With the New Year quickly approaching, it’s common for many of us to start thinking about our New Year’s resolutions. Sadly, studies have shown that only 8% of us are successful in carrying out our resolutions. Why? Most of the time it’s because we fail to see the commitment as a complete lifestyle overhaul, with many different components that need to work together in order to achieve success. We also tend to be a little bit unrealistic when it comes to what is achievable based based on our specific needs, goals and lifestyle.
For many companies, their 2016 resolution is centered around digital business transformation – and the same principle holds true. All too often companies will adopt a solution, but they fail to see their digital transformation strategy as a “lifestyle overhaul”, one that has many interconnected components that all need to work in tandem in order for their vision to be carried out.
In order to execute a successful digital transformation strategy, with high adoption rates and a high ROI, there are 3 main integral strategic components that must be developed. These components can not be treated as separate entities, but rather as cogs working seamlessly together to make cohesive go-to-market strategy.
1. Business Strategy
This should be the center of any digital transformation strategy, before applications or solutions are even considered. It is the foundation of your strategy and without a solid foundation your strategy will be sure to crumble in the short-term.
This is where you define your goals and KPI’s as an organization – what is achievable based on your unique needs? You also need to ensure your business and technology KPIs are aligned. For example, it’s not enough to simply adopt a CRM solution to manage your growing customer data-base. You have to think – how will the solution integrate with your other systems, how can it boost efficiency for the business, how can it help increase sales and how will you define and measure success?
When you work with an IT solutions firm that takes the time to understand your business and one that aligns their solution to your KPIs, you can rest assured that the foundation for your strategy will be solid.
2. User Experience
This is the most important component in your digital transformation strategy and it is surprisingly often ignored. Whether your business operates in the B2B or B2C realm, today’s consumers are not interested in the product you’re selling, for them it’s all about the experience you’re delivering – and this experience must be seamless across all of your channels, both digital and non-digital.
For example – telecom providers don’t have the best reputation when it comes to customer service, however self-serve portals are slowly changing this. Self-serve options allow customers to solve their issues without having to talk to customer service. In addition, connecting these tools to back-office systems such as your CRM, enables a seamless experience both online and offline saving both time and money.
On the flip side – we can’t think about the user experience as purely customer-facing, it’s also very important to consider the operational side. Employees will not adopt and use a new tool unless the experience makes their lives easier and more efficient.
User experience is the sum of all engagements, we need to think more holistically because everything we do from business operations to customer service is connected. By focusing on user experience only then can you measure and define your business KPIs.
3. Applications and Solutions
This is where many businesses and IT solutions firms alike focus their attention. Applications and solutions exist at a high level attempting to solve operational issues such as operational efficiency, collaboration and customer engagement.
However, without considering the business strategy or user experience, applications and solutions are usually deployed as siloed system. They are also often created without sufficient consideration for the needs or varying skill levels of users and the opportunities inherent to business platforms, both customer-facing and operational. On their own, applications and solutions often have poor adoption rates and do not achieve their full potential, much like our New Year’s resolutions.
Successful digital transformation initiatives are only achieved when each of these three components are aligned. When creating your digital strategy it’s important to partner with an IT solutions firm that understands your business KPIs and understands what the desired user experience should be. Only then can they successfully help your business innovation itself. This is exactly how the TechBlocks team operates in order to guarantee success for our clients.
