To SWOT or Not: The Choice is Pretty Obvious
I try my best to live life following a simple rule: don’t settle for complacency. The moment that I feel comfortable with my skill level, education, and abilities is the moment that I start to fall behind my peers. Plus, there’s always areas in which I can constantly improve upon and skills that I can acquire. I would be doing myself and my employers a disservice if I stop trying to consistently become the best version of myself possible. This external and internal inventory should not only be seen as a personal necessity, but also a business necessity. In order to best capitalize on an audience, especially in an ever-growing digital market, social media managers should strive to perform a SWOT analysis if they want to maximize their brand’s chances of success of distinguishing themselves from competitors.
In its simplest form, a SWOT analysis provides an organization with a clear, easy-to-follow map of the internal and external factors that have the potential to help or harm a campaign. They uncover what a brand does best (strengths) and areas in which they could improve upon (weaknesses). Additionally, they reveal potential opportunities and identify any potential threats to succeeding. This is where the primary benefit of a SWOT analysis lies. This simple yet powerful technique presents a large amount of useful information for social media managers to consider when crafting their strategies and campaigns. In a similar vein, a SWOT analysis addresses questions regarding both internal AND external factors. Personally, I believe that the singular notion regarding staying ahead of the competition can put up blinders to potential internal weak spots. This analysis is important because it removes these blinders to expose and address weaknesses before creating a digital strategy. Essentially, a SWOT analysis prevents social media managers from “speaking first and asking questions later.” Asking the important questions upfront about what you want to accomplish and who you want to target provides valuable information and can help avoid conflicts down the road.
In addition to the generalized benefits that a SWOT analysis provides to social media managers and their brands, it allows for the honing in of a brand’s particular target audience: their demographics, user habits, and engagement with content. If you are going to go after a particular group over social media, it is crucial to consider these elements when drafting a social media strategy.
For instance, if your target audience is people ages 50 and up, it wouldn’t be smart to center your strategy around Instagram since only 16% of that demographic are active. Since 55% of them use Facebook, it would be of a better interest to place more focus there. A successful audience analysis identifies the social media platform the target audience is on, revealing to social media managers where to place their focus. It is not uncommon to see brands create “buyer personas” that seek to encapsulate the thoughts and actions of the individuals they want to target. By doing so, it becomes much easier to create a digital strategy that best accommodates these traits and, as a result, leads to more conversations and a greater percentage of conversions: the end goal of a successful social media strategy. Optimizing the consumer experience is essential. Knowing your audience inside and out can make this a reality.
While the first two elements of the SWOT analysis provide meaningful information regarding internal strengths and weaknesses of a brand, I find the latter two elements of identifying opportunities and threats to be equally as important if not more. Ultimately, these should not be understated or overlooked because one of the main responsibilities of a social media manager is to win consumers over to their brand and not the competition. This is why identifying any potential gaps that can negatively affect business should be seen as a good thing and not demoralizing. A solid competitive analysis answers many questions, identifies direct and indirect competitors, and provides a basis as to WHY they are competitors. Additionally, discovering these threats during the strategizing process allows managers to preemptively address them and prepare for any negative repercussions that surface. On the more positive side of the coin, revealing opportunities that could give a competitive advantage provides many exciting possibilities from which to move forward towards. Essentially, addressing these external factors provide direction, correction, and focus for social media managers when creating and implementing social media strategies.
Overall, it should be a no-brainer that social media managers undergo this revelatory process. Knowing your personal identity as a brand is equally as important as knowing how you stack up to the competition. My advice to any social media managers reading this would simply be this: don’t skimp out. Research has shown that 70% of digital transformation initiatives fail due to a lack of preparation, consideration, and collaboration. Put in the work upfront and save yourself time and effort down the road. An effective SWOT analysis is so worth the time and resources put into it.
