Research: Why and How Organizations are Adapting for the Digital Customer Experience

For years I’ve studied the evolution of disruptive technology and its impact on business. While new technology is a constant in today’s consumer world, businesses are struggling to identify trends versus fads. More importantly, many are wrestling with how to adapt philosophies, models and systems to harness disruptive technologies inside and outside the organization to improve customer and employee experiences.

The truth is that technology is relentless and each new wave of innovation only continues to test, business models and push markets forward. Markets are evolving and at some point, customer behavior and expectations progress faster than the ability for executives to first accept that things are changing and then act to do something about it.

But make no mistake; we are not going back to a “simpler” time or to a slower, less connected world. This is a time of Digital Darwinism, where technology and society are evolving faster than the ability to adapt. With every new trend, with every new device, companies are presented with new opportunities and challenges to compete. But it is how businesses change and how they don’t now and over time that is creating a Darwinian ecosystem of survival of the fittest and the fitting.

To compete for the future, businesses leaders must think beyond survival today. Leaders must now seek innovation in how business can be done in an increasingly digital era to compete in tomorrow’s evolving markets right now.

Digital Transformation: Why and How Companies are Investing in New Business Models to Lead Digital Customer Experiences

Over the last year, my colleague Jaimy Szymanski and I spent time with some of the most recognized companies in the world to study how the roles of new customer behavior and disruptive technologies are influencing how organizations evolve. Specifically, we set out to learn how digital technologies are impacting customer behavior and in turn how businesses are responding to these changes. Flying under a banner of “Digital Transformation,” these companies are focusing efforts on understanding the digital customer experience to make the case for change.

Today, I’m both proud, and relieved, to release the results of this research. The new Altimeter Group report is now available here.

The new report defines and explains what digital transformation is and presents the challenges and opportunities that emerge throughout the process. While each story is unique, the steps that each organization takes and why, the challenges they face and how they overcome them, demonstrate that the most compelling way to change is to start by taking steps toward the digital customer rather than attempting to lure them without knowing who they are, where they go, what they prefer or expect, and how they make decisions.

Our findings represent important trends and goals in digital transformation that benefit all businesses seeking to adapt to digital markets in meaningful ways.

Some of the interesting things we learned include:

1. Social, mobile, real-time, and other disruptive technologies are aligning to necessitate bigger changes than initially anticipated.
2. Digital transformation is quickly becoming a priority for many leading organizations.
3. Mapping and understanding the customer experience is becoming critical in guiding transformation efforts.
4. While gaining momentum, digital transformation as a formal process is still in its infancy.
5. Digital transformation is driven partly by technology and also by the evolution of customer behavior.
6. Three key elements that form the compound upon which digital transformation efforts are built:
   1. It is most effective with pointed vision and supportive leadership.
   2. Optimizing the digital customer experience becomes the initial objective.
   3. Change materializes through the formation of a digital transformation team.
   4. A list of best practices will serve as a checklist to help strategists take the next steps to beginning digital transformation or optimizing current efforts.

Customer-Centricity Starts with Actually Being Customer Centric

Digital transformation takes a truly customer-centric perspective that wins over one that’s mainly technology-centric. It starts by simply asking, “what would my digital customer do?” It continues with continually asking and answering the question.

Consistently, we found that companies undergoing digital transformation efforts are refocusing and reorganizing teams to optimize and integrate digital touchpoints. This affects not only the roles and objectives of marketing, social media, web, mobile, and customer service, but also their intentions and how these typically disparate groups work toward harmony.

Digital transformation is not a fad or a trendy moniker to signify rising investments in social and mobile. While other research around the topic may focus on technology investments to solve problems, we believe that digital transformation is bigger than that: organizations are truly changing from the inside out.

In the end, the goal of digital transformation is to make businesses relevant in a digital era. At the same time, strategists seek to grow opportunities and profits as well as scale efficiently in the process.

Digital transformation represents the next big thing in customer experience and ultimately how business is done. Those companies that “get it” early on, that invest more in learning about their digital customers’ behaviors, preferences, and expectations, will carry a significant competitive advantage over those that figure it out later.

Please download the report now.

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