Week One Individual Assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Week One Individual Assignment - Essay Example the threats, the weaknesses the opportunities and the strengths. In diagnosing opportunities and threats, the manager should reflect on Michael Porter’s model for competitive forces in order to diagnose the competitive forces in the particular industry. These forces are very important since they can affect the business profit potential, growth rate or even survival. The business plan should assess these forces. These are the following: competitors, new entrants, customers, suppliers and substitute goods or services. Since the baby clothing store is a start-up business, the new entrants force is not of particular importance for this stage. From the competitors’ side the business owner should check the rivalry among competitors and more specifically should examine the number of firms there are in the particular industry, the rate of the industry growth and the level of fixed costs. The baby clothing store may face the danger of the customers’ bargaining power since the goods it provides are standard and undifferentiated i.e. the customers can find the same or similar ones to other shops and therefore they may force down the prices or buy more goods or services for the same price. A possible solution here would be to offer excellent customer service but this is going to be developed in strategies. The next step in planning is setting goals. The goals should be realistic, challenging but achievable and they can act as a benchmark so the manager can see if s/he meets his/her targets. The goal should be both strategic and financial. Then, the manager should develop and implement strategies. The strategies should be based on extensive market analysis, examination of opportunities and threats and contingency plans if things do not go as expected. From the three strategies i.e. market penetration, market development and product development strategy, it seems that the