The Importance of a SWOT Analysis and Knowing Your Target Audience
It is easy to say that 2020 brewed up quite a storm for everyone, including businesses. After 2020, they will most likely think differently about their actions and words, and will want to make the best decisions moving forward. Although there are a variety of ways to do this, one tip that will always be helpful is to do a SWOT analysis. So, what is a SWOT analysis you ask?
SWOT Analysis Definition
According to Communique PR, a SWOT analysis is defined as a tool used by many public relations practitioners and marketers to evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of a business project or campaign. The article explains that a SWOT analysis covers multiple questions, as stated below.
- How can we employ and capitalize off of each strength?
- How can we improve each weakness?
- How can we improve and benefit from each opportunity?
- How can we moderate and avoid each threat?
Additionally, Knock’em Dead with SWOT Analysis explains the true meanings of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The strengths are the characteristics that put businesses at an advantage over others. For example, if you were writing a SWOT for Disney, you could mention that it is large in size and generates quite a bit of income.
The weaknesses are characteristics that place the product at a disadvantage to others. For example, if you were writing a SWOT for a company, a weakness could be that it has poor customer service.
The opportunities are elements that can be leveraged to your advantage. For example, if you are doing a SWOT analysis on a company that has hired new employees, it can be argued that those employees could have a different insight on things, therefore providing new opportunities for the company.
Threats are considered to be the external elements in an environment that could cause trouble for the business. An example that the article mentions of a threat is e-books potentially harming book publishers and retailers.
All of these ideas are incredibly important while doing a SWOT analysis, and can be extremely helpful for a business or brand. But what about a SWOT analysis is so important? Let’s find out!
Why Businesses Need a SWOT Analysis
According to Why Perform a SWOT Analysis?, there are many reasons why performing a SWOT analysis is extremely important. One of the reasons stated is that a SWOT analysis allows for you to use your resources efficiently. After conducting a SWOT analysis, someone may find that strengths have not been used to their full potential. This could eventually benefit the company, and create quite a positive impact moving forward.
Another reason may be that a SWOT analysis helps companies become prepared for any upcoming threats. If companies prepare in advance, then the threats become a lot less harmful later on.
The article also mentions that competitive positioning and strategy are also key factors during a SWOT analysis. If companies do a SWOT analysis, then they are able to see how they look in comparison to their competitors and think about how they can change moving forward.
The last reason that the article mentions is that SWOT analysis can create new business opportunities. For a SWOT analysis, the management team will usually be able to find new opportunities and take advantage of them. Oftentimes the management team will focus on long-term goals, so that they have time to plan in advance.
Now that we’ve discussed why a SWOT analysis is important, let’s talk about what the next steps are after the SWOT analysis.
The Next Steps
According to What is a SWOT Analysis and How to Do It Right (With Examples), the next steps are to use something called leaned planning methodology. The article mentions that the actions generated from your analysis should fit into a portion of your lean plan and can give you a concrete foundation to grow your business. There is a template provided below, which should help you get started!
While the importance of knowing your strengths and weaknesses for your SWOT is very high, there is equal importance in knowing your target audience. Let me help you understand why!
Why You Should Know Your Target Audience
The Importance of Understanding Your Target Audience discusses reasons that knowing your target audience may be beneficial to your business. The article discusses that research is extremely important and can oftentimes help you identify a buyer persona (buyer profiles). This is always helpful because it can help you see if your product or service is at the right price, the location in which people would be most interested in the product, their genders, etc.
Identifying the target audience can make sure that you are not wasting your time on the wrong people. Knowing your audience can help you find the wants and needs for your product, which will result in a positive outcome later on.
Now that the importance of a SWOT analysis and target audiences are identified, hopefully you can plan for your business with a more successful outcome moving forward!
