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Why did Warren Buffet say “digital transformation is a fundamental reality for businesses today.”?
How is Apple successfully gaining 60% of its revenue from the products that didn’t exist 4 years ago?
And why is it no longer the game of “the big beating the small but the fast beating the slow”?
Well it’s because the tables have changed, potential thoughts have transformed into possibilities and the future of businesses lies in Digital business transformation. It’s a very common myth that DX is only for large organizations with huge budgets.
But that is not the case. Digital business transformation is for every business out there that aims to work with one goal; Thrive while serving better!
It is a no-brainer that small to mid-sized businesses a.k.a SMB’s are more in numbers than giant companies. And if there is anything that we could do to share our knowledge with such businesses, we would go over-board with it. Hence this blog!
SMB’s know a lot about digital business transformation as a whole but not so much about its best practices. So, we will unleash the top 5 digital business transformation strategies that every SMB must know.
But hey, let us boost you with some facts, before jumping onto the core.
- It is estimated that around 40% of the businesses will die in the next 10 years if they don’t figure out how to change their entire company to accommodate new technologies.
- 90% of the CEO’s believe that the digital economy will impact their industry
- The Digital business transformation market was valued at USD 284.38 billion in 2019 and is expected to grow by 22.5%
- There are 1.6 times more chances of a digital business transformation to succeed if the Chief digital offer (CDO) supports the process
- 87% of the business leaders believe that digital business transformation must be a priority
Why is digital business transformation important for SMB’s?
There are various ways for SMB’s to sink their teeth in digital initiatives. It has already shown its power by transforming the concepts like marketing, sales, supply chains, etc.
Our research says some top digital business transformation drivers change the game for SMB’s. They are,
- Attracting new and large clientele for the small businesses
- Keeping the competitive spirit up for medium businesses
- Enhance the employee productivity for every organization
It would not be wrong to say that digital business transformation is not a project but a business discipline and company philosophy that offers the benefits like enhanced product quality, revenue growth, better customer satisfaction, high employee engagement, and reduced environmental impact.
Moving forward we know you are wondering how to digitally transform your business? Here are those 5 best practices that can lead your small or mid-sized business towards success.
1. Understand and prioritize your business goal
Every company, small or mid-sized, has its unique set of goals and objectives. Hence it is essential to identify them at the very beginning. This can be done through business process modeling. It will help you spot the gaps, identify the problems, possible risks, etc.
Also going step by step is the right way of doing it. Transforming every process, workflow, and practice will cost you unnecessary expense and unwanted chaos.
2. Ensure seamless integration of business system
Most of the digital business transformations are started to streamline operation, automate workflows, enhance efficiency and deliver a better customer experience.
And isn’t seamless communication the vital factor to achieve all this?
When you use automation to connect various business applications that work for the departments like finance, customer care, marketing, etc. you build an internal platform. This helps your organization to keep everything transparent, break down internal silos, and promote a customer-centric approach.
And since there is no manual data transfer there are low chances of errors and better efficiency.
3. Empower employees with data
“Successful digital business transformation requires data. Without it, there is no clear view of the customer, no recognition of new opportunity, and no positive control of the business,” Jay Dettling, vice president global partners, Adobe.
Have you ever heard that data is the key to driving accurate business decisions? If you have then we stay you better start believing it too! The better way to promote digital business transformation is to use the technologies that help your team to spot and extract valuable insights from multiple data sets.
This will help your employees to understand the patter in the areas like
- what customers, employees, and partners want
- will simplify the greater complex data sets
- and allow you to leverage various processing tools
This will collectively help you to make extract insights and allow everyone to real-time decision making.
4. Stay away from embracing every new technology
Just like all that shines are not gold; every new technology is not worth investing in and embracing. It can get tempting to try on every other technology that promises the moon but this might just throw your budget into darker depths.
The best and successful way to avoid this is to identify the areas of your business that will yield better results and define your needs precisely.
The thing is digital business transformation need not be complex and expensive to be successful you can use the simplest technology and still get everything you want. For instance, you can choose one predictive analysis software and get multiple benefits like generating high-quality leads, enhance sales, and improve productivity.
5. Look for a partner with SMB experience
We know, SMB’s already run on a tight budget, and hiring a large IT team can be a bit of a task. But there is a solid solution to that problem too.
We say instead of going on to hire an in-house team you can opt for a firm that offers digital business transformation services. Or you can also choose an offshore team and maximize your resources. Or you can skip all the hard work and hire developers for your digital transformation endeavors.
Besides the IT strategies and solutions that an SMB needs are different from what large organizations need. Therefore, we suggest you look for a partner that has extensive and great experience to have served SMB’s.
We hope these practices answered your question of how to digitally transform your business.
Digital Transformation success stories:
- Target started its digital transformation journey in 2006. Their revenue then was $53 Billion. But with its unique business strategies, it managed to reach a revenue of $88 billion.
- Microsoft had a very innovative digital transformation that has led them to a market cap of 1 trillion. And their stock went from $38 in 2014 to $136 today.
- When Nike realized they started to become outdated and need a powerful change to connect to the new audience then choose to go for Digital Business Transformation. And soon the company updated its e-commerce strategy, focus on data analytic, etc. This led them to connect with their audience and create more membership opportunities to and enhance online customer service.
Check more digital transformation success stories.
Wouldn’t you want to make your place in that list?
Conclusion:
Digital business transformation sounds a little overwhelming for small and mid-sized businesses and a lot of organizations can get intimidated but choosing this will be the wisest decision you can make for your business. We suggest you take an incremental step and follow the above-mentioned practices to make the most of the digital business transformation. And yes, don’t underestimate the importance of the right digital business transformation partner.
Tell us which steps have you taken to make your digital business transformation a smooth journey?
