All companies have contingency plans in place to deal with internal and external factors that affect their marketing. Internally; a company should have checks and balances in place to ensure high standards. Robust quality control/analysis, cheap production overhead, good money spent on high performing employees. Externally; companies can be active and passive in their strategy towards managing risk factors. A company can break into an emerging market and flood it with their product, outperforming potential competitors. Company X can partner with Company Y and create a conglomerate with a stronger holding on the market share. New, groundbreaking products can also ensure a company stays stable during a time of external or internal strife.

Q: Based on the external factors of weather, politics, and economy, what are some ways that companies avoid being severely impacted?

A: When it comes to external environment factors in marketing, I believe that most companies can avoid being impacted internally and externally by both projecting the possibilities and allowing for delegation of tasks when it comes to factors that could lead to the downfall of the product. When I  say projection of possibilities, companies are able to make "checks and balance" for the pending possibilities of hardships that may come wit the marketing strategy they develop as well as the product downfalls. This can help with cost spending and allocation of funds that can be pushed toward the management and handling of the external environmental factors. I always thought that once you know that these factors are ultimately inevitable, it is easier to formulate decisions and solutions that can help alleviate the severity of the issue. The delegation of tasks would require the hiring of highly trained professionals and team members who are able to not only assess the factors, but develop a SWOT analysis and can interpret the handling of these issues in a professional and timely manner when/if they arise. 

Companies have shifted their business practices becoming increasing more transparent over the years to their consumers. As we shift to a more sustainable world, companies are shifting their business models to fall align with what is beneficial to the earth’s environment. Consumers  are thrilled to support a product that poses a benefit to or environment. As the world population continues to increase and natural resources become more scare. Governments around the world are have established policies that provide big businesses benefits for conducting in sustainable practices as well retaining a transparent business practices for the world to view. 

Preplanning is the way to go to avoid being affected by weather, politics and the economy.  As a business you should know that all of these exist and that they can happen at any time. They will happen.  So a company should already have a set of guidelines that can help them implement the quickest solution when it comes time to need them.

Contingency plans are certainly important for companies to avoid being affected by external factors. Specifically in terms of weather, it is important for companies to maintain a diversified supply chain. Sourcing materials from multiple locations helps to mitigate the risk involved with inclement weather preventing transportation, production, distribution, etc. Politics can also severely limit production. Companies must remain active in politics, and engage in lobbying efforts to influence policy decisions affecting their industries. Having a voice in political discussions can help shape favorable regulations and policies for their business. In terms of the economy, companies must invest in market research. Conducting consistent market research can help companies to stay ahead of consumer and economic trends. Through the understanding of market dynamics, businesses can adjust strategies proactively to remain successful. What are some other external or internal factors you can think of that can affect companies and what strategies do they use to combat being affected by them?

Generally, almost every company is going to be affected by external factors like the weather, politics, economy, competitors, and collaborators. There is really no escape as external factors are factors you cannot change, and these include opportunities and threats. These all are considered uncontrollable factors. In terms of the economy, I think that companies can or will generally try to market their products as limited/for a certain amount of time, or even try to bundle it together with other products or services. They might even try to make it sound like something of a necessity or that it benefits them to buy the products together. In other words, marketing teams will try to make their products sound even better, more convenient, or even try to bundle it together with other products or services. Maybe they could also have it sound like what they are selling is a rarity to try and hook people into buying it. It could help boost sales for the company for a brief period of time.
In addition to the SWOT analysis, I have found that companies utilize the PESTEL analysis to combat these external factors that could potentially affect them and the market growth rate. PESTEL stands for political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal; these are all external factors. They have recommended that companies repeat this analysis every six months or so in order for them to be on top with the changes in the business world. This would later help them be more prepared and successful in the competition compared to their competitors. Like the SWOT analysis, this analysis identifies any threats and weaknesses. With how they conduct this analysis, it begins with business meetings where everyone from different departments sit down together and discuss any issues or ideas they may have that can help the company. Next, they would relay these messages to customers to get their opinion. The company is transferring their message to marketing and marketing transfers it to the customer. In turn, the customer provides their information to marketing and then back to the company. With that in mind, the company then researches all six categories to evaluate and see how big of an impact it would have on them externally. Once they have finalized their research, they would have to refine those ideas until they have a “manageable number of points in those categories”.
To mitigate these external factors affecting the company, they can set up different systems to stay up-to-date with ongoing changes in the world. This would include having different alert systems and monitoring systems. These could include researchers in the department watching any alerting news in the industry, market, or government that could impact their market, industry, and targeting audience. As mentioned before, with the PESTEL analysis to mitigate external factors, they should perform and schedule it as frequently as possible because change can happen immediately or after a couple of months, so doing it every three to six months would be good. Another way for them to avoid being severely impacted is to attend different events and meetings within the industry, including seminars and conferences. This is a way to stay up-to-date with the market and ongoing changes they may not know or are not aware of or are not covered in the news.