Part B Strategic Marketing Plan

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Strategic Marketing Plan for Google

Lamanda Brookins

MKT/574

11/16/2021

Tina Potter

Company Description

In this case, I will choose Google Inc. as my company in which I will describe as instructed in this assignment. Google is a multinational technology company based in the United States that mainly specializes in internet-related services as well as products which also includes cloud computing, software and hardware development, and search engines among other many services. The main mission of Google is to organize the world's information while at the same time making it accessible and useful to its users. On the other hand, the company's vision is to provide access to the world's information in just a click (Beltrán & Gulc, 2021). The company’s main product is Google search which is a web search engine that allows users to search for information on the internet. Other products include YouTube, Gmail, Android, Google Chrome, Google Ads, Google drive just to mention but a few. The company's employee size is around 130,000 whereby 32% of the workforce is women and 68% are men.

Environmental Analysis of Google

The environmental forces affecting the company include waste management. The environment has been a fast-growing consideration when it comes to marketing as companies are expected to take the initiative of going green and conserving the environment.

Competitors

Google’s main competitor is Microsoft’s Bing which is followed by Yahoo and Internet pioneer which provide similar services as it does. In countries like China, Google is business as there is another service provider of the same services provided by the company. The company’s competitive advantage is that it provides fast search and tools that support the general search engine. The competitive advantage also comes from the infrastructure the company has built for many years’ hence continuous innovations, relevance in results, and ease of use form part of the company's competitive advantage.

Economic forces

Some of the economic forces that affect Google include the economic stability of the main markets, the rapid growth of developing countries, and the gradually decreasing cost of renewable energy. The company can expand the distribution of mobile devices and their services to different parts of the world. Its strategy of decreasing the cost of renewable energy programs as a way of enhancing the available opportunities is a good way of strengthening the company’s energy supply.

Political forces

The political factors that affect Google include wider free trade agreements or opportunities, state-sponsored online companies as well as stable political climates in most of the major markets. Therefore, the above factors show that the company focuses on the growth of its online and offline activities that is mainly based on free trade agreements and markets’ political stability.

Legal, Regulatory, and Ethical Issues

Google has come under scrutiny for various ethical issues like for instance in 2015 where it was interrogated for racist photos. This was followed by protests by the company’s employees in 2018 against Pentagon using its technology to analyze drone images as a way of targeting ISIS. Google was also served an antitrust lawsuit that alleged that the company abuses its monopoly to harm its consumers and competitors.

Technological Forces affecting Google

The technological factors that affect Google include the rapid adoption of mobile devices in the global market, the growing use of cloud services worldwide as well as the growing internet access in developing nations.

Social Factors

Social factors affecting Google are increased use of social media, the rising diversity of online users as well as the rising criticism against other online companies’ use of personal data.

Target Markets

Google's main target market is males which form the upper-middle-income earners. Most Google users are business-minded professionals who mainly use the platform to make advertisements and commercials (Kohne, 2019). Other target markets include users who download applications and use them to stream and connect with friends.

Google's current marketing tactics

The company depends on the market penetration tactic as the main strategy of growth especially in countries that are not located in the United States. The main objective is to obtain more consumers from the company's current market. For instance, the firm has an already established leadership position in the US.

SWOT Analysis

The company’s main strength is that it remains the world’s leading company in the search engine industry. The company is vulnerable to the fluctuating demand for its ads. Also, the high dependence on online technologies forms part of the company’s weaknesses (Christodoulou & Cullinane, 2019).

The following threats affect the company’s strategy and profitability. These include mobile computing, relationship with China, pandemic uncertainty, extreme competition, and antitrust controversy. From the SWOT analysis, the marketing objectives of the company include building awareness, influencing consideration, and driving action.

References

Beltrán, H. C., & Gulc, A. (2021). The business culture of corporate giant–a case study of Google company.

Levy, S. (2021). In the plex: How Google thinks, works, and shapes our lives. Simon & Schuster.

Christodoulou, A., & Cullinane, K. (2019). Identifying the main opportunities and challenges from the implementation of a port energy management system: A SWOT/PESTLE analysis. Sustainability, 11(21), 6046.

Kohne, A. (2019). Target Market. In Business Development (pp. 75-84). Springer Vieweg, Wiesbaden.