The best way for a company to evaluate its key resources, competitive capabilities/liabilities, resource weaknesses, opportunities and threats is to perform a SWOT analysis. This focuses on the internal Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats of the company and is used as a decision making tool by top level managers and can be used for pre-crisis planning.
Google’s Strength’s: * Google has had global dominance of the search industry since its introduction to the market in 1998 and still remains the leader of the industry to this day. * The company is the leader in the search advertising market with its innovative and un-paralleled approach to pricing (cost-per-click basis or cost-per-impression basis) and methods for relevant targeted advertisements to specific customers. * The successful Android operating system for mobile phones which rivals Apple’s iPhone abilities. * Good revenue being created from advertising and from banner and video ads displayed on mobile phones as well as licensing fees from companies using Google’s search appliances. * The launch of Google TV will attract many more customers and further diversify the Google brand. * The strong and ambitious leadership shown by the top management to fulfil their strategy goals of “organising the world’s information and making it universally accessible and useful”. * Google has a well know brand image and work culture that people recognise as being very user friendly as their ethos is “You can make money without doing evil”. Part of their success is down to their ability to maintain strong relationships with internet users, advertisers and websites. * Google’s vision and ability to acquire other companies that will add to their wide range of services.