Table of contents
- What does digitalization mean?
- Reasons for digitalization
- Some advantages of digitalization
- Digitalization as an opportunity
- 4 risks associated with digitalization
- Measures to successfully master the digital transformation
- Acquiring new customers: digitalization as a means of customer acquisition
- 5 misconceptions why companies do not dare to take the step into digitalization
- The 7 main challenges of digitalization
Many people often understand digitalization purely as the digitalization of work processes. Rather, digitalization is a realignment of the company. It is more of a means to an end and not an end in itself.
The new corporate strategy is about revising business models or developing new ones. Work processes are not only transformed from an analog format into a digital format, but rather also reformed.
The primary aim is to better meet the needs of customers. If more time is gained through more efficient work processes, it can be invested more in customer care. A prime example is Amazon, which is not so popular because of the way its shop is presented, but rather because it has optimized the value chain.
As a medium-sized company that has been in existence for a long time, it is therefore important to have the courage to prove yourself and to re-form, as sooner or later the competition will do so anyway. Companies from other industries are suddenly offering products and services that are eating into the sales of established companies. Companies that were previously competitors are becoming partners, and vice versa. Niche providers are outperforming long-established companies.
There are plenty of current examples of this:
In addition to the pressure from competitors, digitalization also offers you many opportunities. You can make your work processes more efficient, allowing you to spend more time on the important areas of your business. The route planning of field staff can be made more efficient, not only to save time but also to generate fewer unnecessary vehicle operating costs. Machines can also be used more efficiently. Through intelligent information management, capacity utilization could be increased.
If you also enter the online business during digitalization, you will enjoy some advantages:
DThe possibilities are almost endless.
» However, you should not simply start digitizing every single work process, but first consider how to align your company's strategy for the future. «
Should I go in the direction of online sales? Should I perhaps concentrate on fewer products/services? Are there new service and business models that would fit with the rest of the company? Does this or that work process still make sense when it comes to a switch to digital?
Once the big questions have been answered and the “new corporate strategy” has been defined, you can start the digital transformation. It is important to know that the conversion or optimization is not a one-time process, but rather an ongoing process. Or as Dirk Beckmann puts it: “Whereas the world used to be solid and full of certainties, today it is fluid and constantly in motion.”
The most important thing when taking the step towards digitalization is to realign your corporate strategy. One way to do this is to look at the company from the customer's perspective, with their needs and consumer behavior. The aim should not only be to change internal structures, but also to reform the interfaces to the outside world.
One way to create an interface to the outside world could be to connect to the supplier's system in order to generate automatic deliveries.
It is also important to have a presence on social media. Many customer enquiries now take place via Facebook. You can find out which channel works best for you by using split tests with the respective providers.
If you do not yet have an online presence, you should at least implement an information page in a design that is suitable for the company in order to ensure greater transparency and visibility.
Customer behavior has changed noticeably in recent years. The faster you get to your goal (service, product), the better. Even though many people would prefer to shop at small retailers for ethical reasons, most still order from Amazon for reasons of cost and time.
With tools such as e-commerce, online marketing and the like, you can bring your company even closer to the customer. This also creates a new way of communicating with the customer. On the one hand, this should provide the customer with faster access to information, and on the other hand, it should enable faster purchasing or contact.
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