary significantly, so the decisions about letting the new product step into the market also differ. At last, review your analysis and let your brand rock.

Questions to ask during SWOT Analysis

According to Mitchell Weiss, “Companies can’t hope to take advantage of or control the external factors until the internals have been objectively assessed”. Although this saying of Mitchel Weiss does an excellent job of demystifying the primary objective of SWOT analysis, how to achieve this aim depends greatly on the questions that you focus on during your analysis and planning.

The more honest and tougher the questions, the more reliable your analysis becomes in making your strategy successful. Therefore, to help readers, we have compiled a list of questions asked during the whole procedure:

1. What are our assets, and which one of them is strongest to our cause?
2. Are our machinery and workers’ skill sets up to date?
3. Do we have something unique to offer to our customers?
4. What gives us an advantage as compared to our competitors?
5. What are the weak points in our strategy?
6. Which weak points are proving advantageous towards our competitors?
7. Are we focusing enough on the improvement of these weaknesses?
8. What opportunities do the external changes offer us?
9. Are we capable of taking full advantage of these opportunities?
10. Do these opportunities come in the form of a change of trends or a weak competitor failing to satisfy its customer base? And if these changes periodic in nature?
11. Is our brand name helping us in broadening our customer base?
12. What are the threats to our client base?
13. Will political instability, natural disaster, or change in governmental policies affect our production?
14. Which competitors can give us a tough time in the near or far future?
15. Are our workers satisfied with their workload and financial balance?
16. Are our prices too high for our customers?
17. Are we missing something on which we should focus?

Alternative Viewpoints:

In alternative viewpoints, the management of the organization considers that the SWOT categorized the key information into two main groups which are as follows.

Internal factors: The strengths & weaknesses are included in the internal factors category.

External Factors: The opportunities & threats are included in the category of external factors.

The internal factors that mainly consist of strengths & weaknesses include all the 4Ps, finance & personal, etc.  While other external environmental forces that can become an opportunity for one organization and at the same time threat for another organization include legislation, sociocultural changes, technological changes & changes in the competition, etc.

The basic issues that are significant to the future of the organization are isolated as the aim of the SWOT analysis so that the resultant marketing plan would be made.

Assumptions:

It is important to highlight certain assumptions of the SWOT, but most organizations do not consider the importance of pointing out the assumptions. For example, IBM highlighted certain assumptions during its SWOT analysis in the shape of a marketing document called “Forecast Assumptions”.

The assumptions were agreed upon by all the participants of the process and they were helpful in the comprehension of the marketing plan. But the management of the organization should select less number of assumptions that seem effective.

The importance of assumptions can also be understood in a way that while forecasting the expected results of the activities of the SWOT analysis, a certain range of alternative assumptions is also made that are relevant to certain needs.

For this purpose, sensitive analysis can also be made that point out those factors that can potentially influence the results of the outcomes. This would be helpful in the management of these potential factors.

Mistakes that Need to be Avoided

Certain errors are quite harmful to the organization and these are mostly observed in the SWOT analysis. These errors are as follows.

1. Starting of SWOT analysis process before identification & agreement on the objective. The objective is essential for the success of the SWOT matrix, because the SWOT”s may not sustain without an objective. Moreover, if the objective is not fully agreed upon by all the participants then each one has its different objective in mind which would ultimately affect the outcomes of the process.
2. The strengths & opportunities are similar in most cases, but the management should differentiate both.
3. In certain situations, the possible strategies are confused with the SWOT matrix. This error occurs based on the opportunities. So to avoid this error, the opportunities should be considered auspicious conditions. Moreover, the SWOT is related to the description of conditions while actions are defined by possible strategies.