STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT

Strategic Management of Yahoo Inc.

Strategic management of Yahoo Inc

Introduction

Nowadays, almost every person can have an access to internet due to its wide availability in almost every house, workplace, and even at school around the world. With new technological breakthroughs every day, business environment is becoming more and more complex for every company regardless of its size; Yahoo! Inc. is one of those companies. Yahoo Inc. has grown up as a portal company. Management at Yahoo Inc. learned early the basic tactics and requirements for a successful portal such as being sticky, maintaining a web presence which forces the visitors to keep browsing the pages on its site with interest and spend maximum amount of time on portal. Yahoo was quick to profit from this phenomenon and made its portal increasingly interesting for its users/visitors. However, as the company grew in size, it begun to expand into other areas of internet such as free hosting (Geocities) and Yahoo photo (Photo sharing website) among others. This shifted the focus of company from being a mere web portal to a diversified IT company facing strong competitors such as Google and Microsoft in strategic areas crucial for company's long term growth and survival. In this research paper, Yahoo's Internal Environment, External Environment, and other strategic dynamics has been analyzed in order to provide a reader a better picture of Yahoo Inc. as a company and based on that, recommendation are developed in order to guide the managers of Yahoo Inc. in the future direction company could take to improve its profitability and chances for long-term growth in different market it operates.

Political Factors

Political factors that affect Yahoo includes Government regulation and policies as well as legal developments in other industries that directly affect the business unit or units of Yahoo! Managers at yahoo are challenged constantly with balancing the responsibility to their shareholders for making a profitable business as well as protecting the best interest of their customers and employees. This is especially challenging for Yahoo! as it operates in internationally and in international business environment. Lack of proper understanding of legal environment can result in several lawsuits and company will end up losing its money and reputation, both are needed for long term growth and profitability.

Economic Factors

The economic environment of a business depends on how the economy is doing in the location where your business is located. When the economy is doing well a company can make adjustments to prices that may be at a higher price point. When the economy begins to suffer, businesses tend to have to make price adjustments to their merchandise so that they can make a profit and also sell to their customers. “Factors that affect the business environment is the cost of labor, materials, processes and procedures.

Yahoo heavily relies on precise and correct information related to all these factors that are associated with the world economy as Yahoo operates internationally, not just the economic status and spending pattern of its users/visitors. More importantly, Yahoo must be equipped with ...