The PEST Analysis

Background

As readers of this blog you know that I have always believed that the most underutilised tool in the business world is the all encompassing, SWOT analysis. It is perfect for any business in any market and provides unfailing insight into both the internal processes and systems of your business as well as the external market forces that prevail outside of your business.  Recently I had a student ask me about what is the best way to assess the current and foreseeable opportunities and threats that are likely to present themselves within the next twelve months?  Enter the  PEST analysis.

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The PEST Analysis

The PEST analysis is a structured framework of macro-environmental (external) factors, which essentially act as a feeder that facilitates a better awareness of the likely opportunities and threats that your market will present your business in the short, medium and long terms based on the current available knowledge and understanding. It is made up of four key groupings.

Political 

Political factors examines how directly and to what extent the Government (National, State or Local) intervenes either in the market your business operates in and/or within the economy. Political factors include monetary and fiscal policy, taxation levels, employment law, environmental legislation and regulation, trade policies and tariff settings.

Economic

Economic factors include various aspects that measure the state and dynamics of the economy such as the inflation rate, foreign currency exchange rates, income tax rates, the level of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the level of budget deficit or surplus.  The robustness or weakness of the key economic indicators have a direct and profound effect on the level of business optimism, levels of risk tolerance and subsequent levels in business expenditure.

Social (and Cultural)

Social factors look at the prevailing attitudes, beliefs and generally sum up the current mind set of the people within different groups that make up the community or market place. These factors include: key demographics such as age distribution and population growth rate as well as attitudinal data such as environmental attitudes, home ownership, career aspirations and immigration. Changing beliefs in these social factors affect the demand for a company's products and future products. Currently for example Australia has a Baby Boomer driven aging population that will increasing require additional levels of pharmaceuticals, medical services, retirement facilities,etc.

Technological

Technological factors as the name suggests involve any refinement or advance that occurs in the processes, automation or broad technology used by that market or industry. As the levels of sophistication and cost for technology rise in any given market, so to do the barriers to entry which protect the businesses currently within that space and deter potential rivals from entering. Broadly speaking technological advances made by any business or group within a market, drive continued research by the other players to match and surpass that business and lead to greater quality, production levels of efficiencies in production supporting a more profitable outcome.

Summary

By utilising the PEST analysis and reviewing your findings on a regular basis you will be able to ensure that you are feeding the best, most relevant and timely information into the SWOT analysis as the basis for robust and reliable long term, strategic and short term, tactical decision making for your business.

Naturally to discuss any of the marketing and social media discussions raised here, please come along to any of the Victorian Chamber of Business Workshops as detailed at:
http://www.victorianchamber.com.au/business-solutions/training/course   
Hope to see you there.

So until next time, good luck and good marketing.
Regards,
Daniele.

Revisiting the Need For SMART Goals

The Very Chic: Chic and Town Hotel in Rome. Customer Service At Its Best

As I continue to travel both locally here in Australia and Overseas for Business it never ceases to amaze each and every time how excellent customer service is a powerful, meaningful and sustainable differentiator between one product or service and another rival product or service.  In fact for any business the most important question needs to remain how can we provide additional value to our target market audience regardless of the market or product offering.

To answer this, it is wise to consider that real value is a function of both price and quality. Now let us take as an example the very competitive market place that is the Roman Hotel market in Italy.

Obviously with Rome being such a  perennially important tourist and business destination the demand for rooms will always be high which puts a lot of pricing pressure on hotel managers and owners to provide fair and reasonable pricing for their rooms. This is understood by most businesses and it does not in itself, differentiate that business from others. However exceptional customer service does exactly that.

When recently traveling in Italy, I had the good fortune to stay with my wife Sharon at the renowned Chic and Town Hotel  (www.ChicTown.it ), in the heart of Rome at: 31 Via Dei Due Macelli, Rome just a stones throw away from the iconic Spanish steps.

It is beautifully appointed, centrally located and fairly priced which presented a genuine level of customer value, matched against its many rivals. But what really puts this business over the top is its exceptional and unfailing level of customer service that aims to exceed customer expectations and provides true, wow factor for all to see. A simple formula but a winning one that makes the Chic and Town and similar businesses in every market the best value for the customers dollar.

So until next time, good luck and good marketing.
Regards,
Daniele.

Facebook Has a Bet Each Way On Its' New Dislike Button

Having Your Cake And Eating It Too

So if you've ever wondered what having your cake and eating it to looked like in the digital space try Facebook's latest effort in introducing a quasi Dislike button.



This week  Facebook allowed its users to show some form of disapproval in content by putting in a button that that allows users called a 'Downvote Button".  

This will give users scope and option to flag and hide comments on given posts but not the posts themselves that are made on public pages. This feature to date has only been available to a small test group of US members. 

Reporting to Facebook

Additionally this new feature also provides options to report a comment as either:
offensive, misleading, or off-topic, which then acts to hide the associated content.

It's no secret that Facebook has resisted the strong desire of the Facebook community to have a genuine Dislike button.  Facebook will  argue to that it has resisted as it's trying to unite everyone, but perhaps  the real reason for this partial retreat is that the first real cracks are starting to appear in the popularity of Facebook to competitors.  Hmm. If that trend continues, who knows we may get an actual dislike button in the not too distant future.

So until next time, good luck and good marketing.

Regards,
Daniele.
 

Recent Data Showing How Much People Like and Dislike Key Social Media Sites

Large Sample

Recent polling data from a Harris Poll with over one hundred and eighty three million Americans and Canadians has provided some keen insights into how popular or unpopular each of the key social media platforms are.

Specifically the sample provides data on both how many users want the respective sites to continue as well as how many would like to see it stop operating. Additionally the poll also provided information on what percentage did not know about each platform.

For example Twitter has 330 million monthly active users, but 46% of the people surveyed would prefer to 'kill it and hope it dies', as the poll puts it. The level of dissatisfaction lessens with other key social media sites with Facebook coming in at 32% who hope the site disappears, whereas Pinterest  had only 26% of respondents who wished for it to cease. 

Perhaps most interesting is the fact that for some of these sites, over 70% of the polled audience did not know who they were.  This is both a real issue for these sites yet concurrently a huge marketing opportunity to raise awareness among users.

So until next time, good luck and good marketing.

Regards,

Daniele.

Review Sites: The Emerging Key To Customer Acceptance

If ever there was a case to be made that customer service was even more important today than at any stage in the past, I suspect it revolves around the fact that Customer Review Sites are continuing to gain an even more powerful place within the social media arena.

 
There are now literally dozens of well established, respected and influential customer review sites that are widely known to the general public and in many cases, to the specific audience they cater to.

The list includes but is not by no means limited to:

• Yelp
• Google Reviews
• Trip Advisor
• CitySearch
• InsiderPages
• YahooLocal
• Urban Spoon
• DealerRater
• JudysBook
• Edmunds
• Zagats.com

These and many more review sites are now the first port of call for many customers looking to gain insight into what the better options are and from this starting point, additional research is done a s a basis for the buying decision and ultimately the purchase.

For businesses the implication is simple. You need to continue to:

1. Maintain the highest standards of customer service and quality delivery
2. Drive positive referrals to customer review sites
3. Include inbound links that drive the top line interest preferentially back to your digital hub such as your corporate website or blog.
   To learn more about any aspect of social or digital media marketing go to the latest Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry courses at:http://www.victorianchamber.com.au/business-solutions/training/course
   
   So until next time, good luck and good marketing.
   Regards,
   Daniele.
   
   

Facebook Messenger Ads Now Available Globally

The new Facebook ads that underwent their initial testing phase through Thailand and Australia, have as of now been expanded to be available globally to add 2 billion plus Facebook users on messenger app.

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The Messenger ads are now displayed in each Facebook user’s inbox, and based on the actual number of threads that user has, the phones actual screen size and the pixel density of the display.


Each messenger ad comes with a ‘sponsored’ label in the home tab of the Messenger app. Their formatted structure is that it appears as a typical news-feed ad, including the headline, copy, image, and calls to action.

This ad is a portal to take the reader to any designated landing page for example on the website of the business where specially designed offers and promotions await the incoming Facebook user.
If you receive a Messenger ad, at this stage there is no way to permanently turn off ads, however there is a downward arrow in the bottom right of the ad that provides options where the user can hide the ad or report sender to Facebook.

These Facebook Messenger ads now offer a greater ability to reach this vast audience globally.
AS always given Facebook’s in-depth user demographic information, all marketers should revisit who their target audience is and in so doing refine the demographics of the group for better targeting.

So until next time, good luck and good marketing.
Regards,
Daniele.