MKTG 2003 - Marketing for Financial Services - Blog Post 2

                                                       SWOT Analysis

The most interesting concept I found in Unit 2 of this course is one of the most fundamental concepts in marketing/management, it is the SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. Strengths are positive internal characteristics of a company whereas Weaknesses are negative internal ones. Opportunities are positive and external whereas Threats are negative and external. Each entity be it an individual or a firm has all 4 of these characteristics. The goal of every entity is to maximise and use their strengths to the best of their ability and reduce the impact of their weaknesses while exploiting opportunities and avoiding/tackling threats. The beauty of the concept lies in its simplicity and its easy applicability to everyday life. For example my strength lies in test taking whereas my weakness lies more in writing assignments. Using SWOT I try to ace all my tests (my strength) and practice improving my assignment writing skills (my weakness). The assessment of the course is decided by the lecturer and hence is out of my control. Therefore the structure of the assessment is external. An example of an opportunity to me would be if the assessment became more 'test based' and thus more suited to my strengths and an example of a threat would be if it became more 'assignment based'. Almost all businesses around the world use the SWOT analysis to analyse their business and improve their ability to compete in the marketplace and thus this is a very important concept in marketing.