0Phase 0 · Context & strategyv2.1.3
Product development methods · External environment analysis
DevelopmentMilad Karami🇩🇪 DeutschOriginal tool: John Naska (mokka.solutions) · October 2026

STEP / PEST analysis

Analyse the external environment of your company or project in a structured way, so you do not overlook anything important. This tool guides you category by category through S·T·E·P (and the extensions PESTEL, STEEP and STEEPLE), collects opportunities & risks and derives measures from them. Five editable examples, an optional guided mode and export included.

▶ Watch the explainer video 🇩🇪 Deutsch
Guided mode
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💡 Click the Opportunity/Risk field to toggle it, and the dots to set the impact (low → high). For each factor, enter its meaning and the derived measure – the measures are collected below as an action list.

Guide: how to proceed

STEP analysis is a guide to make sure you do not overlook any important external factors. Pick a step above – or switch on guided mode and an assistant will take you through it step by step.

What is STEP / PEST analysis? +

STEP analysis (also called PEST – the same factors, in a different letter order) helps you analyse the external environment of a company or project in a structured way: identify all the important external influencing factors, derive opportunities and risks from them and finally determine suitable measures. It comes from strategic corporate development, but it works just as well for projects – large or small.

Example from the video: Anyone who wants to sell German bratwurst in Paris should think about local taste, food law and French employment law – all external factors.

The four basic categories

S — Socio-cultural Society, values, trends, demographics, language
T — Technological Technology, innovation, patents, infrastructure
E — Economic Economy, purchasing power, interest rates, prices, subsidies
P — Political Politics, laws, regulation, stakeholders

Extensions

PESTEL/PESTLE adds environment (ecological) and legal · STEEP adds environment · STEEPLE additionally adds ethics · LONG PESTEL runs PESTEL three times – local, national, global. Which variant is the best? The one that sets the right priorities for your undertaking and that you find easiest to work with.

Important

The analysis is only a tool. The decisive – and hardest – part comes afterwards: deriving concrete measures and strategies from the factors for your project, your company (or even your own life).

How saving works +

This HTML file is your document. Everything you enter is saved in this very file, just like a Word document. If you share the file, it includes all your analyses.

Save (green button or Ctrl+S) saves the current state without prompting. Until you create your own working file, the state is stored in the browser and is available the next time you open it.

Save as (under “Analyses”) creates a file on your drive. This is the only time you are asked where to save. After that, each Save writes silently to the same file.

The first time: Open the file, click “Analyses”, then Save as. From then on, just use the green button.

Autosave: Once an analysis has been saved, the tool automatically saves subsequent changes after a few seconds.

If something goes wrong: The tool continually stores a recovery copy in the browser. If the browser crashes or you accidentally close the window, your work is available the next time you open it.

Browser support: Chrome and Edge currently support writing directly to the file. In Firefox and Safari, everything stays saved in the browser, and the file itself remains unchanged.