Digital transformation—one of the many buzzwords that will be floating around in Orlando next week at OPEX, the Business Transformation World Summit. In fact, it's a word that has been floating around quite a bit lately, with some calling 2017 the year of digital transformation.
Digital transformation describes the strategic use of digital technologies to accelerate business activities, processes, competencies, and models. Many are feeling the pressure to embrace the digital space—87% of companies believe that digital transformation will make their businesses more competitive.
And with technology continuing to accelerate, the risk of not investing in digital strategy just keeps getting higher. According to a recent Gartner survey, by 2017, 20% of all market leaders will lose their dominant position to a company founded after the year 2000 due to a lack of digital advantage.
But many of these companies are fighting to maintain their positions. 90% of Fortune 500 enterprises are implementing or looking to implement advanced digital use cases, such as advanced analytics, machine learning, and IoT, and the enterprise digital transformation is expected to be a $136 billion market by 2020.
In case you are among the many making digital transformation a priority, we’ve compiled a list of nine things to consider as you do so.
Be careful that you don’t simply jump on any technology that crosses your path. You need to determine which processes are the most important to take digital first. Focus your initial efforts on areas with a more immediate payback. A census-wide poll revealed that customer experience, operations, innovation, and marketing possess the largest potential for early payback in the digital transformation—so you may want to start there.
Take the time to find the platforms, applications, and solutions that fit your culture, existing workflows, and budget. There’s no set roadmap for going digital that will work for everyone—it needs to be an approach personalized for your organization and situation.
The ultimate goal of digital transformation is user experience. So in order to meet the demands of the digital age, focus on your consumer and the user journey. Map out the entire customer journey, and then determine how going digital can make each touchpoint an improved and more efficient experience.
Transform the user experience into one that is positive, consistent, and available anytime, anywhere. Customers are looking for increased technological capabilities, ease of use, and responsiveness. If the experience doesn’t align with their needs, they’ll be quick to turn elsewhere.
More than 40% of spending on digital transformation today comes from customer targeting and engagement use cases, such as more personalization, targeted promotions, and omnichannel experiences.
Quick sidenote: Lucidchart is the perfect tool for mapping your user journey. We've even got a template to get you started.
When it comes to technology, change is going to be a constant, and there’s nothing we can do about it. What you can do is create a culture within your organization that embraces technology and the changes that come with it. Foster a culture that moves quickly from idea to implementation so you can analyze the impact of new technology and determine its impact on your organization.
