Yahoo is one of the leading brands in the media, and entertainment sector. It is a trusted online brand and positioned as a democratic and unbiased search engine. Although Yahoo has been left far behind by Google and Facebook, at one time it was in assertion for internet dominance.

In this case study, we will be learning about the SWOT Analysis of Yahoo.

Before diving into the main segment, let’s get started with the brief introduction of Yahoo.

About Yahoo

Yahoo was founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994 which is said to be the first web search engine that helped users discover everything on the Internet. It is an American-based multinational technology company headquartered in California. 

The web search engine provides digital content products, news, media, sports, and also advertisements entertaining its users worldwide. Despite strong competition from Google, the company still attracts more than half a billion consumers every month in more than 30 languages. It stands in the third position in terms of market share in the U.S. behind Google. 

As of October 2005, Yahoo modified into serving approximately 3.4 billion internet web page views globally. However, according to Alexa Internet and SimilarWeb, Yahoo domain websites are still among the most popular websites, ranking 12th in worldwide engagement.

Now that we have a clear-cut idea of what Yahoo is. So let’s go through the SWOT analysis of the company. 

 

SWOT Analysis of Yahoo

The strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of an organization are investigated in a SWOT analysis. While there are several techniques to evaluate a company, one of the most common is to perform a SWOT analysis. 

Yahoo analyzes the processes to ensure that the search engine is operating as efficiently as possible to run a successful business.  It helps to discover advantages and strategies, with a focus on leveraging strengths and opportunities to overcome the weaknesses and dangers of an organization. 

So let’s start focusing on the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of Yahoo in the coming section individually. 

 

1. Strengths of Yahoo

Strengths deals with the characteristics of a business that give it an advantage over its competitors. Strengths trace what a corporation excels at and what separates it from the competition sort of a strong brand, loyal customer base, a robust record, unique technology, and so on.  Some of the strengths of Yahoo are as follows.

• Yahoo has a large user base, and the majority of its revenue comes from advertisements in its email.
• Due to its large mail subscriber base, the brand is considered to be a powerful marketing company.
• Its product portfolios include Yahoo Messenger, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo Personals, Yahoo 360, Delicious, Yahoo Buzz, Yahoo Mobile, Yahoo Shopping, Yahoo Real Estate, Yahoo Next, Yahoo Boss, etc.
• Customers and users have access to a fast and highly relevant search that is completely free. Yahoo employs more than 8000 people around the world.

Yahoo being a successful web search engine, managed to keep its business in the competitive era. But it also has some weaknesses that are likely to be a negative aspect of the brand. Let’s find what are the weaknesses of Yahoo in the next section. 

 

2. Weaknesses of Yahoo

Weaknesses are the major hurdles in an organization from performing at its optimum level. There are some specific areas where the company needs to improve to remain competitive.

Let’s peek into the weaknesses of Yahoo below. 

• According to a survey taken in Jan 2012, data shows that Yahoo’s market share in search engines is only 6%. Google has 83% market share and therefore the other competitors are Baidu which has an equivalent 6% and Bing has 4% in search engines. 
• Though Yahoo entered the market with high potential and proved itself for a long time by offering different services, this doesn’t make any important innovation for a long time.
• People are demanding new technology and services, and Google is meeting those wants with ongoing innovation, but Yahoo is falling behind.  
• The company’s financial situation does not bode well for investors. The value of the company’s assets, both intangible and tangible, is decreasing.
• Google is the leading service provider on the internet, is grabbing the revenues from advertisements
• Yahoo offers a lot of new services but those are unknown in the internet space

These are the frenzy weaknesses that Yahoo possesses. The company needs to work on it to enrich its efficiency among its competitors. So now, let’s learn about the Opportunities of Yahoo below. 

 

3. Opportunities of Yahoo

External elements that provide a good competitive edge to a company are referred to as opportunities. Below mentioned are the opportunities seized by Yahoo. 

• Yahoo Directory is the most structured and substantiated business directory, each customized development for the consumer will result in a new revenue stream for the organization.
• The number of mobile users is increasing in developing nations. The development of Yahoo! Mobile app services will improve the market share. Introducing mobile applications is one of the smart techniques of Yahoo to retain its position. 
• Advertising on social media and the internet has become a necessary component of any product’s marketing strategy. Yahoo also can improve its reputation through these promotional strategies. 
• Yahoo has a big future when it comes to merging its services with social media sites like Flickr and others.
• It can concentrate on diversification of business segments related to the Internet space

With this, the section of opportunities comes to an end. Now, let’s finish this case study with the last segment of  SWOT Analysis – Threats of Yahoo below. 

 

4. Threats of Yahoo

Threats refer to factors that can harm an organization. Other common threats include things like rising costs for materials, increasing competition, brand image, and many more. 

Some of the threats are discussed below.  

• The biggest threat for any global service provider on the internet is the increase in competition in the local market, especially in China. 
• Yahoo is at risk of involving in legal complications due to the breach of privacy. 
• Google’s presence in the search engine services has defeated the service provided by Yahoo. 
• The number of competitors is increasing because of the innovations in the internet space established by young entrepreneurs. 
• The advertising market which was once influential by Yahoo is being gradually grabbed by the social networking sites like Facebook, Myspace, and so on. 

With this, the case study of Yahoo’s SWOT Analysis ends. Let’s wrap it up shortly.

 

Conclusion

 

Since its origin, Yahoo has been one of the best internet companies. Even after Google’s rise, Yahoo has kept its position intact and updating its users with quality news daily. Because of the dedication and hard work of Yahoo’s crew, it will be one of the most popular Web Portals in the world.  

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