8 Ways to Build Digital Transformation Strategies

Companies have had unavoidable business effects since embracing digital transformation. Its advantages include increased efficiency, increased revenue growth, and lower operating expenses. 

 

In fact, according to a recent poll, 92 percent of businesses are already seeking digital transformation. Many companies have understood that in order to compete utilising digital marketing, data, and technology, they need to go through a systematic digital transformation process.

 

Despite the fact that the first pioneers began to use the Internet for marketing more than 25 years ago. We were told that new strategies such as web and email marketing would provide inexpensive, rapid, and simple ways to reach new customers. We now know this isn't the case, and aggressive digital marketing management is required.

 

 

What is Digital Transformation and its scope?

 

Digital transformation is the process of combining digital technology into all aspects of an organisation, drastically changing how you operate and provide value to clients. Firms must continuously challenge the established quo, experiment, and learn to embrace failure as part of this cultural transition.

 

It's tough to come up with a uniform definition because each company's digital transition will be unique. However, we define digital transformation as the integration of digital technology into all parts of an organisation, resulting in significant changes in how businesses operate and provide value to customers. 

 

Beyond that, it's a cultural transformation that requires companies to regularly challenge the current quo, experiment constantly, and be comfortable with failure. This might involve discarding long-standing business procedures on which organisations were based in favour of newer, still-developing practices.

 

As Dave Chaffey of Smart Insights noted in his book Digital Marketing: Strategy, Planning, and Implementation, the scope of transformation should include controlling and leveraging these "5Ds of Digital." 

 

The 5Ds identify the many ways in which consumers may connect with brands and businesses can reach and learn from their audiences:

 

• As they connect with corporate websites and mobile applications, audiences interact with businesses using a range of linked devices such as smartphones, tablets, desktop computers, televisions, and gaming devices. 

• The majority of interactions on these devices occur through a browser or apps from major platforms or services such as Facebook and Instagram, Google and YouTube, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

• Paid, owned, and earned digital media platforms for reaching and engaging audiences include advertising, email and message, search engines, and social networks.

• Digital data, or the information that businesses collect on their audience demographics and interactions with businesses, is now required by law in most countries.

• Companies use digital technology, often known as the marketing technology stack, to create interactive experiences that range from websites and mobile apps to in-store kiosks and email campaigns.

 

(Also read: Top 10 Digital Transformation Trends)

 

 

Understanding Digital transformation Strategies

 

A Digital Transformation Strategy is a plan of action that outlines how a company should reposition itself strategically in the digital economy. The way winning firms function changes as client behaviours change. They use evolving technology to innovate, adjust operational and business models, and take advantage of new technologies.

 

A digital transformation plan, from the perspective of the technology sector, often entails the use of technology to accomplish formerly manual processes. The problem with this approach is that businesses have been using technology to better how they provide their products and services since the beginning of time.

 

A digital transformation strategy is a precise plan for implementing digital technologies to enhance your company's physical elements in engineering, production, and service. Digital transformation is a wide business approach in and of itself. The important cornerstone is the development of a roadmap for short and long-term digital transformation, led by business results rather than technology.

 

(Suggested blog: Examples of digital technology)

 

How to build digital transformation strategies?

 

1. Obtaining buy-in

 

You'll need top-down buy-in before you can start creating your digital transformation framework. Because digital transformation is such a large undertaking that touches every aspect of the organisation, you won't be able to implement a plan without the buy-in and alignment of all key stakeholders. 

 

The leadership is in charge of communicating the company's vision to the rest of the staff. Your digital strategy will be doomed before it even leaves the port if you don't have a cohesive staff.

 

2. Aligning your transformation efforts with your company's objectives

 

Once you've figured out your narrative, make sure everyone else in the company, especially other leaders, understands how to communicate it. 

 

"The most crucial stage in a successful transformation is alignment, and it must be supported from the top down," says Bernie Gracy, Agero's chief digital officer. "CEOs and boards of directors must convey that moving to digital is the correct strategy, define the proper results, and allay fears of the substitutional impact,' in which old processes or products are replaced by new or digital ones." 

 

Furthermore, digital transformation affects every department and budget, and all functional teams must be included. IT alone cannot drive transformation; it must be properly connected with the organization's broader route, goals, mission, history, and planned future."

 

3. Obtaining funds

 

If everyone is on board, you can start crunching numbers. What kind of budget do you have for this project? 

 

It's critical to keep in mind that digital transformation is a long-term project. It's a long-term strategy to how you do business that will affect all aspects of your company (including all departments, employees, and customers). Your budget will aid you in determining priorities, allocating resources, and determining scope as you go forward with your overall plan.

 

4. Specifying an engaging tale about your digital approach

 

What benefits would digital transformation bring to your business? The first key step in your digital transformation journey is figuring out how to answer that question and make it relevant for everyone involved.

 

People routinely use the word "cloud," but few workers have a clear understanding of what it is or how it operates. Before you can generate buy-in and adoption, workers must understand what they need to support, as with any change. 

 

Make up a tale. Take a look at a normal employee's day in their life, complete with all of the benefits of working in a digital environment. Draw attention to both the rewards and the problems, and connect them to strategy and success. Give them something to aspire for that they can relate with.

 

5. Examine your existing situation

 

You may begin establishing the basis for your approach after you have buy-in and a rough budget. The first step is to assess your company's current situation. You won't be able to plan your path if you don't know where you're starting from. You may use a current state analysis to:

 

• Examine the company's culture.

• Examine the skills of the workers.

• Processes, operations, organisational structure, and roles should all be mapped out.

• Determine what possibilities and problems need to be handled.

 

One of the most common blunders businesses make when undergoing a digital transformation is expecting they can simply move their existing technology to a new platform or system (such as the cloud or AWS) without taking into account their present procedures. 

 

A current status evaluation will provide you with the data you need to make strategic decisions about your digital processes and resources.

 

6. Master the art of risk management

 

Everything about digital transformation and disruptive business models appears to contradict standard IT risk management and control notions. 

 

Moving quickly, challenging the status quo, and developing and scaling new technologies and operational mindsets are all part of the digital transformation process. The ones who have mastered this facet of disruptive change are more likely to lead a successful transformation initiative.

 

7. Determine your objectives and intended outcomes

 

After you have a clear image of where you are now, you can start looking ahead. 

 

• What digital goals are you aiming for? 

• What are your goals for this project? 

• What type of experience do you want your customers and employees to have when they interact with you?

 

As you consider these questions, keep the overall picture in mind. The goal of a digital transformation is to accomplish long-term core goals. Be brave and ambitious in your vision. Make a gap analysis.

 

You have a good idea of where you are and where you want to go. As a result, you can now see where the gaps and possibilities are between those two stages.

 

• What gaps must be filled? (e.g., customers, stakeholders, employees, skills, culture)

• What inefficiencies or redundancies do you have?

• What resources, procedures, or data would you require?

 

 

8. Make a plan for digital transformation

 

You may construct a strategic roadmap to assist you reach your vision now that you've set your goals and identified any gaps between your business and those objectives.

 

Make a plan to move from where you are and where you want to be. Reframing infrastructure, retraining staff or attracting new talent, upgrading your software stack, and switching to a new development methodology are all examples of this. 

 

For each section of the plan, your roadmap should include primary goals and priorities, intermediate objectives, a calendar with milestones and benchmarks, and essential participants and responsibilities. (source)

 

Keep in mind that a plan should be malleable and develop as your organisation and the digital landscape's goals change.