Swatch Group – High Brand Awareness as a Market Leader
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S.W.O.T. Analysis
Strengths
High brand awareness as a market leader
In the Swiss watch exports, the Swatch Group has biggest market share of 25% compared to other opponents, including Rolex and Richemont Group of 21% and 20% respectively.
Various products for different segments
The Swatch group has strong reputation and owns 19 world famous watch brands, such as Omega, Rado, Tissot, Swatch, Longines, Tiffany & Co., ck watch & Jewelry, Certina, Blancpain, Jaquete Droz, Leon Hatot, Union Glashutte, balmain, Mido, Hamilton, Flik Flak, Endura, and Brequet. Among all these brands, each brand targets different customer segments from Basic to Prestige and Luxury. For example, Brequet is the one of the worlds top luxury watch brands and Swatch is focusing on the youth segment.
High quality products from experiences of developing technology and innovation
In 1990s, The Swatch Group acquired Blancpain and Breguet which both have experienced manufacturing division providing movements for Omega. The Swatch Groups two units, Nivarox and ETA, provided all of the groups brands with high quality watch parts. Therefore, Omega has technological superiority of products over Rolex because the Omega watches can last up to 100 years with the almost zero-friction Co-Axial movement. Moreover, there are more and more customers requiring not only accurate watches but also practical and unique ones. As a result, the launching of Co-Axial movement technology made Omega a mechanical watch successfully.
Emotional communication
The Swatch Group believed that the Omega watch is not just a commodity but more than that. They positioned their products from functional to emotional items by conveying emotional brand messages through mass communication, such as events and famous spokespersons. As the official time keeper for global sporting events like Olympics and Golf tournaments, Omega successfully built its brand image and value proposition. Moreover, Omega often used international celebrities as brand ambassadors, such as George Clooney and Cindy Crawford, to attract customers attention and escalate their perception.
Clear group organizational structure and well-trained sales staff
The Swatch Group is a multinational company that has 26,200 employees across 50 countries with 250 boutiques locations across the world. Every local distribution subsidiary is led by a country manager and the main brands were represented by a brand manager. In this way The Swatch Group can adapt to different cultures of countries and make adequate marketing actions. Additionally, in mono-brand boutiques The Swatch Group has qualified sales staff able to educate customers. The more customers know, the more they want.
Weaknesses
Lake variety marketing plan
The brand such as Omega is highly dependent on its brand spokespersons for its marketing and advertising campaigns. They spend less on advertising than their major competitor Rolex. As a result, Rolex has higher popularity than Omega.
Limited market share growth due to competition