Leading organizations in the world undoubtedly employ unique and effective strategic management skills to remain profitable and wade off competitors. While some of these strategies last for a short duration, partially attributed to trends, some are developed to be the backbone of a business; therefore requiring to be long term in nature. Apple Inc, Amazon.com and Google are three of the world’s top ten fastest growing companies. While products can be considered as part of the company’s competitive advantage, the primary determiner of growth in a company is strategic planning and management. In this way, the essay seeks to determine effective strategies used by Apple, Amazon and Google in pursuit of global excellence. Information regarding the relevance of a strategy in real life is also included to further develop an understanding of the importance of strategic management. By developing a clear image of the companies, it would be possible to determine the extent to which strategies are emphasized in multinational organizations.

Since Apple Inc’s induction in the technology industry, the company has grown exponentially to eclipse every other manufacturer in its line of work as the leading technology company in the world. Apple Inc utilizes effective strategies to determine the relevance of a market, how to penetrate it, and products or services that would best fit the location. The company is well-known for using a quality approach to maintain loyal customers, they can be deemed as the most loyal customers to a technology company in the phone and computer business. Widely regarded as a pioneer in his time, Steve Jobs illustrated Apple Inc’s potential. He focused on quality, producing high-end products that are tailored to a particular customer. Through the development of the iPod, Macbook, iPad, iPhone, amidst a range of other excellent products, the company continues to spread its risk over different products and gain additional market share. Apple Inc focuses on quality and elegant looking products. It is well poised to dominate the technology field in the foreseeable future as it diversifies its products to inculcate those developed by competitors such as Samsung. In this way, Apple Inc gains customers through production of high-end products that are not easily acquired, enabling them to illustrate a high-standard of life, which further contributes to loyalty (David, 1986).

Google can be deemed one of the most successful companies due to its use of an intensive growth strategy that has seen the company grow magnanimously over a span of less than two decades. Firstly, it employs the use of market penetration in many regions, particularly other nations apart from the United States. Due to the existence of other large firms that utilize online advertising and search engines in nations such as China, the company views market penetration as an effective intensive growth strategy. Therefore, it is clear that Google is continuously seeking a larger share in the rapidly expanding market for online advertising (Rao, Rao and Sivaramakrishna, 2008).

The company has also evidenced growth through the integration of an intensive strategy for growth focused on market development. Google’s Fiber product is an excellent example of this strategy where the company’s Fiber Internet service and cable has been availed in a few states such as Missouri, Utah, Kansas and Texas. These states have been selected as a pilot program for Google’s market development strategy. The company seeks to provide the Fiber product to additional states in the future, continuously expanding its capabilities while weeding out competition as it advances (Hill and Jones, 20120

Amazon is the current global giant in online retailing. It started as an online bookstore, which was a success. For that reason, the company’s management ventured into online retailing, selling anything that can be sold online. Amazon moved to the global scene where it integrates globalized logistics platforms, localized portals and globalized delivery in its systems to exhibit considerable competitive advantage over its competitors. Amazon has in a way, leveraged technology and used it to gain considerable benefits due to economies of scale. Moreover, it leverages existing synergies between external drivers and internal resources that its competitors have repeatedly tried to mimic to develop effective business models. The company displays creativity as it seeks additional share in the market through introduction of aspects such as an Amazon app aimed at capturing a large percentage of the growing mobile commerce segment. It is evident that Amazon employs a global strategy as it seeks to dominate the retail business. Since it is an online store, it elicits considerable flexibility over its brick-and-mortar rivals such as Walmart. As a result, it is easier for Amazon to penetrate interior markets where physical stores cannot as it provides an individualized experience to cater to a customer’s needs through a localized portal (Rao, Rao and Sivaramakrishna, 2008).

Apple Inc, Google and Amazon use similar albeit different strategies to capture market share. In each company, the focus is retention of customers and growth of market share. Nonetheless, different processes are employed to elicit objectives where quality of the process can be deemed a critical factor. Although each organization operates in a different industry, each company analyzed focuses on ensuring high-end customer service, a fact that has led to their continued expansion in contemporary society. Strategic management, when implemented effectively, is a powerful organizational management tool as illustrated in the essay.