In every marketing strategy plan, the first step in determining your current position in the market is through a full SWOT analysis. This helps you identify and improve your Strengths and Weaknesses while focusing on external Opportunities and Threats that can positively or negatively affect your business.

1. Strengths

In a SWOT analysis, Strengths are considered part of the internal factors favorable to your marketing strategy plan. Basically, it covers areas related to your competencies, assets, revenue generation and other intangibles such as customer service and positive public image and reputation, good relationship between managers and employees and camaraderie in the workplace. When you define your strengths, you need to reflect where you are today and have a clear plan for how you can maintain and nurture them so that these factors are always the driving force in your business.

2. Weaknesses

Weaknesses can stem from both internal and external factors. Typically, these are the areas of your operation that can have a negative impact on your marketing strategy plan. The purpose of creating a list of your weaknesses is so that you can adjust your strategies to include improvements in these areas. Among the common weaknesses of companies are the loss of money in their operation, the lack of experience, skills and/or resources, among others. Weaknesses can also explain a bad reputation, a significant decrease in trust levels among consumers, or simply due to the absence of any strength.

3.Opportunities

Opportunities are basically external factors that offer potential benefits for your business. When creating a marketing strategy plan, having a good understanding of the opportunities is highly beneficial. This allows you to take advantage of various factors that can have positive effects on your projects, such as the current economic situation, cultural climate, market volume, economic demand, etc. When you know your opportunities, you can also see the real needs of your target market that are not being met. In essence, these opportunities are actually your future strengths and should be prioritized.

4.Threats

Although threats are usually seen as an external condition that can hinder your marketing strategy plans, they can also be seen internally. Threats can be unstable economic conditions, cultural differences, hostile social conditions, significant changes in political stability, new industry regulations and legislation, and the current position of your competitor. Internally, threats are often found in the workplace, such as unstable manager-employee relationship and other related conditions. Unlike Opportunities, Threats are essentially your company’s future weaknesses and must be addressed as soon as possible.

With the help of a SWOT analysis, you can analyze your business internally in comparison to its various resources, financial situation, support, etc. When you look at various external factors, you can look at various areas of the economy, political stability, industry regulations, demographics, social, skills, and technology that can have a direct impact on your business.