Fresh spring air is at last filling our lungs delivering much-needed renewed energy. Finally the bright lights of a Covid-19 exit plan are illuminating the road ahead.
But before we look to the future, recognise this. It’s been 12 months of undeniable change. Digital transformation leapt out of every panicked strategy deck, and into our daily lives: Digital transformation is changing businesses right now. It’s freewheeling around our kitchen counters, new-found studies and on a good day (with so many more ahead of us), our patio dining tables. If you haven’t barbecued during a whole company meeting, you’ve missed a trick.
Grilled meats aside, “Declare change. Work for change. Become the change.”
Whilst Leslie Dwight sent the internet into meltdown with her poem last year, she also empowered us all. We weren’t unusual - it invigorated us as individuals, and as a team to refocus on why and how we create products that people will really love.
We’ve chunked it up into three main elements - wherever you are on your own digital transformation, hopefully this will resonate.
1. Hype up your backers.
A change of this magnitude is not for the fainthearted, and there’s simply no option to go it alone. Despite the old-adage of ‘go fast alone or go far together’, digital transformation is a real non-starter if you’re on your Tod.
- Set a vision
- Rally your investors (financial, emotional and most importantly, influential)
- Secure commitment
2. Live and breathe customer.
I know, it feels like this should go without saying, but it’s all too easy, once under pressure, to focus on commercials and give the customer a gentle nudge to the sidelines.
86% of customers are willing to pay more for a better customer experience.
Ideas to make it real:
- Build weekly customer contact into your culture
- Obsess over what your customers are shouting for (and tie that relentlessly to commercial objectives)
- Knit something surprisingly delightful into every key touchpoint of your experience
3. Experiment your way out of everything.
Knowing where to start - it’s a tough business.
Take inspiration from Sir David John Brailsford CBE (Performance Director of British Cycling). He introduced marginal gains theory into sport, to make a huge challenge much more attainable.
The marginal gains theory has transformed the sports industry. Sir David John Brailsford CBE (Performance Director of British Cycling) introduced it to dissect winning bike races into smaller, more attainable pieces. By searching for 1% improvements everywhere, the British Cycling Team won 70% of the gold medals on offer at the London 2012 Olympic Games. 70%!!!
Conversion rate optimisation is one example of where you can drive incremental experimentation.
During the 2008 presidential election, Barack Obama used A/B testing to see which media and button variations were the most effective at convincing people to sign up for the President’s e-mail newsletter.
They tried 24 (4 buttons x 6 media) combinations. After testing with 310,382 visitors, the winning combination was the media where he is with his family and the “Learn More” call-to-action button. This combination had a sign-up rate of 11.6%, where the original page had a sign-up rate of 8.26%. The increase in conversion rate resulted in additional 2,880,000 email addresses on their email list, translating into an additional $60 million in donations.
Experimentation doesn’t always depend on fancy software - how about you use some of that weekly customer contact time to put a paper prototype in front of some real life humans to test out your latest hypothesis?
So with the lockdown near ended and Spring underway follow some of these tips and you’ll find your transformation travelling at the speed of one of Brailsford’s bikes and overtaking your competition.
