SWOT analysis before web application development

---

SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Weakness) analysis is a framework for business analysis that is exponentially gaining popularity in corporate culture. It has been asked many times in interviews but still most of us don’t have a clue about this word. Let’s just focus on how to build best web application with SWOT analysis that can give you an edge over your competitors.

Preconditions before doing SWOT analysis

• One should not do over analysis: avoid complexity, make it sweet and simple to eliminate erroneous information.
• The analyst shouldn’t have a biased opinion and should consider the good as well as bad factors of the business.

STRENGTH

The strength of a business is a service, business model or product that differentiates it from peers, this difference should also be visible through balance sheets so that the analyst know it’s not a biased opinion of the business owner or someone who work there. Business should focus more on this strength and extend the services in that domain with their web application development. Data from this web application will help them to optimize their operations to increase revenue in best possible way.

WEAKNESS

A weakness is what’s causing problem for a business even incurring losses on balance sheet. So business owners beware your weakness is an opportunity for your competitor, you need to check is it worthy to fix that weakness. If yes then how to turn your weakness in to strength.

• If it is a service that is incurring losses for your business then you can include service in your business’s web application and go for digital marketing as well as SEO (search engine optimization) to record profits.
• If it is a problem inferring your business process then you can develop a cloud based web app for business process management to overseer the whole process and eliminate the problems effectively. 

OPPURTUNITY

Your opponent’s weakness is an opportunity for you, it’s all upon your shoulders how you leverage this opportunity and turn it in to a profitable venture for you.

THREAT

There are couple of factors for a business that are external which needs to be accounted for in business operations. For example: Change in rules from regulating authorities, Currency fluctuations and new technological innovations from competitors.

I know all the stuff written over seems pretty confusing and irrelevant so we are going to look over the SWOT analysis that taxi hailing service Uber and its Indian rival OLA might have done to sustain in market.

UBER vs OLA SWOT analysis mapping

Strength for UBER: Being a renowned international name in the industry.

Strength for OLA: Being familiar with Indian demographics and people’s mentality.

Strength for both: UBER uses number of rides as a target for its drivers whereas OLA is using revenue as a target for its drivers.

Strength for both: UBER primarily focuses on cheaper rides whereas OLA focuses on quick service to customers.

Weakness for one opportunity for another: UBER has been blamed for being extremely customer oriented whereas OLA tries to maintain a balance between both parties.

Weakness for one opportunity for another: UBER works like an owner whereas OLA moreover works as a business partner with its drivers.

Strength for OLA weakness for UBER: OLA realized that most of their business partners aren’t highly educated so they opened centres for drivers where their problems are resolved, these centres can also be used by customers for offline booking of a ride.

Threat for both: Accidents and changing rules and regulations imposed by the regulating authorities can ban their operations.

Both companies considered these factors before going for their web application development and became successful, no one needs to explain how a new player OLA stood against the international player UBER and now it is currently valued more than 5 billion dollars.

If you enjoyed this article then here’s a link for another one : Bitcoin vs Blockchain : Investor’s take

I hope it secures a place in your must read list. Thank you