PESTEL, SWOT & Porter's Five Forces Guide

In a SWOT analysis, strengths are the resources and capabilities that provide a company with a competitive edge. These include tangible assets like strong brand names, high quality products or services, and innovative technologies, as well as intangible assets such as a good reputation, loyal customer, customer satisfaction, and unique assets that differentiate the company from its competitors.

Weaknesses are internal factors that may have negative impact on business operation and its competitive position. The weaknesses could be outdated technology, financial issues, poor reputation, legal issues, bad product reviews, etc. To identify weakness, you may want to research on what the company does poorly, what it lacks in comparison to competitors, what the company can improve, etc.

To identify strengths, you may consider the below resources:

• Company/corporate websites. Look for About Us, Investor Relation, or Our Company sections to find out the core value and strategy of this company.
• Social media. Another good source for identifying strengths for a company.
• Library databases. Find company profiles from one of the library databases listed below on this page.
• News articles.

To identify weaknesses, you may consider the below resources:

• Articles from local newspaper, business magazines and trade publications. Look in articles in various sources, from people who are not employed by the company to get an unbiased view of their options.
• Library databases. Read company profiles and look in Competitors section to look for information about how the company compare to others in the industry.
• Company/corporate websites. Look for Investor Relation sections to find out the financial reports or annual reports to examine the financial performance.