• strengths
• weaknesses
• opportunities
• threats

for one or more firms in a given industry.
Purpose
The goals of a SWOT analysis are:

1. identify strategies that fit a firm’s resources, capabilities (or competencies) to its external environment;
2. generate alternatives that apply a company’s strengths to exploit opportunities and counter threats; and
3. offer strategies to correct company weaknesses

General Advice
Based on problems students had doing SWOT analysis (and the lack of help from most textbooks), here is some advice on how to do a SWOT analysis for this class.
Remembering the Differences
To keep clear how to apply a SWOT, remember this matrix
 
+
–
 
Internal
Strength
Weakness
 
External
Opportunity
Threat
Guidelines

• A strength could be a capability, a resource or a competence. Not every firm can have the same strength, although more than one firm can share a strength if other firms do not.
• A weakness is often relative to a competitor’s strength — i.e. a strength of one firm is another firm’s weakness. Or if a strength (or weakness) is the norm for the industry, then you would only mention the exception.
• Some opportunities and threats will apply to all firms in an industry; others may apply only to some firms.
• List as many items for each of S.W.O.T. as possible.

Strength vs. Success; Weakness vs. Failure
If a strength is an attribute of a firm (e.g. its distinctive competence), this is not the same as success, which is a result or outcome. A strength can help explain a success, and often a success gives you a clue as to a strength. Similarly a failure is not a weakness, but may have been caused by a weakness.
Sometimes success leads to a strength, but you need to explain why. A firm that has high market share may have high brand name recognition, excellent distribution, or enjoy economies of scale when compared to its smaller rivals. Remember something is a resource, capability or a distinctive competency only if it leads to some form of competitive advantage.
Past, Present and Future
SWOT analysis is never about the past, but always about the present or future. A battle that’s been fought and lost may have previously been a threat, but if there’s nothing left to lose (e.g. you’ve cancelled the product line) it isn’t a threat anymore. Similar, a past failure might reflect a weakness — a weakness that the firm had — but you need to explain what is today’s weakness (or strength, opportunity or threat) and how it affects the firm going forward.
You will be responsible for selecting a company, product, and/or service. In order to do this analysis properly, you must also look at the competitors. Upon doing enough marketing research, you should be able to calculate out the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Remembering that strengths differ from opportunities based on internally be able to control them or not, and the same hold true for weaknesses and threats. Once you have been able to identify these variables in depth, the student will be responsible for converting the weaknesses to strengths and the threats to opportunities. You will illustrate how by matching the strengths to opportunities, you come up with a competitive advantage. It is through this type of strategy that the student will identify how marketing is the driving force of all business. On the average, the SWOT Analysis is between 5-7 pages, typed written, double spaced, 12 pt. font.