Marketing Draft _1
Company Selection: LinkedIn
Need a 1 page paper Topic: Portfolio Review on LinkedIn
I have uploaded a SAMPLE paper on the company Facebook to help give an idea of what I need
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Running Head: Marketing Plan Draft 1 – Facebook
Table of Contents
Facebook 3
Portfolio Review 3
SWOT Analysis of Facebook 5
Strength 5
Weakness 5
Opportunities 6
Threats 6
Porters Five Forces 6
1. Competitive rivalry 7
2. Threats of new entrants 7
3. Bargaining power of suppliers 8
4. Bargaining power of customers 8
5. Threat of substitute products or services 9
Portfolio Review
Facebook is an online social networking and social media company headquartered in Menlo Park, California. It was founded in the year 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg and his college friends at Harvard. Facebooks motto is to make the world more open and connected. Anyone can sign up with Facebook for free and can connect with friends and family and with virtually anyone in the world. Facebook has over 2 billion monthly active users and is the world’s biggest social network. Facebook makes billions of dollars from digital advertisements and generates its revenue from targeted advertisements, based on user data.
The majority of Facebook’s advertising revenue comes from the self-serve advertising platform. This self-serve platform has a very efficient targeting feature. Using this platform, anyone who wants to reach a particular target audience can do so efficiently. Over the years Facebook has innovated in its targeting capabilities, letting its advertisers reach more relevant people in no time. On top of the self-serve advertising platform, Facebook also generated a good percentage of its income through Engagement Ads. The main purpose of Engagement Ads is to help advertisement efforts for the large brand advertisers. Facebook does this by placing advertisements on the sites home page itself. When users come to the brands home page, they interact with these ads which in turn drive the marketing and sales for these brands. Facebook as a company has been constantly innovating on its products and services. It has done it in two ways, building products and services ground up and by acquiring other companies. Facebook has some famous and high-profile acquisitions like Instagram, Whats App, and Oculus Rift.
We think that Facebook should offer more privacy-focused and secure platform for people to connect and interact. In recent times Facebook has been subjected to several data breaches. In the year 2018 alone, there were into 20 scandals related to privacy and user data leaks. These incidents have brought down the reputation and trust of Facebook among its users. Hence, Facebook should work on strengthening its security and privacy features. We also think Facebook can start offering digital wallet/currency for its users, some form of cryptocurrency that will benefit its users all over the globe to do easy, fast and secure financial transactions.
SWOT Analysis of Facebook
Strength
With the increase in technology in electronic devices like mobile phones and the launch of the Facebook app criterion, there has been a development in the usage of Facebook. Their main aim is to provide more offers in development where the involvement of the user goes high day by day. Facebook attracts advertising agents. This helps Facebook promote products that users need on a daily basis and filter content based on what interests the user. This provides a great experience to the user and a source of revenue for Facebook. The organization also introduced the 360-degree photos which were a popular way of capturing moments with friends and family. Since anyone can sign up on this platform, loved ones can stay in touch even if they are continents away.
Weakness
The increase of revenue in the organization is only from advisements and therefore, it is one of the weakness in the organization. If a major advertiser decides to back out from the platform, it can hurt the revenue of Facebook. The organization needs to make sure that they stay competitive in the market and are aware of any competition. The organizations should sign a contract which would help keep a steady flow of guaranteed income.
Opportunities
The strongest opportunity for Facebook would be targeting the audience of advertisers. The platform provides the user with an understanding of different products. It also provides recommendations to the user based on their needs. This would be a convenient option for advertisers who are launching the products as they can target their audience to maximize product awareness and sales.
Threats
Spammers pose a large threat to Facebook. That is because there might be too much unattractive and repetitive stuff which would make the users of Facebook feel bored. People tend to lose interest quick if they do not see what they want to buy. Since Facebook uses browsing/ search history to target products to their audience, they often get threats from law agencies in regards to customer’s privacy.
Porters Five Forces
The porters five forces developed by Michael Porter is a model to determine the external factors that might prone a threat to the company. The need of this analysis is fundamental as it determines the rivalry a company has in the market. This helps a company maintain their position in the market as they are aware of their competitors and threats. Facebook is one of the largest multinational companies in the world. Facebook has high revenues and popularity among users. This helps Facebook fulfill its mission and vision statements. The five forces that have an impact on Facebook are as follows:
1.
Competitive rivalry
Facebook is one of the top social media platforms in the world. Due to this it has lots of competition in the market. This part of the porters five forces analysis shows how these competitors has an impact in the workplace environment at Facebook. There are very few companies that provide advertising like Facebook. One of the biggest rivalries for Facebook will be YouTube. This is a video streaming platform owned by Google LLC. Since there is a small number of firms competing with Facebook in this field, it is a weak force against Facebook. Although, since there is a very low cost involved with the advertisements and there is no contract binding the companies with the advertising platform, it shows a strong force against Facebook. Due to this, Facebook has to keep a close eye on their rivalry and keep strategic plans in place to make sure that the rivalry does not take away business earned by Facebook by offering lower rates.
2.
Threats of new entrants
The social media platforms have a great number of new entrants which has a negative impact on Facebook. This part of the porters five forces covers the impact of new entrants on the company. Due to the low switching costs for the advertisement platforms, new entries prone a great threat to Facebook. Although, it is harder for the new entries to gain business as it will take lots of effort to be as popular as Facebook. Due to this, loyal advertisers will stick to Facebook regardless of the lower costs they might be offered by the new entrants. This gives Facebook the competitive advantage in the market. In case Facebook sees that the new entrant is providing services that Facebook does not provide, it tends to offer similar services to make sure they stay competitive in the market. This keeps the advertisers happy and loyal to Facebook as they receive all the benefits that are currently available in the market.
3.
Bargaining power of suppliers
Suppliers have a great influence on Facebooks advertising services. Just like any other company, Facebook needs supplies for various services. These supplies include servers, computing equipment, networking equipment and office supplies. The big firms that provide Facebook with these supplies has a moderate force on the company. Although, these supplies are available from many manufacturers in the market. Based on porters five forces, the suppliers have a small impact on Facebook. That is because, there are multiple vendors out in the market who are readily available to provide services to Facebook. This gives Facebook the competitive advantage. Facebook can improve supplier relationships if management comes up with strategies for the supply chain.
4.
Bargaining power of customers
There is great pressure by the customers in regard to what they want from Facebook. This impact on a company in the online advertising industry is shown by the porters five forces. In this field, customers have a wide variety of options for their advertising need. This includes the use of commonly used advertising platforms like Television, Radio, Billboards, and the printing press. Despite the great popularity of social media, all the other platforms have a great impact on Facebooks revenue. That is because the primary source of revenue for Facebook is advertisements. This is considered as a strong threat to Facebook as it has to keep its customers convinced that they will benefit more by advertising using Facebook. Since there is a growing demand of advertisements on social media, Facebook has a competitive advantage which weakens the bargaining power of the buyers. Although, it is vital for Facebook to keep its customers satisfied to keep this competitive advantage.
5.
Threat of substitute products or services
Competitors can have a great impact on Facebook as it does not take much to catch the attention of consumers and direct them to something that is trending more. This impact is considered as one of the porters five forces. It is easy for advertisers to use different platforms for their advertising needs such as radio, television, and printing press instead of paying Facebook for their advertising services. According to the porters five forces, this exerts a strong force on Facebook. Due to the high availability of these advertising services, it is important for Facebook to keep a close eye on its competitors. Facebook has a competitive advantage amongst other platforms as it is much cheaper to use Facebook for advertising services. This cost effectiveness has a moderate force on the company. This threat of substitution of products or services is a major threat to Facebook.
References
Burt, A. (2019, April 08). Can Facebook Ever Be Fixed? Retrieved July 20, 2019, from https://hbr.org/2019/04/can-facebook-ever-be-fixed
Frue, K (2019); SWOT Analysis of Facebook: How has it Survived for so long? Retrieved from https://pestleanalysis.com/swot-analysis-of-facebook/
Reiff, N. (2019, June 25). Top Companies Owned By Facebook. Retrieved July 19, 2019, from https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/051815/top-11-companies-owned-facebook.asp
Team, T. (2014, November 28). Facebook Through The Lens Of Porter’s Five Forces. Retrieved July 21, 2019, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2014/11/28/facebook-through-the-lens-of-porters-five-forces/#209d26cf7dd3
Young, J. (2018, June 13). Facebook Inc. Five Forces Analysis (Porter’s Model) & Recommendations. Retrieved July 22, 2019, from http://panmore.com/facebook-inc-five-forces-analysis-recommendations-porters-model
