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Imagine you have a streaming company called Streamare. Now you need to develop some new business strategies so that Streamare can have a higher market share.

Two people are discussing business in an office.

How will you make your business plan innovative and creative?

Get to Know the Landscape

Before you start your work, you have to know the landscape of the business you are in. But how? Two people in a meeting. One asks, 'How, what, why, when?'

One model you'll find helpful in this respect is the SWOT analysis.

"SWOT" stands for:

  • Strengths

  • Weaknesses

  • Opportunities

  • Threats

SWOT is a handy decision-making tool. By analyzing internal strengths and weaknesses, you gain a deeper understanding of your business. By studying external opportunities and threats, you gain insight into the broader business environment.

Conducting SWOT Analysis

When you draft a SWOT analysis, draw a table that is split into four columns.

In these columns, list essential factors and elements to compare them. Notice that for internal factors like strengths and weaknesses, write elements you can control, while for external factors like opportunities and threats, write things that you can't control.

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This SWOT analysis for Streamare gives you an idea of how to do it!

A SWOT analysis of Streamare noting strengths, opportunities, weaknesses, and threats (audio description below).

Click the play button on the audio player below to listen to an audio description of the SWOT chart above.

Did you know?

Apart from being regularly used in the business world since the 1960s, SWOT analysis can also be used to assess a person's strengths and weaknesses so that they can get a roadmap for personal growth!

Generating Innovative Ideas

Now, it's time to generate new ideas for the directions you've chosen for your business based on the SWOT analysis.

Team meeting in a conference room. A woman has sticky notes on a whiteboard and is pointing to one of them.Photo by Jason Goodman on Unsplash

If you have a team, organize brainstorming sessions where your staff can freely express their ideas and exchange thoughts on how to leverage the identified strengths and opportunities and reduce weaknesses and threats.

Check out this Byte on how to facilitate a creative brainstorming session.

Quiz

Streamare has received feedback from customers complaining that prices are too high. During a brainstorming session, Anna suggests that the company can offer more service options at various price levels. This suggestion is to:

Planning Implementation

After the brainstorming session, Mark proposes that it might be a little bit too risky if you all just carry out all these ideas and put Streamare directly into the big market. He suggests that you field test these strategies in specific markets on a smaller scale before they go big to help prevent wasting resources. 

Lisa Kudrow saying, 'Start small, end big!'

You think he is right and you decide to do a field test and gather some feedback. Your team will analyze the feedback carefully, and adapt your strategies accordingly.

Quiz

Which of the following actions can you take as a field test?

Take Action

Being creative and innovative in establishing new business strategies is an important step in business development. It can often be risky and there are a lot of tasks to complete in the process.

A computer keyboard, a pen, and several sticky notes on a desk.Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

To help increase your rate of success:

License:

This Byte has been authored by

ZC

Zheng Cheng

Teacher

MA

English

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