Mission,Vission and Personal Strategy (Essay Sample)

YAHOO AND GOOGLE: MISSION, VISION, SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY, AND STRATEGIC PLANNING
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Yahoo is the most visited website on the internet. When Yahoo was originally founded, it was called Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web (Yahoo Inc, 2005). When the founders decided to change the company name, they could not get a trademark for the name Yahoo, so they added the exclamation point, thus the trademarked version of the name Yahoo! has undergone a good amount of restructuring over the past years, in part due to internal roadblocks & financial reasons, and also because of the adoption of social media. Yahoo’s mission statement is: to connect people to their passions, communities, and the world’s knowledge. (Answers, Del.icio.us, Flickr, Inclusion)
Google is primarily known around the world as an internet search engine. (Nile W , 2011). Google provides a huge suite of internet products and services. Google Maps, Google Earth, Google Videos, Google Images, Gmail, Google News, Google Phone, Google Calendar, Google Groups, Google Translate, and Google Books are the internet-based services that make Google the number 2 most popular global website, according to Alexa.com. Google’s mission statement is: To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful."
Yahoo’s new mission clearly differentiates its path from Google’s with Yahoo’s emphasis on the user life experience and emotions, with the terms connect, people, passions, communities ( Smith, D., & Carlos A., 2010). However, the difference is quite evident, as Google has taken a different approach of connecting its users to Google search as its core, rather than to each other, like a network operates; hence Google’s success in search.
The main difference between the missions of the two companies is, Yahoo!: Providing knowledge obtained via personal experience, association, awareness and understanding. (Answers, Del.icio.us, Flickr, Inclusion) while Google: Providing information obtained via investigation, study, data, measurement and numerical quantities. (PageRank, Algortihm, Link Measurement, Profiling)
Vision Statements contain details of the company's future - its vision (the future plans with aims and objectives). These types of Statements focus on tomorrow. Google Vision Statement: "To develop perfect search engines" while yahoo’s vision statement is to enable people to find, use, share, and expand all human knowledge”.
The companies appear to be heading towards the same direction however one is more competitive than the other.Google Goole has relied on delivering the most relevant, highest quality search results to its users with its simplest of web-pages - a page with a Search box on it. By providing a better mouse-trap, Google quickly began gaining mind-share and eventually users from its competitors like Yahoo!, GoTo.com, MSN.com and so forth followed suit
Social responsibility is believed to be an important asset for a company’s success.At Yahoo!; they give people the online products and the right context to help them take action to make the world a better place (Yahoo Inc 2005). And given the size of their audience, over 600 million people every month, can create action at a large scale. They also innovate in their company practices and policies to help encourage the entire industry to move in a positive direction. Part of their efforts also includes empowering their employees to have a greater impact on the community by working together. Yahoo! is also committed to enabling people to contribute positively to the world. From the way they design their products, to the tools and stories they provide, they are connecting more people to ways they can engage positively and productively in their communities. Many of their efforts grow industry and global awareness around the needs of youth and people with disabilities in their increasingly digitally connected world.
When it comes to issues to do with environment, at Yahoo!, they make it easier to be green, and they are doing it on a really large scale. As the #1 destination for green information on the web, they offer people simple ways they can be green in their own lives. In addition, they empower their employees to help the environment, at home and at work. And because Yahoo! is one of the world’s biggest technology companies, their green practices lead the way in their industry.
At Yahoo! they believe in sharing success and treating people right. They’ve taken a leadership position in many areas that promote fair and ethical business practices both at home and abroad—from building cultures of socially responsible workplaces in their industry to promoting freedom of expression on the Internet.
SWOT analysis is a strategic planning method used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a company. The strengths of yahoo are that: Yahoo!'s Overture is a tremendously profitable Internet advertising business which focuses on affiliate advertising for large advertising accounts, in the same way as Google's Adsense programme. (Hof & Holahan, 2007) This is an important income stream for Yahoo! Another strong hold is that Yahoo! has over 350 million users of its services and solutions. This makes it a very powerful marketing company, with a very well known brand. Some reports indicate that is it is the most popular website in the World. A key long-term strength is Yahoo!'s international business presence. As the Internet expands and it is adopted by more nations the opportunities for Internet brands begin to emerge. Yahoo! is well placed to take advantage of these opportunities with its strategic business units in Asia, Europe and Australia. The Yahoo! Directory is an original source of structured information. It has built over the last decade, and unlike mainstream search engines, its content is moderated (i.e. sites are vetted before their inclusion).
The main weakness of yahoo is in differentiation. Differentiation is difficult for Yahoo! Almost all of its packaged services are available from other sources. Search facilities are available on MSN and Google. Free E-mail accounts are available from Hotmail (MSN) or G-Mail (Google), and many others, news is available from CNN or the BBC .In addition online advertising is a new income stream for organizations such as MSN, Yahoo! and Goggle. However, as technology develops and new unforeseen advertising media emerge, the future is uncertain for these income streams. This is a weakness for Yahoo! and its competitors.
Another income stream that has been key to Yahoo! is derived ...