Digital processes are reshaping every aspect of a business today. As digital technology continues to evolve, digital transformation requires collaboration, planning, and breaking the siloed working environment in order for organisations to embrace the power of the medium. The shift in how people consume information is influencing how we behave.
Digital has already started taking shape as a pillar of corporate strategy and requires to be driven from the CEO. The importance of collaboration and ownership has shifted the traditional way of working across organizations where it has been successful (Banking, Aviation, Start-ups). Be it a CIO or CDO the important factor for driving the change is the authority of being able to pull in resources agnostic of the roles and increase collaboration across teams and functions.
Every business that exists today will undergo this transformation as disruption across the sectors increases. With technology disrupting and changing the way sectors have worked traditionally (Uber, Airbnb, Amazon) it starts the introspection of re-looking the way customers were perceived. The randomization of the customer (due to increased contact points, modes of access) it’s imperative that brands look at them as collection of data points vs the traditional route.
1.Being Adaptive:
As silo’s get broken, co-working and co-creation take the main stage, a modern enterprise would need to adapt to the industry and marketplace shifts and incorporate new technology into company culture and regular operations. One of the key elements to digital transformation is to be able to embrace the power of technology and be able to weave the enterprise culture to lead change. The most innovative future centric companies like Google, Amazon, Airbnb have been at the forefront of driving a modern working enterprise and enables the process of transformation via collaboration across teams. Smaller working groups, cross practice projects, and employee engagement are handy tools.
2. Evolution of the Customer Behaviour
The evolution of the customer today has resulted in them having way more control on what they want to read/see or hear or engage with. At the same time it gives marketers control over what and how they want to showcase. As, we become more connected the avenues and paths that defies the typical customer journeys are blurring and/or evolving. Customer delight should be the ultimate goal of any digital transformation project and these include both the internal and external customers. The patterns that guide purchase decision are both random and “self-influenced”. The one key element in that remains constant is the word of mouth and how peer to peer interaction sustains.
3. Innovation as a culture
Proactive innovation is one of the best ways to stay competitive in an evolving marketplace. New technology needs to be assessed, tested, analyzed, and judged more quickly than ever. Innovation leads to disruption that leads to new customer journeys and brands could be key in driving those behaviours in a digital first economy.
4. AI and Bots
2017 will see our engagement with technology increase to a new level and adoption made easy to an everyday model. Machine learning and deep learning has already allowed computers to understand and replicate human centric responses. Google DeepMind/ Messenger/Siri/ Alexa, the rise of AI and bots would be key to driving efficiencies in customer interactions and communications. It will become one of the most disruptive forces in the coming year, and something that can be embraced across various functions including HR, Sales, Marketing, and rightly strategized and planned would become something that people get used to interacting with and in turn define behaviour.
5. Privacy and Security
Another key area given the impact and penetration of technology would the importance and need of improving and evolving the data privacy and security. With increasing data being shred and available online, it’s important for users, providers, and companies need to have a strong focus and investing on security, firewalls and blockers as required. In a pervasive digital first era, the risks that one faces as an individual or as an organisation also come with the same speed.
6. Analytics
Brands leverage analytics to discover where customers are connecting to them either social media platform, a blog, or somewhere else. It’s important to have seamless user experience to build that brand and customer loyalty. Digital provides more accurate segmentation, interest and behaviour pattern. Big Data as it evolves, will help define the core pillars of an organisation and consumer behaviour.
With the increase of human to tech interface, the way structures and cultures get defined will be impacted. Collaboration and co-creation across functions would be allow organisations to think beyond the normal and drive change. Technology needs to be weaved as part of the narrative rather than worked on as a function of IT or Marketing, it needs to be embraced as a pillar of corporate strategy.
