Why you need to leverage digital transformation to provide your consumers with an enhanced customer experience
As digital technologies evolve and redefine every aspect of how businesses operate, the economy is simultaneously transforming. At the core of this multifaceted transformation lies the responsibility of delivering distinct, enhanced, and outstanding experiences to the customer.
While efficiencies in process and production may help to even the playing field, when used alone, this model will not offer a business long term advantages. To stand out against competitors in today’s economy, businesses must design and deliver imaginative and exemplary customer experiences leveraging the powers of digital transformation.
What is Digital Transformation?
Digital transformation is the use of fast, innovative, and rapidly evolving digital technology to solve problems and propel the growth of businesses. While there are numerous elements contained within the purview of the term ‘digital transformation’, at the center lies its correlation to a customer centric focus. As businesses continue to adopt digital transformation, the change is fundamentally driven by an evolution in customer expectations.
- According to a 2017 Salesforce study, 75% of customers surveyed expect a consistent experience across all channels of interaction, to include online, social media, on the phone, or in person.
- According to a Wunderman survey, 79% of customers want brands to demonstrate that they are valued, prior to making a purchase. The survey also found that 54% feel a greater affinity for brands that appear to understand them.
- According to a 2018 Temkin study, customers who have an exceptional customer experience are 7 times as likely to make a new purchase, 5 times as likely to repurchase, and 4 times as likely to refer their purchase to another consumer.
The results are undeniable: an enhanced customer experience matters. The benchmarks and dynamics of the consumer-business relationship are clearly being driven by the consumer. Equally apparent, digital transformation is one of the most efficient means available to effectively and consistently meet and exceed customer expectations and standards to provide an enhanced customer experience.
Customer Experience in the Digital Age
Customer experience (CX) includes every interaction your customer has with your brand and organisation. Across every stage of their journey, these interactions will shape their overall perception of your company. When your company creates a positive customer experience, they will be more likely to use your products and services. Additionally, when a customer has a positive experience, they will be more likely to share their experience with their friends and family. Perhaps most importantly, a positive customer experience leads to enhanced brand loyalty.
CX is an integral, embedded, and definitive aspect of your brand, products and services. Given the current climate of our digitized economy, we have reached a point where businesses can create differentiation from their competitors through engaged customers.
According to Ann Lewnes, SVP and CMO for Adobe, “The term ‘customer experience’ won’t exist in the organization of the future. It will be so deeply entrenched in a company’s product, process, and culture that it will be synonymous with the brand and represent the only way to do business.” We’re inclined to agree. Digital transformation has both enabled and enhanced the customer experience. It is not merely a fad in business strategy, but rather CX represents the shift to a new paradigm. CX is the new expectation. It’s the new industry standard and is here to stay.
Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things
As Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT) increasingly become an integral aspect of our everyday lives, the very definition of what constitutes as good service and a customer experience worth paying for will continue to evolve. Subsequently, when you consider the digital transformation you must also consider the impact of AI and IoT. As we look towards the future, one will be hard pressed to find a market that will not be impacted by these influential technologies such as innovations needed on operational excellence software.
According to R “Ray” Wang, Chairman and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, personalized relevance and context is the key to the customer experience of the future. Wang believes “We are living in an attention economy. Contextual relevance earns you the permission to engage.”
As innovative technologies such as AI and IoT continue to disrupt the model, the only way to attract and retain a customer base will be to use digital technologies to deliver seamless and consistent customer experiences. These solutions are designed to respond to natural language and ‘normal’ human communication. There is literally no learning curve for the user. Additionally, these innovative technologies lower costs by using distributed cognitive technology (i.e. budget friendly memory space and processors).
Automated customer engagement enables a personalized experience tailored to extremely specific preferences. In fact, they are flexible enough to proactively engage customers’ curiosities and whims in real time. As customers become accustomed to this level of individual attention, anything less will be inadequate. At the end of the day, digital transformation is the only means by which to deliver such a service to the customer.
CX Through Digital Transformation
As technology and innovation continue to shape digital transformation, businesses will have no feasible alternative to incorporating and embracing a digitally enhanced customer experience focus. The pace at which industry leaders are incorporating these technological breakthroughs, as well as a customer’s rapid uptake of platforms and devices that deliver such services, represents a sort of “changing of the guard.”
From the internet to mobile devices and everything in between, the past few decades continue to ‘move the cheese.’ If your business won’t look for the cheese in its new location, or rather your new approach, you will be left behind. To say that digital transformation, as applied to customer experience, represents the greatest single leap of all would be an understatement. So what are you waiting for? Leverage digital transformation to provide your consumers with the enhanced customer experience they have grown to expect.
At Kanari, we are all about your customer and their experience. Our innovative customer experience management solutions provide a reliable, flexible, and scalable platform to help your company create better customer relationships. Contact a member of our team to schedule your customer experience management consultation.
