Question:
Identify and assess the extent of such Macro Factors that determine the Business Growth, challenges faced by Woolworth.
The retail sector in Australia is one of the larger contributor to its overall service sector with capturing an annual growth rate of 3%. With increase in online-based demand over the store-based market operation the retail market is booming and expanding. Popular retail based supermarkets like Wesfarmers, Woolworth, Coles, Aldi owe its existence in Australian domestic retail market (Xu, Gao & Hammond, 2016). In terms of food and liquor, the Woolworth is Australia’s biggest supermarket chain operating in retail market with operation extended through 995 stores all over Australia. Even if the firm has substantial market power yet there are external factors operating outside the firm having equal importance impacts the business condition.
The report aims to identify and assess the extent of such macro factors that determine the business growth, challenges faced by Woolworth while proposing for solutions that can be undertaken.
Social Media Tool Analysis:
Social Media Bookmarking – A widget like application allowing products along with brands and category to be shared on website pages, social sites and email. The option of wish list makes it an ideal tool to share ideas. This tool is not free and monthly charges are applicable (Okazaki & Taylor, 2013). Sharing wrong information misleads users generating spam. Regular maintenance of account with due care is important solution.
Facebook Like Button -The like button in facebook Woolworth page allow consumers to share products detail to own facebook profile. Like box option allows consumers to stream products from ecommerce website of Woolworth just clicking the like page. This is limited to facebook users only hence more sign-ups can add more likes increasing the popularity of the pages sharing information of the firm.
Activity Feed- It is helpful plug-in to track the activity of buyers on the website of the firm. It refers to multiple data and requires strong analytics to decode information from activities.
Business Analysis:
Pinterest Analytics : Helps in promoting better understanding of the content and users through recording data on the interest profile. It allows getting insight of the engagements audiences have with the content of the website. One account can access one site at a time hence multiple account required in order to access multiple websites. Functions only through official site of account holder and unable to track the pins shared on other sites.
Keyhole: This analyzes the trending of brand operated in popular social sites like twitter, facebook and instagram. It provides access to dashboards keeping track of the hash tags, campaign and keyword and promotes impression and frequency of higher activities (“Top 25 Social Media Analytics Tools for Marketers – Keyhole”, 2017). It also allows to get information regarding highest interactions in surrounding accounts.
Online Customer Analysis:
Facebook: The facebook pages of different categories of products in Woolworth deal with sharing of information with large-scale population. The like buttons and comment sections allow people to express opinions.
Twitter: This allows the the firm to track for its popularity along with streaming responses, views and proceedings.
Instagram: Woolworth maintains instagram accounts that makes it more approachable to buyers with mor shared images and brief details.
All of these are subject to account holding hence more-sign ups can make the Wool worth products more accessible.
Competitor Analysis:
Quintly: Most efficient tool to portray the comparison of Woolworth profile with the strategies and operation of its biggest competitors like Wesfarmer and Coles. It measures stats and presents graph on the engagement metrics by other firms so major social media platform. It helps the most in setting goals amid competition.
Rival IQ: Another best tool to monitor the activities and operation rival brands prevalent in various social media platforms. This is more accurate in presenting weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual data regarding how the firms operate (“Top 25 Social Media Analytics Tools for Marketers – Keyhole”, 2017). The record of historical data helps in comparing growth and analyzes the business cycle trend of the firm on long run basis.
Risk Management:
Social media marketing has many disadvantages captured in probable risks that the operating firms are exposed to. Absence of proper dealing in the social site can create outcry socially leading to mismanagement and mess. On business term, the biggest threat is the revelation of information and detailed strategies of the rival and competitors (Arli & Dietrich, 2017). Risk of violating legal and social rights is also common risks that can take place in any social site. Pertaining to no specific policies and procedures and lack of training given to employees also lead to potential operative risk of the firms (Nadaraja & Yazdanifard, 2013). The online activities often require for business coverage and cyber insurances so that the firm can stay protected against unethical claim and blame of the functions, which has not been conducted by it. The mitigation of the risks requires proper management in terms of more alignment to legal terms and social rights while operating online, provision of employee training to make them deliver proper outcome (Sashi, 2012). Application of filter on share information and locking of websites or denied access are best option for risks like hacking, revealed secret information..
Some of the social media based strategies of Woolworth require the firm to implement following tools:
Conclusion:
The increasing trend of online retail over store-based retail enhanced the social media marketing operation of the supermarket firms like Woolworth and its rival firms too. The competition in the industry is the biggest external factor influencing the business operation of Woolworth. Tools based social media analysis allowed to detect the opportunities and challenge the business of the firm face. This rightly helped in shaping the risks and coming up with management strategies that further allow the form to keep moving ahead.
There have been changes in the trajectory of Woolworth business operation due to influence from both internal and external business environment. The major factors are consumer behavior conforming the social and psychological influences, age of consumers, existence of concentration and rivalry in market. The reason behind Woolworth being largest supermarket chain contributing 80% to the retail industry is the positive image the brand socially, culturally amid wide population. Biggest external factors affecting Woolworth are existence of concentrated market with many rivals. No threats to entry allows ant firm to enter and operate though they often face lower market share in presence of larger market share of the big superstore retailers. Existence of more firms leads to greater bargaining power of the buyers as well as suppliers. Tool based analysis of customer base, business, competition allows the firm to capture the trend of taste, and preferences of buyers and their inclination toward others brand as well. These effects of factors on business help in re-devising strategies for own growth incorporating rival operations and strategies too while mitigating the challenges it is exposed to.
References:
Arli, D., & Dietrich, T. (2017). Can Social Media Campaigns Backfire? Exploring Consumers’ Attitudes and Word-of-Mouth Toward Four Social Media Campaigns and Its Implications on Consumer-Campaign Identification. Journal of Promotion Management, 1-17.
Bordonaba-Juste, V., Lucia-Palacios, L., & Polo-Redondo, Y. (2012). The influence of organizational factors on e-business use: analysis of firm size. Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 30(2), 212-229.
Dwivedi, A., Merrilees, B., Miller, D., & Herington, C. (2012). Brand, value and relationship equities and loyalty-intentions in the Australian supermarket industry. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 19(5), 526-536.
Nadaraja, R., & Yazdanifard, R. (2013). Social media marketing: advantages and disadvantages. Center of Southern New Hempshire University.
Okazaki, S., & Taylor, C. R. (2013). Social media and international advertising: theoretical challenges and future directions. International marketing review, 30(1), 56-71.
Philpott, L. (2014). Marketing and merchandising: Strategies for successful marketing. AJP: The Australian Journal of Pharmacy, 95(1129), 46.
Sashi, C. M. (2012). Customer engagement, buyer-seller relationships, and social media. Management decision, 50(2), 253-272.
Top 25 Social Media Analytics Tools for Marketers – Keyhole. (2017). Keyhole Blog. Retrieved 14 November 2017, from https://keyhole.co/blog/list-of-the-top-25-social-media-analytics-tools
Wirtz, B. W., Daiser, P., & Mermann, M. (2017). Social Media as a Leverage Strategy for Open Government: An Exploratory Study. International Journal of Public Administration, 1-14.
Xu, J., Gao, X., & Hammond, J., (2016). E-tailing in Australia: A preliminary analysis of David Jones.
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