Zoom Innovation: Presentation and Skills Reflection

ZOOM
By (Name)
Professors' Name
Institution
Date
Zoom
PART A
Innovation
Zoom Video Communications, Inc (known simply as Zoom) is a US company providing video conferencing software. Today, Zoom has grown to offer a range of video and teleconferencing solutions together with cloud-based video communications (Hinton, 2021).. The company’s primary product is the Zoom meeting platform, which permits clients to undertake video and audio meetings, weaners and virtual events. Since its launch in 2011, the business has made tremendous progress. The first version of Zoom was launched in August 2012 and allowed a maximum of 15 participants (Hinton, 2021). However, today the platform allows up to 1000 participants to attend a Zoom meeting. In 2019, Zoom went public with a valuation of $9.2 billion (Hinton, 2021). The widespread acceptability of Zoom has been due to various innovative approaches the business has employed to attract clients.
Firstly, Zoom places high importance on innovation to maintain its competitive advantage. The company has established a strong competitive position in the video conferencing and collaboration market. According to (Harris, 2018), competitive advantage entails an entity positioning itself concerning its competitors. Organizations need to analyze their competitors by establishing their objectives, strategies, strengths and weaknesses to establish whether to compete against or ignore the competitors (Harris, 2018). Back in the 2010s, video conferencing tools had complicated interfaces. Over the years, Zoom has worked towards making its platform easy to use by users from diverse backgrounds The platform is straightforward and offers a seamless experience to users (Hinton, 2021).
Secondly, Zoom uses innovation to meet the evolving needs of its clients. The needs and expectations of clients in the digital space are evolvingly rapidly. Some firms operate in highly competitive markets with rapidly changing consumer tastes (Sloman & Hinde, 2007). When businesses are faced with changing consumer needs, it is critical to innovate constantly to meet the new requirements. However, it is important to note that “innovation is not about inventing things but about developing systems for value creation.” (Vargo and Lusch, 2017, pg. 54). One of the ways of enabling businesses to assess the range of perceptions and opinions related to client satisfaction and preference is by undertaking customer research. Zoom has been at the forefront of research to understand the requirements of clients. According to (Harris, 2018), organizations are increasingly collecting customer behaviour data, and analysing it to build up more detailed pictures of clients’ purchase behaviour and preferences. Zoom has been using consumer data to make improvements on its platforms.
Additionally, Zoom ensures smooth communication to facilitate innovation. According to (Harris, 2018), conflict can arise when expectations between challenge members are breached. This occurs when members act in their best interests that threaten the interests of other members. As a result, problems can emerge due to misunderstandings through clear communication. Zoom appreciates the importance of communication in sharing ideas and collaboration. The business encourages open communication between employees and management. Zoom believes in a culture of happiness where employees are free to express themselves (Hinton, 2021). Further, Zoom ensures communication with customers to get their feedback and insights. The business has customer support interactions where clients can have their issues addressed. “The relationship between staff and consumers is at the heart of the brand experience” with staff behaviour key to creating value (Ind, 2007, p.22). Zoom also undertakes surveys to establish what customers want. Actively listening to customers has allowed the business to understand the needs, pain points and expectations of clients. Zoom then identifies opportunities for improvement to develop features that address the needs of clients. Moreover, the management communicates its vision clearly to the employees. The leadership sets the vision, goals and priorities for innovation and communicates them to the workers.
To facilitate innovation in the organization, Zoom integrates various business functions. Firstly, Zoom aligns the marketing and sales team towards innovation. The team gathers customer insights and market feedback to identify the needs of the clients. According to Welch and Jackson (2007, p. 118) innovation is facilitated through feeding back staff's experience and expertise to improve customer service and the organisation's offering and operations. The sales and marketing team has spearheaded an innovative model that offers multiple pricing and support options (Hinton, 2021). The Enterprise, Business and Freemium subscription options cater for the different needs of clients. Secondly, Zoom’s human resources work towards creating a culture of innovation. Zoom hires and nurtures talented individuals, providing training and development programs, and promoting a ‘culture of happiness’ (Hinton, 2021). Thirdly, Zoom undertakes research and development (R&D) to explore emerging technologies, identify clients’ needs and come up with innovative solutions. Lastly, Zoom ensures product and service design that collaborates with R&D, marketing and other departments to come up with innovative products and services that meet user needs. For instance, the 'single-click solution has made it easier for clients to use Zoom (Hinton, 2021). The intermigration of the various business functions ensures that Zoom translates innovative ideas into actionable plans, which are then actualized within the organization.
Threats and Opportunities
Threats
Stiff Competition
The growth of Zoom has attracted competition from new and existing players in the video conferencing and collaboration market. From March 2020, Zoom became the most downloaded non-game app worldwide (Hinton, 2021). The pandemic brought about lockdowns as governments sought to minimize contact to minimize the spread of the virus. Some businesses opted to have their employees work from home, which made video conferencing and collaboration tools like Zoom very instrumental for the survival of businesses. The closure of schools forced learning institutions to embrace online learning and Zoom provided features to facilitate the institutions. For individuals, Zoom provided a forum where they could engage and catch up despite the lockdown. The sudden growth of the video conferencing and collaboration market attracted more competitors. Existing products like Skype and WebEx, which had been in the market started making improvements to their products to take advantage of the growing market. New entrants like RingCentral MVP, G2 Deals, GlobalMeet Collaboration, 3CX, Fuze and GoTo Meeting among others have merged to offer the same service as Zoom.
To combat the problem of stiff competition, Zoom needs to focus on innovation and product development. Since clients are looking for better conferencing and collaboration tools, Zoom needs to introduce new features that meet the needs of its clients. When a business satisfies the needs of its clients, it improves their loyalty. Zoom must invest in customer-centric approaches that allow it to better serve its clients. It is also important for Zoom to employ strategic partnerships and collaborations to expand its client reach. This will allow it to offer more value to its clients who are looking for innovative products.
Security and Privacy Concerns
The rapid expansion of Zoom has increased scrutiny and raised security and privacy concerns. This comes at a time when companies like Google accuse the Chinese government of being behind a cyber-attack on it and other tech companies, especially in the US. Users take seriously security and privacy concerns and any business that does not take them seriously is likely to lose clients in addition to facing legal consequences. Zoom has more than 300 daily active users, a growth that has taken place in less than two years (Statista, 2022). However, the platform’s growth has been shadowed by concerns about security, as experts question if the business has done enough to protect users (Dassel & Klein, 2023). Since 2019, there have been numerous incidences of Zoom bombing, where uninvited users turn up at meetings and disrupt sometimes with harmful content. Experts also expressed concerns in 2019 when Zoom had a bug which allowed the hacking of the webcam without the knowledge of users. There has also been misuse of data where Zoom apologized for sending data to Facebook without the permission of the users (Hinton, 2021).
However, in 2021, Zoom made announcements that it had worked towards addressing most of the security concerns. For instance, it allows administrators to limit the accessibility of recordings to certain preapproved IP addresses (Zoom, 2022). Participants can also see when a meeting is being recorded. At the same time, Zoom has fixed most of the security concerns, making it more challenging for Zoom bombing to take place. The company has explicitly stated that it does not monitor or use customer content for any reason apart from providing its services. Its policies indicate that the business does not sell customer content to third parties or use it for any advertisi...