Eharmony Case Study Essay

go along dog 1The first general environment that is most relevant to this sheath is the demographic shargon. This atom focuses on population size, age structure, geographic distri entirelyion, ethnical mix, and income distribution. This segment is relevant to eHarmony because there main focus is to conform to their customers with potential partners. They need to take in account the matches age, income, ethnicity, and income. In the case, they discuss how they require customers to answer questions about how old they be, where they atomic number 18 from, where they are living, where they work etc. They take all this information and match it with some other(prenominal) customer. The second general environment that is most relevant to this case is the socio heathen segment. This segment focuses on the societys attitude and pagan values. This segment is relevant to eHarmony because when they match their customers, than they have to take an account what their cultural values are and what their attitudes are toward the social norms. The United States is a melting pot of different subtletys. Some customers are high on refining and some are not.Demographic segment represents an opportunity for eHarmony because they brush off unfold their caller-up to other countries. The article Are You Ignoring Trends That Could Shape Up Your line of work do an interesting point that ignoring trends can give rivals the opportunity to convert the industry. If eHarmony does not go into international grocerys than they would give gibe the advantage of getting more(prenominal) customers on their range. eHarmony wants to be on the top, and the only way they can do that is by entering a new market. Sociocultural segment represents an opportunity for eHarmony because customers want to have partners that work and have the same cultural values that they have. It is all about being compatible with your partner. In the article, it dialogue about how social trends can cha nge the way people grasp the world virtually them. By showing customers different matches from different countries but the same values, can open their eyes to their new life partner. straits 2When online personal firms entered the market in 1992, they didnt do easilybecause people thought the desperate use it. Which caused the online personal market to change by reversal very(prenominal) retard. Everything changed in 2005, because peoples mindset changed and found it refreshing to use online personal site to find their partners. Not just i-year-old people use the site but also the middle cardinalth-year group use this site. According to the article, of the 2.2 million marriages that took place, about 120,000 of them were because of online personals site. It took awhile for the market to accept this new industry to help people hook up and find a suit up to(p) person to marry.The volumes of the power of suppliers is that they can subjoin their prices of their products so they can exert their power oer there competitors. Thats what eHarmony is doing over their competitors. There are some drivers that drive the bargaining power of suppliers, which are (1) there are few of them, (2) they purchase a large follow of total output from the industry, (3) products or services they purchase are homogenous and undifferentiated, (4) switching costs from one product or service to another are low, and (5) there is a realistic threat they could backward integrate into the industry itself. eHarmony does have service that no other company was able to copy well and be as successful as eHarmony.The strength of rivalry among existing competition is that when a company has a loose rival then they are determined to beat their competition. They would do anything to withstand sure that their company is on top. The biggest rival that eHarmony has is flout. eHarmony tries to give services to their customers that Match cannot give. There are some drivers that drive the i ntensity of rivalry among competition, which are (1) there are many competitors of roughly equal size, (2) the industry has slow or no growth, (3) exit barriers are high, (3) existing firms are attached to staying in the industry, and (3) there are few bases of competition beyond price. Match and eHarmony are almost equal into size and they intend to grow crimson more. Match is determined to beat eHarmony for the top position in the industry.The deuce opportunities that would reshape the industry structure are shifting threat of telephone exchange and new bases of rivalry. Shifting threat of substitution is when a substitute becomes more or less threatening because of the advances in technology that make believes new substitutes. mod Bases ofrivalry is when mergers and acquisitions introduce new ways of competing, or technology insertion can reshape rivalry. examination 3eHarmony competitive advantage is that it uses a scientific developed questionnaire based on Dr. Warrens 29 dimensions. other advantage is that they are the first online personals site centered around marriage minded individuals. The last advantage is that they are exclusive on who they allow to use the site. The competitive advantage is sustainable because they satisfy the four criteria in sustaining competitive advantage. The first criteria is valuable capabilities and they satisfy this criteria because the founder created this great questionnaire that he uses to determine which person they are compatible with.The second criteria is obsolete capabilities and they satisfy this criteria because the founder has a PhD in psychology and he did is get along in marriage and love. He was the one who created the questionnaire and he was the one who created the algorithm on how to match the customers together. No other company was able to re-create that. The third criteria is costly to imitate and they satisfy this criteria because no other company was able to create the algorithm that the founder was able to create to match their customers together. The last criteria is non substitutable and they met this criteria because there is nothing that substitutes it. Question 4I believe that eHarmony should choose the last selection, which is the rapid geographic expansion. They should take this option because they want to beat their competition and get more clients. They have already got their place in the US market, now its time to expand the argumentation and become global. In the case, it says that in European Union nations, online dating is very popular. eHarmony does not realize that besides the US, there are other countries where online dating is popular. The downside of expanding is that they are not sure how these other countries might react with online dating. The countries would any accept them or decline them. They would loose a lot of money. Another downside is that they are not sure if their questionnaire and there algorithm would work in other countries. Th ey would need to think about the social and cultural norms of each country.I did not choose the third option, which was that eHarmony wanted to create sites that focus on key life stages such as wedding, pregnancy- fertility care, and sr. care. I feel that eHarmony is known for the match making place and not known for doing life stages. I feel that they should first master one side of the company before they start jumping into new industries. Question 5eHarmony has an effective strategical leadership because Greg Waldrof, the CEO has all the qualities of a level 5 executive. Mr. Waldroff wanted to make sure that his company is the top company in the match making industry. He created a questionnaire and a formula on how to interpret the results. He made sure his provide understood it and used it correctly. The second reason why eHarmony has an effective strategic leadership is because the leaders of the firm made sure that the organization culture was kept in tact. Their culture was to create good matches for their customers. The leaders made sure everyone understood that. The last reason why eHarmony has an effective strategic leadership is because of their ethical practices. In eHarmony, they screen their customers before they can create a profile and buy the packages. They dont allow conjoin customers on the site because they want their customers to feel that the people on this site are looking for marriage.