In the wake of the pandemic, businesses around the globe have found themselves at the forefront of an unexpected wave of digital transformation. But as people return to their offices, many companies have switched back to their old habits, erroneously believing the threat is gone.
But the truth is, the threat of exclusion from the highly competitive and ever-changing business market is always there. Whether you’re running a big or small business, you must find a way to embrace digital transformation and ensure that it makes a sustainable and meaningful impact on your business.
What Is Digital Transformation?
When people hear digital transformation, they mostly confuse it with digitalization or digitization, which are two completely different processes. Digitization is converting analog information into digital, while digitalization refers to using digitized information to simplify and increase the efficiency of your work. Both processes pave the way for digital transformation. Moreover, without digitization, you can’t reach the digitalization stage either.
However, what digital transformation means for your business is unique to its specific needs and capabilities. The standard definition describes it as incorporating digital technology that changes your business in its entirety, from its basic business operations to the end product that reaches your customers. It also entails changes in your organization’s mindset so that you’re constantly encouraged to experiment, challenge yourself, and not be afraid of failure.
The main drivers behind digital transformation are the need for improvement and various issues your company encounters. It could be the need to increase productivity, customer satisfaction, profitability, etc.
Customer satisfaction and expectations have always been the leading challenges for every business. With new technologies like mobile devices, social media, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things (IoT), their expectations have reached new heights. Of course, there are also the “disruptors” who raise these expectations further and create standards for other companies by utilizing these technologies in new ways.
Digital transformation might happen inside your business, but it’s much larger than you think. It also affects government organizations and public sector agencies that deal with many serious societal issues. By leveraging these emerging technologies, they look for ways to improve living standards worldwide.
What Are the Benefits of Digital Transformation?
Besides ensuring that you stay on the business battlefield, digital transformation also carries various benefits that help your business evolve, garner more customers, and prosper.
Increasing Customer Satisfaction
As mentioned, customer satisfaction is one of the primary drivers of digital transformation. But it’s also the result. Digital transformation enables personalization and automation of services, which puts the customer first and ensures a high-quality user experience.
Real-Time Data Monitoring
Digital transformation enables companies to collect and analyze data in real time, gaining better insight into the performance of their products and services. You get more accurate, complete, contextual data that tells you exactly what you need to change or improve.
In addition, previously, you had to collect data from multiple disconnected platforms. Now, you can have your data all in one place, ready to analyze and transform into informed, revenue-generating decisions.
Increasing Efficiency
Implementing technologies like AI and robotic process automation (RPA) to perform dull and repetitive tasks will increase the pace of business and your office productivity and leave your employees with more time for more inspiring and motivating tasks. Employing bots also minimizes errors and improves time-to-market.
Enhancing Company Collaboration
One vital aspect of digital transformation is innovation. To encourage innovation and creativity, you must have a community with good collaboration and open communication. As you introduce digital transformation technologies into your workplace, you’ll get higher productivity, eliminate slow responses and information loss, and improve idea sharing between employees.
That ultimately helps businesses make smarter and more accurate decisions that meet the needs of clients and customers and outperform the competition.
Ensuring Future Digital Growth
Starting your business’s digital transformation journey will prepare it for implementing technologies yet to come. Otherwise, your company risks falling behind others and soon becoming obsolete and irrelevant in the ever-evolving market. Gradually implementing changes and keeping up with current trends is a must for every company.
How to Digitally Transform Your Business
Your digital transformation strategy depends on how you imagine your business to operate in this new digital age. However, there are several vital considerations that every business needs to take into account.
Switch Your Mindset From Product-Focused to Customer-Focused
You should start by envisioning the ideal experience you want for your customers. That includes analyzing the market, your competition, and current trends. This way, you’ll be able to anticipate your customer expectations and their potential changes before you even start crafting your new strategy.
Understand the Potential of Your Technology
Understanding what today’s new technology brings is another crucial aspect you need to master early on. Then, knowing how to tailor them to your business and customer needs is next. But don’t forget to also think about how to reap as many benefits of your technology investment as possible.
Train Your Employees
Apart from implementing new technology, ensure that your employees are aware of the changes and retrain them to be accustomed to the new way of working. Clearly explain your new goals and why changes are necessary, and ensure everyone knows their role.
Some employees get too used to the old ways and might take longer to adjust, so it’s necessary to devote enough time to this aspect.
Be Prepared for Mistakes
New technology allows businesses to be more agile, regardless of their size. Don’t be afraid to experiment and explore in ways you weren’t able to before. It’ll help you better understand what works and what doesn’t for the future and makes fewer mistakes as you go.
Find a Reliable Partner on Your Journey to Digitalization
Digital transformation may sound overwhelming regardless of whether you’ve just launched your business or have many years under your belt as a business owner. It requires you to reimagine how you do business and its whole structure.
If you’re struggling to start your digital transformation journey or aren’t certain where your company currently stands on that path, know that you’re not alone. For businesses in Philadelphia, eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware, KDI Office Technology is here to help. Our IT experts will match your business with appropriate technology that fits your company’s requirements and needs. Contact KDI today for more information on how to digitally transform your business.