Category: Strategy

This was a component study exploring the area of substitutes for a later more complete strategy analysis paper of a airline industry company.

Although flying was once a luxury, it has become the go-to means of travel following deregulation in 1978, in particular when it comes to longer distances.  With many airlines offering budget rates, flying can be inexpensive and quick.  However, that’s not always the case and some have looked for alternative means of travel to avoid extended travel time and hidden charges.

A two-hour flight can take double that amount of travel time due to transportation required to get to the airport in outlying areas, long check-in and security lines, transfer times at hubs, waiting for luggage to arrive at the other end, etc.  Many budget airlines have hidden charges such as airport taxes, fuel surcharges, luggage fees, and food and beverages purchased onboard.  Plus, there is gas to get to the airport and parking fees.

“to learn strategy a longer lense of time must be used”, at least that’s something my strategy professor would regularly say. It did make quite a bit of sense to think longer term to understand business strategy. Many actions taken by people and businesses are in reaction to previous circumstance and they don’t quite make sense without the historical context. This was a study of the development of a specific industry, air express package delivery, over a 30 year timeline.

This was a strategic study doing a breakdown of some of the key elements of a business and its competitive forces.

• Why did pay-per-click search grown so rapidly?
  • Rapidly expanding internet going from 130 in 1993 to 600,000 in 1996
  • Initially keywords were only tiny fractional dollars payments per click to websites makes for an initially inexpensive and logical pay as you go type advertising. Owners of websites can easily understand and put value toward with clicks driving traffic directly to their sites.
  • It creates a cause & effect link in ways not possible by traditional marketing & advertising, ex. % of clicks which turn into orders and $, A/B testing, etc. With improved search driving higher quality traffic in the form of people finding the site they were looking for.