20+ SWOT Analysis Templates, Examples & Best Practices

May 27, 2021 No Comment 696 Views

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A SWOT analysis is a great way to effectively evaluate a person, campaign, strategy, or product.

Looking to conduct a SWOT analysis? Read on for SWOT analysis templates, plus top tips and plenty of SWOT analysis examples.

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What is a SWOT analysis?

A SWOT analysis is a simple and practical evaluation model. A SWOT diagram looks at a combination of internal and external factors, as well as assessing strengths and weaknesses. This combination of evaluation metrics means a SWOT analysis is particularly useful for gaining a thorough overview of a business, product, brand, or a new project early on in the project life cycle.

WATCH: What is a SWOT analysis? [TIPS + TEMPLATES]

A SWOT diagram allows you to think about your own internal strengths and weaknesses. It also helps you think about external opportunities and threats that could affect your company’s performance. The SWOT also helps you explore what the differentiators between yourself and your competitors are.

The SWOT diagram has been around since at least the 1960s, although its origins are unclear, and are still used today in businesses across the world. Here’s a grid SWOT analysis example that companies can easily put together.

While a SWOT is good starting point for evaluation, the disadvantage of a SWOT is that it doesn’t produce actionable outcomes – rather it helps you understand where you currently stand, and how you can begin to move your business forward.

A good SWOT analysis template, like this example, should always be followed by further planning and development.

The simplest way to build a SWOT analysis is to use a free SWOT analysis template.

How to write a SWOT analysis

The first two letters of our SWOT, Strengths and Weaknesses are internal factors that you have control over, and you should look within your company or business to complete these letters. Opportunities and Threats are external factors that you do not have control over, and you should look outside of your organization to complete these letters, like in the SWOT analysis example below:

When developing any marketing campaign you can use a SWOT analysis, like the one above, to outline any potential threats as well as opportunities for your business. You can include a SWOT diagram as part of your marketing plan or business plan, like in this SWOT analysis example.

When creating a SWOT analysis template it can be difficult to find jumping off points for your evaluation. Often, you either go too big and list “impossible to fix” problems, or think small and spend your time and energy focusing on things that are overall insignificant. Deciding on your SWOT analysis questions can take as much time as conducting the SWOT analysis itself!

That’s why it’s important to decide an overall goal or objective that you want your SWOT to help you achieve. This could be more sales, bigger growth, better brand recognition, a prestigious award, or more. If you’re conducting a personal SWOT analysis you can pick a goal you’re working towards such as a promotion, or an award, and identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats in relation to that goal. In personal SWOT analysis examples like this, you can give yourself a time period, such as the last year, to review.

Once you have decided on a goal, you can start to think about SWOT analysis questions that related to:

Your customers
Your competitors
Your market share
Business growth
Availability
Price point
Online following
Customer retention
Budget restrictions
Suppliers
Company culture
Reputation

This is by no means a complete list of topics to evaluate, and you should add your own ideas, but this is a good starting point for effective evaluation.

What does SWOT stand for?

SWOT is an acronym which stands for:

Strengths

Weaknesses

Opportunities

Threats

Strengths

Strengths are the areas that you excel in. What do you do better than anybody else? What do people praise you for?

To identify your Strengths, spend some time thinking about what you’ve done well, what tasks were well within your comfort zone, and any times that you’ve exceeded expectations, or achieved fantastic results. A SWOT could be conducted during recruitment to help identify the strengths of candidates, and directly compare them effectively.

Weaknesses

Next you identify the areas that need improvement. Think about things you find difficult to achieve, times you’ve struggled to meet expectations, and areas that you don’t feel confident in. Look back at your Strengths list and think about the inverse.

Weaknesses should always be things you have control over, and things that you can put steps in place to improve upon. You could use a SWOT to help analyze your brand, and understand why your customers chose your competitors over you, or if there are any services you are not currently providing. Use this SWOT analysis example for inspiration.

Opportunities

Moving onto the “O” in our SWOT – Opportunities are areas that your business could take advantage of. When conducting a SWOT for internal company analysis, is there an unserved or underserved market that you could grow into? Are you maximizing your media coverage? Could you change or develop a product to better serve a wider audience?

Within Opportunities, you should also look back at your Strengths and Weaknesses lists, and include any weaknesses that could be turned into a strength as an opportunity.

Threats

Finally, threats are potential or upcoming obstacles that you should be wary of. In this case, by threat we mean emerging competitors, changes in the market, things that would negatively affect your business. Most commonly, you will not have any control over your threats but it’s still important to be aware of them so that you can develop contingency plans.

Marketing SWOT analysis templates

When developing a marketing plan you should conduct a SWOT for your product or service. By looking at what you do better than your competitors you can start to understand the best way to market your product. This free SWOT analysis template for Word showcases the opportunities for the business.

Equally, by looking at opportunities you can begin to understand potential new markets, as well as under-served areas that you already market within. Marketers, consultants and freelancers often include SWOT analyses in competitor analysis reports.

Looking for more marketing resources?

Nonprofit SWOT analysis examples

Nonprofit organizations can use SWOT analysis to help inform their strategy decisions.

A SWOT is a great way to understand how your nonprofit fits into the market, and how you can maximize your impact by running effective targeted campaigns and fundraising initiatives. This SWOT analysis example showcases areas where a nonprofit can improve.

Especially in nonprofits, you often don’t have the luxury of testing out multiple ideas or strategies due to time and budget constraints. Conducting a SWOT analysis early on in your strategy development can help you make the most informed decisions. This SWOT analysis example highlights the threats that a nonprofit should be looking to overcome soon.

Looking for more nonprofit guides?

Exec SWOT analysis templates

Execs have to wear many different hats within their roles and organizations. Business development is a crucial part of company success, and being fully aware of your organizational strengths and weaknesses is invaluable. For example, there are numerous opportunities in this SWOT analysis example.

When going through a period of rapid growth within your business, you should take some time to conduct a SWOT analysis. This will help to ensure that you are able to reach your growth goals. Doing a SWOT also helps you identify any possible weaknesses that may become issues for your growth further down the line.

The weaknesses in this free SWOT analysis template for Word should be addressed quickly before they become a threat to the company.

A SWOT diagram can also be used to help evaluate employees’ work. You can assess your employees’ performances and provide detailed feedback, like in this SWOT analysis example.

Interested in more resources?

Personal SWOT analysis examples

In some circumstances, you might want to conduct a personal SWOT analysis to help evaluate your personal growth. If, for example, you were looking to move up the career ladder in your existing profession, or to change careers completely. If creating a personal SWOT analysis, you should slightly reposition your thinking regarding “threats”.

Comparing strengths and weaknesses directly can help give you clarity over areas that you can improve, like in this personal SWOT analysis example.

Rather than thinking about competitors or change in the market, think more about things that may hold you back personally – i.e. a lack of business finances, or an upcoming relocation, as you can see in this SWOT analysis example.

Consultant SWOT analysis templates

Consultants are in a unique position because they are looking to market themselves. Starting out as a consultant can be difficult, but conducting a SWOT analysis of yourself as a consultant can help you discover any unique selling points for your services.

You might also want to conduct a SWOT analysis when delivering work for clients. A SWOT can help inform any project or growth plans that you are recommending. The SWOT analysis example below makes a strong case for the business.

Looking for more consulting templates?

How to visualize a SWOT analysis

There are many different ways you can visualize a SWOT analysis. Below we’ve outlined the main layouts you might want to use for your SWOT, and provided SWOT analysis examples for each.

Use a 2×2 grid system design

You could use a 2×2 grid system to evaluate your options. This is a good way to compare all data at once, as each box has a direct relationship with every other box. This makes it easier to think about a SWOT as a whole, in context – rather than as individual segments, like in this SWOT analysis example we shared earlier:

A 2×2 grid is easily stylized and a flexible design style, and you can use brand colors, shapes, or motifs. 2×2 grids are also useful in business reports that contain a lot of information, as they make it easy to digest all elements of the SWOT quickly.

Use a vertical list

You can also use a vertical list. Vertical list SWOT analysis templates work well for Word, within reports, on the internet, or if sending via email. If you’re doing this, make sure you make a visual distinction between each segment by using a box or leaving plenty of space.

This SWOT analysis example uses a vertical list with different colored boxes in its design:

Use a horizontal table

A SWOT template for Word needs to be vertical, but that type of SWOT diagram is less useful for PowerPoint, due to the orientation of presentation slides usually being in landscape.

In this case, you should use a horizontal table. This is good for presentations as it allows you to fill the entire screen with information. Again, just make sure to suitably differentiate the segments with color, graphics, or empty space between the columns, like in this free SWOT analysis template for PowerPoint:

SWOT Analysis Best Practices & Design Tips

Whilst a SWOT diagram is a fairly straightforward evaluation model, there are a couple of SWOT best practice tips you should follow in order to maximize the effectiveness of your SWOT:

Use measurable and quantifiable statements in your SWOT

You should be able to evidence all of the points in your SWOT template, aka prove that you are good at the thing you said you are good at. Saying you increase your market share regularly is good, but saying you increase your market share 10% year over year is even better.

Make sure all areas of your business are represented when developing the SWOT

Get feedback from different departments on both what their strengths/weaknesses are, but ask what they think your strengths/weaknesses are. This SWOT analysis example has gathered feedback from multiple teams.

Try and keep the lists an even number

If you have 5 strengths, find 5 weaknesses. For every opportunity, try and write down a threat. This makes it easier to compare the categories.

Have a goal in mind when doing your SWOT analysis

Whether this is developing a new project plan or business, or scaling your revenue – a SWOT diagram is particularly useful when there’s a definitive outcome you’re trying to achieve.

Don’t aim for the perfect SWOT list straight away

Start with much longer lists, gathered in a brainstorming session, and whittle the lists down. This brings us to…

Make sure your SWOT is thorough

Make sure you’ve thought about every possible strength, weakness, threat, and opportunity. A SWOT is only as valuable as the information you include, so make sure you do your due diligence during the analysis. Take inspiration from this SWOT analysis example.

Format your SWOT in a way that makes sense for multiple uses

If you plan to present your SWOT analysis to an executive at your company, make sure it is clear to understand, and presented in a way that makes it easy to take in all of the information at once – such as a 2×2 grid template. If it’s for a company presentation, use a horizontal SWOT analysis template for PowerPoint.

Think short, mid, and long term

Your product might be great now, but what could be happening in the next 6 months that might affect that? What about within the next year? Sure that competitor could be small fish now, but what about if they have an aggressive growth plan in place? You need to be prepared for that to stay ahead of the game.

Use clever design tricks

Use color in your SWOT to help grab attention. Differentiate different areas of your SWOT, as this SWOT analysis template does.

FAQ about SWOT analysis templates

1. Why is a SWOT analysis important?

It’s important to remember that your business doesn’t exist in a vacuum and that you should analyze both internal and external factors. A SWOT diagram will allow you to gain a good, thorough understanding of where your business sits within the wider market, as well as identify potential opportunities to explore.

The benefit of a SWOT analysis is that you can directly compare every individual letter to its three counterparts. You can explore the relationship between your strengths and your weaknesses, but also look at how your strengths could be used to help leverage opportunities, and assess the potential your strengths have to help improve your weaknesses.

2. What comes after a SWOT analysis?

Once your SWOT is complete you can use the information you have gathered to inform your business strategy.

Spend some time thinking about:

How you can continue to develop your strengths?

How you can improve your weaknesses, what procedures can be put in place or training can you undertake to help with this?

Also, think about how you can leverage your strengths to take advantage of the opportunities you’ve listed.

Can your strengths be used to tackle any threats?

What about your weaknesses, will they hold you back from pursuing the opportunities?

Will your weaknesses further disadvantage you when it comes to your threat list?

Ready To Create Your SWOT Analysis?

A SWOT analysis is an invaluable tool for evaluation and is particularly useful for small businesses or businesses in times of change. Make sure you follow these SWOT analysis best practice tips to maximize your evaluation opportunities and further your evaluation by conducting a thorough Competitor Analysis.

All of the SWOT analysis examples featured in this blog post are fully customizable SWOT analysis templates available for use on Venngage. You can also use our Smart Templates to create documents easily.

Once you’ve created your business or personal SWOT analysis, make sure to keep a copy safe for the next time you conduct an evaluation. With Venngage you can keep your work online or download a SWOT analysis PDF if you’re a Business user.