3 essential steps to kickstart Digital Transformation
Digital Transformation is a focus for many organisations right now and as you can see from the Google Trends search volumes, it's increasing in popularity recently. As with any change within an organisation, there are many challenges (as shown in my previous post on Understanding Digital Transformation), so once you've identified digital advocates in the organisation, it's time to map out the journey.
In recent months, several companies have mentioned to me that their CEO is committed to digital, but they're having challenges at middle management levels, where it's harder to gain commitment. This can be easier if there is a clear plan shared with all. You can, as many do, call this your digital roadmap, it describes where the business is now and where they're going. There are several models available, for example, Dave Chaffey recommends the Carnegie Mellon Capability Maturity model (CMM) in his post 'Using capability maturity models to review effectiveness and set targets for Digital Transformation' Interestingly he describes the early internet age which is less than twenty years ago, when many companies had claimed their domain name yet the website was 'under construction'. At that time many CEOs I was working with could not see why they needed a website when they had fantastic brochures, sales teams on the road and great PR contacts!
Today, if a business doesn't have a good quality, branded website you assume something is wrong. It's suspicious not quaint. Your online presence is part of your authenticity, it is inconceivable to imagine a Fortune 500 or FTSE100 company without at least one website. In the same vein, in five years' time we may consider companies without a digital strategy, or an integrated marketing strategy to be in the same time warp.
Gain evidence before you get started with digital transformation
Before starting on a new journey, it's essential to gain some evidence. It's unlikely you'd plan a holiday without first checking weather reports, currency details, travel times and hotel reviews. Yet in business we frequently start on a project without evidence. To ensure your digital transformation journey works, start with an audit to identify the 'where are you now?' question. This gives you benchmark information that can be used at a later stage. Within this I typically would review:
- What are your digital strengths and weaknesses? Use the TOWs matrix to make this more useful.
- What are your key competitors, or similar organisations doing?
- What's around the corner? This information is often not available online as it's often 'work in progress'. I recently attended the Academy of Marketing conference to explore what's new in marketing education, it was really useful and revealed latest marketing thinking in research and education. Look at relevant events where you can meet other businesses in a similar situation and if you’re reading this and in the digital sector, don't forget the Smart Insights conference taking place in London (17th September) which brings together all the elements of integrated digital marketing.
And what do your customers want? Customers often find the path to the new product offer way before organisations do. Taking holidays as an example, consumers can spend hours, days and weeks to identify their ideal holiday (how long did it take you to plan your holiday this year?) Yet how many destinations, hotels and attractions still produce masses of brochures? TripAdvisor conducts in-depth research each year and its latest report noted that
“When researching places to stay on TripAdvisor, 80 percent of respondents read at least 6-12 reviews before making their decision, and they’re most interested in recent reviews that will give them the freshest feedback.
More than half of respondents (53%) will not book a hotel that does not have reviews.”
Yet at the same time, many hotels and restaurants ignore the reviews and worst still, some argue with the customer! If you're in the hospitality sector, and if you ignore reviews online and your bookings are down, there is a reason. Is it time to ditch the brochures and focus on the reviews?
There are many digital resources to explore what your customers think, as an example, see this blog post with suggestions for Website Customer Feedback Tools and see also our digital audit toolkit.
But when you get the customer feedback, don't ignore it!
Create clear objectives about where the business is going
Once the audit stage is completed, it's useful to understand what does your organisation want to achieve? Are there specific objectives? Is there a future milestone that's driving practice within the business? Or has your business started to notice that it's being left behind?
To move to the next step, use a model or process. I'd recommend the 5S marketing goals as a tool to develop business objectives. This is because many objectives focus on the numbers, which is essential, but it leaves out other factors. The 5Ss which was originally designed as a website review tool (and still works for this purpose) is an easy to use ‘objective generator’. If you’re not familiar with this tool, click here. It’s worth working on the objectives with a team so you get some early buy-in.
Even so, it's important to understand that the process doesn't happen overnight, it can take some time. Dell is a good example of a company that's constantly adapted to customer and market needs, from 1996 when Dell.com launched, generating $1 million in sales per day just six months after the site went live, to 1999 when they blazed a trail and took technical support online, when others said it couldn’t be done. Dell share their story and we’ve included it previously as a great example of how a company has managed its transformation.
In a recent consultancy article from Cap Gemini, they highlighted Starbucks who adapted their business to embrace digital, after a series of disappointing results. From free WiFi to adding mobile payments, they have created a difference in today’s ever-crowded coffee shop market.
The New York Times is probably the best known news publisher in the USA. Founded in 1851 it’s recently embarked on a programme of digital transformation, forced due to a changing macro environment and competitors who have moved ahead. And with the advent of new, younger competitors, like the Huffington Post who started less than ten years ago, and have eclipsed the readership of the NYT.
In the past the idea of a start-up gaining more web visitors than the best known political paper, was unthinkable. Yet the Huffington Post has a higher web rank both in the US and globally.
What’s needed for digital transformation to work?
The UK government and indeed the US government are embarking on programmes of digital transformation. This seems to be driven by customer need (I want to pay bills online, so send me an email with a link) and cost saving, reducing the amount of paper issued, documents printed and postage every year.
The UK government’s vision is ‘Digital by Default’. I've used this transformation dashboard on several training courses as it sums up the vision succinctly. There is a supporting paragraph for anyone needing more detail and one of the reasons it will work is that they’ve started to classify where each department is on its roadmap.
As would be expected within major institutions such as government services, the steps to digital transformation start with discovery, what are the users’ needs and will it work? Stage two is alpha where the objective is to build a working prototype to be used by stakeholders to gain greater understanding of a service. What’s interesting is that this stage is time-bound to take no more than 8 weeks. I wonder if that always happens? Stage three is beta, where the service is tested and improved until it reaches stage four, live.
In the USA President Obama launched the digital strategy with a question “I want us to ask ourselves every day, how are we using technology to make a real difference in people’s lives?” This evolved into their vision “Information and services anywhere, anytime, on any device”.
How to launch the digital transformation strategy
In all these examples, there are three common factors which you need to adopt to get started with your digital transformation. This is the first step on your digital roadmap.
- A high-level advocate
- A clear vision
- A digital team
A high-level advocate
You need support from the highest level to transform your business and adopt digital tools, techniques and technology. If you don’t get buy-in from the C-suite, it’s difficult to achieve. Identify your champion or advocate early and ensure they're in a position to get things done.
A clear vision
In the past companies had ‘mission statements that were so long, they were printed onto the back of business cards as an aide-memoire! Today your vision has to be clear, memorable and succinct. If you need a place to start with a vision, look at this blog post on setting BHAGs and this post on examples of using vision statements.
A digital team
Teams have been formed to transfer knowledge, provide support and enable existing staff and departments to adopt digital. The teams may be formed as a working party within your organisation and supplemented with external help either as training, consultancy or new staff. This is also why there is such growth in digital qualifications!
In the next article I’ll look at getting buy-in. Do share how digital is working in your organisation! In the meantime, the Smart Insights Digital Transformation guide gives more recommendations on making the journey.
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