Brian Solis's Blog, page 107

A New Era for Search: The Zero Moment of Truth is Now Defined by Shared Customer Experiences

This is the story of when ZMOT met UMOT…

Search is a natural step in the discovery process. In a web world, search engines offer a lens into a qualified and structured view to help online consumers focus and make informed decisions. With Google dominating search, marketers concentrated on improving search ranking through tried and true techniques to ensure that what they were marketing earned a coveted position in the likely search results a customer might consider clicking.

Search is only part of the story now.

The experiences that people have and in turn share is created a powerful collective repository that is indexed and tapped every minute of every day…mostly outside of Google.

The importance of search engine marketing is fundamental to the discovery process. And, this is a world that still thrives today even though popular conversations among businesses and marketers center on social and mobile media as the “next big thing.” There’s notable truth in the hype surrounding social and mobile of course. With over one billion users, for example, many tout Facebook as its own internet. And with Graph Search on the horizon, a new era of interest and relationship-based content optimization will become a reality for the majority of its users.

This isn’t a debate about the merits of SEO versus social media optimization (SMO). Nor is this a discussion about social media. This is a discussion about behavior and the importance of discovery among an increasingly connected customer and the need to optimize and unite their journeys whether it’s on the traditional web, in social networks, or via mobile.

The Zero Moment of Truth

In 2011, Google released an ebook written by Jim Lecinski, Winning in the Zero Moment of Truth. The premise of the book introduces us to instances when shopping decisions break down into a series of Moments of Truths where each require special understanding to help nudge customers along their journey.  For example, when a customer is considering a purchase, whether driven by a stimulus or need, in the Zero Moment of Truth or ZMOT, customers are essentially going to “Google it.” Anyone involved in the art and science of search wins in this moment by ensuring that web pages are optimized to outperform competitive pages as people search.

Without awareness, there can be no consideration.

What happens though when your customers naturally start their discovery process in other communities other than Google or traditional search?

Trust

This is an important question as the pervasiveness of social and mobile media is conditioning a new generation of connected consumers to rely on their networks of relevance, not just search engines, as an alternative and efficient means of guiding decision-making.

Think about it for a moment. Study after study shows that everyday consumers trust others like them. They don’t trust executives. They don’t trust ads. But, they do trust peers. Global marketing agency Edelman also revealed in its annual Trust Barometer, that customers trust employees of companies. Why is that a significant finding? When people are searching for information in a social ecosystem, they wish to find qualified information that informs and guides them quickly and efficiently. Landing pages are just the beginning. Employee-as-experts are also part of the content and discovery equation allowing customers to find answers that help rather than sell.

This is just the beginning. The future of search is tied to the experiences shared by your employees and your customers across the web, social networks, communities, and mobile apps.

If you think about traditional search for a moment, what comes back as someone types in a keyword or question into the search bar? That’s right, websites. And websites are often the last thing a connected customer is looking for in a moment when trusted impressions and experiences outweigh pages ranked by inbound links and keywords. After all, many of these connected customers are mobile and as a result, looking for content that’s organic to the context of their state of mind and the device they’re using in each moment of truth.

In the Zero Moment of Truth it is shared experiences that serve as the ultimate Page Rank. In addition to promoting designated landing pages, how do you optimize experiences to be shared and also appear in each moment of truth?

The Ultimate Moment of Truth

You’ve all heard the stat shared by search and social media experts that YouTube is the second largest search engine. Many skeptics will of course argue that YouTube is merely a network for funny cat videos, wannabe celebrities, movie trailers, and music videos.  But you and I know that YouTube is indeed a notable alternative to Google for processing more search queries than any other search engine.

Connected customers don’t just seek information, they’re searching for input, validation, and direction in a way that they can appreciate and use. This isn’t a surprise. As consumers, we’ve too searched on YouTube for content to help us accomplish tasks, learn, or conduct research. We’re not alone in the hunt for product-related videos to see them in action and also gauge the impressions of others.

YouTube becomes a search engine not for web pages but for shared experiences. Apps too are becoming the new search.

It’s a good thing Google also owns YouTube. According to a research study published by Ask Your Target Market in Q3 2012, 95% of consumers use both YouTube and Google when searching for relevant content. And, it’s not just YouTube either; connected customers are fragmenting search through every social network, community, forum, and app where shared experiences become a currency in decision-making. Google doesn’t own the app economy though.

We now need to optimize search results for shared experiences in every network that’s significant to our connected customers.

Ultimate Moment of Truth (UMOT)

Our work starts with uncovering what comes back around our brand when we use keywords or questions, as our customers do, to search each network.

The Zero Moment of Truth is matched in significance by the Ultimate Moment of Truth (UMOT), a critical bookend to search introduced in my recent book, What’s the Future of Business (WTF). The Ultimate Moment of Truth represents the future of discoverability, branding, and influence and it is directly tied to the Zero Moment of Truth.

The UMOT signifies the instant when a customer creates content based on an experience with your product or service and publishes it in their community or network of preference for others to find. The intention of doing so is a combination of self expression and the desire to inform others. This experience then becomes discoverable for anyone who searches each network. And in many cases, these experiences also populate Google’s search results. Said another way, The Ultimate Moment of Truth becomes the next person’s Zero Moment of Truth.

Every day, customers are sharing experiences in the form of videos, blog posts, reviews, Tweets, status updates, et al. This content doesn’t self-destruct like SnapChat images. Shared experiences build upon one another forming a collective repository in the cloud that’s indexable, searchable, and influential. SEO, branding, and sales compete with this content and at some point, without address and optimization, shared experiences can eclipse traditional marketing no matter how creative or aggressive.

Without defining and promoting desired shared experiences, businesses will become victim to whatever people create and share.

Optimizing Share Experiences

Social and mobile bring to light the importance of shared experiences and why organizations must first design them rather than just react. Certainly great experiences start with vision and purpose enlivened by the product or service design and its intentions. For marketers who may have little or no control over business affairs, the ability to shape and steer experiences is made possible by promoting every nuance tied to your value proposition and also the unique advantage customers discover on their own. I refer to this as the experience gap.

In the experience gap, there’s the experience we want people to have, which is reinforced by our marketing messages and strategies. Then, there’s the experience people have and share, which usually demonstrates that what “they” say about us is frequently different than what we say.

A key question for you to answer is, “are you facing an experience gap?”

Driving shared experiences is a form of customer journey optimization that literally closes the gap. This is where search works for us beyond traditional SEO. With a little keyword anthropology, we can better understand the questions, not just key words, that customers are asking and answering. This research also reveals the following key attributes to develop a UMOT optimization strategy:

Searching beyond keywords: The questions that people ask over and over again.
What comes back in the Zero Moment of Truth: Patterns and context of questions, what customers find that helps them make decisions, and also why customers err to locate or value traditional content.
The communities and people of value: Where people are finding and sharing experiences outside of Google or other traditional search engines (this introduces new touch points in the customer journey).
Helpful content that actually answers customer questions: Discover valuable content, additional links, reactions, and a rabbit hole of ambient experiences that further guide customers to or away from you.
Real world impressions as told through expressions: What product opinions, tips and tricks, cautionary tales and how these shared experiences influence the impressions of others.
New marketing opportunities: Hidden gems and new product usage scenarios not originally considered.
A clear picture of your connected customer’s journey: All touch points and related information that shows exactly how UMOT connects to ZMOT and where your customers click to continue their journey.

Once you’ve identified the state of shared experiences, it’s time to develop a strategy to close the experience gap. Start by defining…

What is it that you want people to experience?


What is it that you want them to feel and share?


What are people sharing today, where (networks/apps) and how (content)?

The relationship between keyword anthropology and content creation will guide your strategy development so that you can understand how to influence the relationship between what’s shared in the Ultimate Moment of Truth as customers begin the discovery process in the Zero Moment of Truth.

Truth can often be a painful surprise. And we all know that perception is reality. There’s no need to be placed on the defensive in reacting to shared experiences. It’s our job to optimize positive experiences and promote beneficial content and stories to enhance the Zero Moment of Truth wherever customers go to learn and explore.

The future lies in the mixing of experience design, content marketing, UGC, and SEO.

Positive conditioning promotes a collaborative effort to solve the experience gap. By activating and rewarding customers and influencers, marketers can rally content that promotes desired experiences at every touch point that customers uncover in their journey or lifecycle. By coordinating these efforts, what appears in new channels in each Zero Moment of Truth is no longer a surprise; it’s strategically optimized to walk people through each moment of truth. It also loops together, to create a value cycle that keeps on giving to the next person who enters the journey.

User and employee-generated content must then become part of an integrated SEO program to optimize the right content in the right context for each moment of truth.

When balanced with a premier SEO program, optimized shared experiences will complement the customer journey wherever your customers search and share. What we soon realize is that Moments of Truth aren’t just moments in time, they become an experience fueled continuum.

The future of shared experiences and your brand isn’t just created, it’s co-created.

Written to summarize my experiential book on the subject, “ What’s the Future of Business, changing the way businesses create experiences.”

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

 

Image Credit: Shutterstock

Digital Transformation and the Race Against Digital Darwinism

Digital Darwinism is a fate that threatens most organizations in almost every industry. Because of this, businesses not only have to compete for today but also for the unforeseeable future. Digital Darwinism is the phenomenon when technology and society evolve faster than an organization can adapt. There are many reasons for this of course. Every fabric of a company is strained due to internal and external influences. The challenge lies amongst the very leaders running the show today. Their mission and the processes and systems they support today may already be working against them.

Technology and its benefits are beyond democratized among connected customers nowadays. As my friend Alex Howard points out, this is not indicative of technology around the world. There are in fact global divides on literacy, income, connectivity and  wealth in the real world that we often overlook as he reminds me. And, he’s right. For clarification, I’m focusing here solely on “the connected” and the technology that is quickly becoming invisible in their lives.

Technology is now part of life among those who live an active digital lifestyle. Connected consumers or Generation-C as I refer to them represents a growing subset of consumers as a whole. They’re simply more connected than everyone else. As a result, they’re more informed and empowered. And, their expectations , at the same time, are soaring. They demand attention, personalization, and efficiency…their way. And, they require that your values match their own. This goes beyond expectations. This is about entitlement. Don’t think for a moment that this change is solely relegated to your customers or simply for b2c companies. This is about everyone, including your employees today and tomorrow.

To compete, to thrive, requires new perspective…now. It also necessitates transformation of the digital and philosophical kinds. Time is ticking. As customers and employee behavior evolve and once your competitors set out to address them, you’re reactions and actions seal your destiny and legacy.

The answer to digital Darwinism is digital transformation. Digital transformation is the use of technology and methodology to address shifts in behavior by upgrading or overhauling processes and systems that amplify existing and unforeseen opportunities.

Sounds easy right?

The real story is that many companies aren’t ready to face this challenge. Turmoil exists inside as CIOs wrestle with existing roadmaps and managing legacy departments. Managers manage against dated procedures skillsets. Marketing, sales and service teams are missing customer touch points and needs because they’re unaware of new windows or customer suppositions. At the same time, executives focus on shareholders who are also out of touch with market shifts.

Investing in technology is not the answer. That’s a reflex. Building upon the house of cards that is your existing IT infrastructure is also not the answer. Investing in digital transformation to earn newfound relevance is the goal and the solution.  Now’s not the time for a wait and see mentality. If the culture of your organization is risk averse, one that waits for others to take the first step, trust me when I say that first mover advantage is indeed an advantage.

Capgemini and MITSloan set out to learn more about the challenges that face organizations, leaders and what they’re doing (or not doing) to adapt. In the seminal report released in 2012, “Digital Transformation: A Roadmap for Billion-Dollar Organizations,” the team found that all companies surveyed face common pressures from customers and employees and as such, digital transformation is now inevitable. Successful digital transformation as validated by the report does not come from implementing new technologies but instead from transforming the organization to take advantage of new possibilities that new technology provides.

Yes, it’s complicated, challenging, and terrifying.  But it takes courage in the face of VUCA, volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, to not only solve problems but admit that they exist. It also takes vision to see a new direction and leadership to unite teams and show the way. This is not something that can be defined through a bottom-up revolution. Capgemini and MITSloan found that this is in fact the duty and responsibility of executive management if change is to manifest and sustain.

The key to digital transformation according to the report, is “re-envisioning and driving change in how the company operates. That’s a management and people challenge, not just a technology one.”

Everything begins with fixing what may not appear broken today. Start by assesses the experiences your customer is having today and how their online and mobile behavior is affecting decision-making. Then, re-think and redesign your customer journey. Examine how the current infrastructure of your organization can optimize performance or where it hinders it. The answer lies in new technology, processes and business models.

The question is whether or not executives are actually in touch with the need for digital transformation and the opportunities it presents.  A couple of quotes made by executives during the interview process say yes.

One executive cited younger employees as saying “Come on. I know the company’s more than 100 years old, but our IT capabilities don’t have to match the age of the company.” Another executive vocalized the reality of the massive BYOD (bring your own device) onslaught permeating businesses and firewalls everywhere. They don’t want to wait for corporate practices to catch up. One CIO shared, “Officially iPads are prohibited by our policies. Yet 50 percent of our employees are using them at work.”

So what’s the answer?

According to the report, executives are mindful when approaching digital transformation, recognizing that focusing on any one area would miss the point. Capgemini and MITSloan discovered that digital transformation is unfolding in three key areas: 1) customer experience, 2) operational processes and 3) business models.

The study also identified nine elements that defined each of the three pillars. They are as follows:

Customer Experience

Customer understanding
Top line growth
Customer touch points

Operational Process

Process digitization
Worker Enablement
Performance management

Business model

Digitally-modified business
New digital business
Digital globalization

Successful enterprises pursuing digital transformation incorporated several elements, in their own way, as the building blocks for technology, process, and business model investments. Interesting, and not a surprise though, that no company in the sample had fully transformed or embraced all nine elements. Of course they haven’t. This is leadership not management and the vision required to move forward is as elusive as the leaders who will lead digital transformation.

To come full circle, the report also outlines the challenges facing organizations to take the first steps toward relevance.

1) Lack of impetus rises to the top. Why change when the business is performing wonderfully as is? If the company is not experiencing pain, then it’s difficult to prescribe a painkiller. As the report notes, this skepticism often results in the investment of processes that prevent digitally focused experiments and ultimately business changes.

2) Regulation and reputation rightfully plague certain businesses, especially those in financial and healthcare. There’s a piercing fear of regulatory sanction. At the same time, there are reputational considerations that may carry a far more devastating outcome should something go wrong. However, there is hope.

The study found the companies here are evaluating digital investments based on four criteria 1) Economics, 2) Burning platforms, 3) Strategic foundation investments, and 4) Low risk investments. Sometimes answers appear through every step you make, no matter how small.

3) Missing skills can prove fatal if not addressed sooner than later. Many executives use “professional judgment” to make important decisions about the future. Their competitors however are harnessing the power of big data to embrace analytic-based decision-making. Social media, mobile, big data, are just a few of many technologies disrupting businesses. I refer to this as the “Wheel of Disruption.” New skillsets are required to understand new tech, bring about change from the top-down and also to reverse mentor from the bottom-up.

4) Culture issues are often the chokehold of digital transformation. Sometimes, as the report notes, legacy leadership is part of the dead weight that prevents successful transformation and long-term viability. The best answer may in fact be to hire new leaders for their fresh perspective and the culture it can create. Successful enterprises also empower front-line workers to make autonomous decisions.

5) IT difficulties are often lacking in infrastructure and capabilities.  Personally, I see this as a significant challenge and to address it requires that the IT function undergo an overhaul starting with mission and purpose. You can’t lead transformation against the current technology roadmap. With CMOs estimated to outspend their CIO counterparts, IT should replace the “I” for information with innovation. You cannot innovate, adapt, or thrive if you build on top of legacy systems that prevent true integration or at least match how employees and customers connect and communicate outside the organization.

One executive was frank on the subject, “We have through the last 50 years proliferated our IT systems and applications. We don’t retire systems. We just add on top of them, which creates a tremendous amount of expense and complexity.”

6) Decision-making is slow, sluggish and often painful. Governance issues are rooted in the inability to get find and share actionable information across the enterprise. To do so requires changes in processes and decision-making enterprise-wide. Without a top-down approach, existing governance dampens the winds of change, thus creating coordination and collaboration issues. One group may solve problems but they cannot or will not collaborate with other units. The channel conflict is real and it must be addressed through an overarching, longer-term vision.

7) Vision is commonly nearsighted. No two visions are equal as they are measured by distance and loftiness. Sometimes vision is incremental and not enough. As the study notes, “Unless senior executives establish a transformative vision of the future, managers in the rest of the firm will tend to locally optimize within their own spheres of authority.”

Challenges exist in every organization. It is how leadership addresses them now and over time that defines their fortune and legacy. This is not a time for the spaghetti theory where stakeholders randomly throw pasta on the wall to see what sticks. This is about an investment in transformation to meet or exceed customer and employee expectations at every step of their journey. It takes vision. It takes courage. It takes resilience. Without it, organizations will continue to make the same mistakes as they always have. Technology isn’t the answer; it’s an enabler.

The real value of digital transformation pays its dividends in the short-term, but its true prize is one that remains out of reach. The goal is to create a culture of empowerment, agility, innovation, and engagement. Technology is not the answer in of itself. Technology is a way of life and business. Its impact on society is only accelerating. If you do not adapt, you will fall to digital Darwinism. You are competing as much for relevance as you are market share. By re-imagining your company’s direction and how it works, technology (and people) become part of the solution instead of the problem. This increases revenue, cuts costs and improves competitive advantages.

#AdaptorDie

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

Image Credit: Shutterstock

[updated to include thoughts by Alex Howard]

Hunter S. Thompson

 

http://arneylon.wordpress.com/2011/07...

http://fineartamerica.com/products/hu...

 

“There he goes. One of God’s own prototypes. Some kind of high-powered mutant never even considered for mass production. Too weird to live and to too rare to die.

Five Trends Shaping the Future of Work

Guest post by Jacob Morgan, author of the newly released, The Future of Work: Attract New Talent, Build Better Leaders, and Create a Competitive Organization . You can connect with Jacob on Twitter or email him directly: Jacob@ChessMediaGroup.com.

If there’s one thing that we can all agree on it’s that the world of work is changing…quickly. The way we have been working over the past few years is NOT how are we are going to be working in the coming years. Perhaps one of the most important underlying factors driving this change is the coming shift around who drives how work gets done. Traditionally executives would set the rules and pass those down to managers who in turn would pass those down to employees. But as Dan Pink aptly put it, “talented people need organizations less than organizations need talented people.” In other words employees are now starting to drive the decisions and conversations around how work gets done, when it gets done, who it gets done with, what technologies are being used to get it done, etc. The next few years are going to bring about dramatic changes. But why now? What are the key trends that are driving this new future of work? There are five of them as seen below.

New behaviors

Ten years ago if someone were to tell you that you would have all this information about yourself public for the world to read, see and hear, you would have said they were crazy. Now look at where we are, we are so much more comfortable living more public lives, we build communities, share, communicate, collaborate, access information, and shape our personal experiences. All these new behaviors are cascading over organizations which is forcing them to make changes.

Technologies

Big data, the cloud, the internet of things, robots, automation, video, collaboration platforms, and other technologies are changing the way we work and live. The cloud puts the power of technology in the hands of employees, robots and software are forcing us to rethink the jobs that humans can and should do, big data gives us insight into how we work and how customers transact with use, and collaboration platforms give us the ability to connect our people and information together anywhere, anytime, and on any device.

Millennials in the workplace

By 2020 millennials are expected to make up around 50% of the workforce, by 2025 this number is projected to be 75%. The important thing about millennials isn’t the fact that they might bring new approaches, ideas, values, or styles of working; it’s that there are going to be so many of them. They are by all accounts going to be the largest generation to ever enter the workforce. This is a generation of employees with technological fluency that is willing to live at home longer until they find a company that they truly want to work for. In other words, organizations must shift from creating an environment where they assume that people NEED to work there to one where people WANT to work there.

Mobility

It’s absolutely fascinating that living in the Bay Area, I can access virtually the same type of information that someone else can living in a remote rice patty field in China. Today where you are is starting to matter much less when it comes to being able to do your job. As long as you can connect to the internet, chances are you can access the same people and information as if you were working in an office building. We are connected anywhere and everywhere we go whether it be 35,000 in the air or in a home office.

Globalization

This is essentially the ability for organizations to work in a world where boundaries do not exist. The world is becoming just like one big city. The language you speak, the currency you transact in, and where you are physically located are starting to matter less and less. You can work in San Francisco yet have clients in Beijng or Melbourne; the same goes for employees. Boundaries to working with anyone and anywhere are being crushed and this trend will only continue.

So what do you do now?

First, make sure you understand what these five trends are and how they are going to impact your business. For example if you are in retail you should absolutely be thinking about things like mobility, the internet of things, robots and automation. If you are in finance you should be exploring how to attract and retain top talent and the future workforce. If you are in professional services then understanding globalization is going to be crucial. These are just a few examples but the important thing is to think through the potential implications of these trends on you and your organization.

Second, run experiments and tests constantly and frequently. In a world where the rate of change is rapidly increasing the best thing to do is act as a scientist. Your company is a lab where you need to challenge conventional ideas around how work gets done. Don’t take anything for granted.

Third, implement broad based changed based on the experiments you run. So, if you text out something like flexible work in marketing and find that the results are positive then the next step should be exploring how something like this can be rolled out to the entire company. GE is doing an excellent job of exemplifying this by rolling out their “lean startup” approach to various parts of the organization.

When it comes to the future of work “late adopter is equivalent to out of business.” The question that you should be asking yourselves is what is your organizations doing about these five trends to make sure that you can succeed in the new world of work? If your organization doesn’t think about and plan for the future of work then your organization will have no future.

The Maker Movement and Its Impact on Supply Chain Transformation

I follow the Maker Movement as a consumer, analyst and also as a maker. What is the maker movement? It a manifestation of the DIY (Do It Yourself) or DIWO (Do It With Others) culture where everyday people design, build and/or market something that they want or need on their own rather than buying something off the shelf. The maker movement has led to the creation of a number of technology products and solutions by typical individuals working without supportive infrastructure. This is facilitated by the increasing amount of information available to individuals and the decreasing cost of electronic components.

One of the most interesting sub-movements of the maker movement to emerge recently is the rise of 3D printing.  Once the subject of science fiction, ordinary people have the capacity to bring their ideas to life simply by clicking “print.” I’m not talking about paper-printed designs of accessories, furniture, cars, houses or even synthetic body parts, I’m talking about physically producing them wherever, whenever.

The impact of 3d printing is potentially profound. In the manufacturing world, 3d printing is also known as additive manufacturing and it’s already moving product development from the factory into the office. Essentially, consumers are becoming creators. Manufacturers are becoming suppliers. Businesses now face disruption and competition from the very people they used to sell to up and down the supply chain. With the barrier to production hitting new lows, this threat is only materializing…and accelerating.

Chris Williams, assistant professor and director of the Design, Research, and Education for Additive Manufacturing Systems (DREAMS) Lab at Virginia Tech compared 3d printing to the likes of application development. In an interview with The Financial Times, Williams shared, “What the app idea has given us is that anyone can be a software developer. Now that’s the same for physical ideas.”

In the same article, FT also interviewed Jordan Brandt, a technology futurist in the Manufacturing 2020 Team at Autodesk, a 3d software company. He believes that with additive manufacturing comes the ability to disrupt manufacturing overall as well as the supply chain, “In [a] super-optimal supply chain, value is added at every stage…”

The word “added” in Brandt’s quote could also be swapped out with “created” for an entirely different effect.

What happens when manufactures become the supply chain?

GE is thinking about just that…

The company is exploring ways to build more than 85,000 fuel nozzles for its newest jet engine according to Bloomberg. Rather than source, it plans to create the units with 3D printers.

Greg Morris, business development leader for additive manufacturing at GE Aviation shared that GE’s supply chain is already being stretched, “There doesn’t exist a supply chain out there right now for this kind of work. GE has to be involved in developing it.”

Even though it’s possible, it’s not that easy to simply shift resources toward manufacturing and supply chain disruption.

Sal Spada, Research Director at ARC Advisory Group, recently told a crowd at ARC’s annual automation forum held in Orlando, Florida, “if you are considering additive manufacturing on the horizon as part of a manufacturing strategy then you better start now.”

As Forbes’ Steve Banker notes in response to Spada’s advice, “The technology limitations and required process knowledge are nontrivial.”

In the grand line up of business services, processes, and philosophies to transform as a result of digital disruption, supply chains are clearly not immune. In the worlds of marketing, sales, and service, digital transformation is changing how business is done, not just through or because of technology, but also due to shifts in customer (and employee) behavior, values and expectations. The same is true with supply chains.

Whether or not businesses pursue supply chain optimization or full-blown transformation is dependent on the business issues that arise because of current and coming shifts in respective markets. As in digital transformation, supply chains will also require changes in strategy, processes, sourcing/procurement, logistics and distribution, et al.  Equally the goal and the challenge are to evaluate business issues and opportunities before they become technology issues.

In the end, every aspect of business, even supply chains, are open to disruption. The DIY culture of the maker movement is just the beginning.  Disruptive technology and trends does just that…they disrupt. However, processes, systems, technology, resources, partners, etc., benefit from integrated resilience. That has more to do with culture and leadership than it does with technology.

As Spada recommends, we should all prepare for the future yesterday because tomorrow is already here.

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

3d Printer Credit: Shutterstock

 

Born Digital: Meet Generation C, a new generation of connected customers

Businesses today are met with unique challenges and opportunities that necessitate pause. For years, management models were developed to optimize the pursuit of business objectives. Processes were established and hierarchies, technologies and reporting systems supported them. Everything was business as usual until it wasn’t.

Nothing is permanent. As in life, things change. And so is true in the world of business. The models and practices that have been taught for generations are tested in a time when customer and employee behaviors and resulting expectations are evolving without official study, strategy and systematic transformation.

Digital Darwinism: Survival of the Fitting

Technology permeated society to the point where the vast separation between professional and personal access was obliterated. And, the line between online and offline was forever obscured creating an always-on society with an insatiable appetite for consumption and connectedness.

Over the years, technology has impacted how everyday people communicate, share, discover, and learn. Some of you will read the previous sentence and think, “and yes, it’s completely ruined our society and we are worse for it.” Others will read it and continue without contemplation as the sentence states the obvious, “and?”

This divide reveals a stunningly under appreciated challenge facing any organization that hopes to survive in an era connectedness. With foresight, its clear that the situation before us is dire. It is how decision makers react now that either defines their destiny or seals their fate. In a world where Digital Darwinism rewards those who adapt as technology and society evolve, I believe many models governing how organizations are not only outdated, they reflect management’s vision in how it competes for the future.

With the barrage of digital devices, services, networks, apps, many organizations are merely reacting to trends with terminal skepticism or half-baked attempts to embrace new technologies and opportunities. In each case, what’s new is often interpreted or dealt with through the very perspective, methods and practices that contribute to business as usual.

“Wheel of Disruption” from What’s the Future of Business: Changing the way businesses create experiences

 

Social media, mobile, real-time, each has contributed to the digital lifestyle that everyday people, your consumers AND your employees, embrace as second nature. It’s not just a Millennial or a Generation Z thing…it’s everyone who uses a smartphone, a tablet, or any smart device. It’s someone who takes selfies and takes pictures and videos at every live event. It’s also that person who checks Twitter and Facebook each morning before email for mentions of their name and see what they might have missed. It is for all intents and purposes, you and me.

This isn’t about age; this is about a connected generation (Generation-C) and it represents a significant share of consumerism. Simply said, this category of consumers is different from the traditional customers and employees around which many organizations are modeled.

To reach them requires a different approach. To see them and the value they represent to an organization takes vision and a different philosophy.  Instead however, most executives or decision-makers employ an “us vs. them” mentality. They see the world as they know it rather than seeing the world for what it is or what it’s becoming.

#AdaptorDie – Lead by example, don’t lead by following examples

Let me put this plainly…

Connected customers are growing.

Traditional customers are fading.

To compete for the future takes an investment in new philosophies and models where relevance and resilience become part of the corporate DNA.

Traditional management practices and the structures that support them are not only aging, they’re liabilities and competitive disadvantages. It’s not just today’s competitors who will realize that connected consumers are a different breed. Unforeseen competitors, some that may not even exist today, will see what it is that you do not to change market direction, and as a result, take market share.

This is a time that requires great introspection and empathy. This is a time for leadership.

The goal now is to open our perspective to explore a world that we do not know in order to lead our organization in a direction of greater relevance. We must discover what is truly is valuable to Generation-C, why, and how to use these insights to inspire more desirable products, services, and even stories and messages. The next step is of course to bring them to life through new processes, systems, and directives.

This is why I believe that the future of business takes leadership not management. Executives, employees, and other stakeholders or shareholders who do not share in the desire to earn relevance with a different customer is standing in the way of progress.

Born Digital – We are the Champions

Well-meaning decision makers don’t know what they don’t know. As such, they will need a little help and this is an opportunity for champions who believe in the need for organizational transformation.

The case for change won’t be won by new technology alone. It’s not social, mobile, or real-time that presents the answer in of itself. It is the affect they have on consumer behavior that matters. Attempting to convince anyone of the need for change should never include mentions of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, iPhones, iPads, et al. These are means but not a means to an end. What’s required is an understanding of market trends and impact, missed opportunities versus actual short and long term losses, the balance of connected vs. traditional consumerism, and a better understanding of how innovation in the product roadmap will prevent disruption while disrupting others through innovation.

Technology is merely an enabler…and a powerful one at that. But without vision, purpose, direction, or meaning, new channels are the conduits for old reasoning and convictions. Without understanding technology and its relationship with behavior, without aligning a bigger mission or vision with what we are trying to do — something that is going to matter to people — we are just managing businesses the way we always have. We are not moving in any new direction.

This is a time to lead the next era where ideas are “born digital.” Rather than discount how, when, and where people connect…innovate!  Born digital is a mantra and a philosophy that invests in products, services, and supporting systems that align with the expectations and behaviors of Generation C…consistently, across every screen, in in the context of every scenario.

Born digital doesn’t take what already exists and attempt to repackage it as something new. Born digital isn’t conceived by groups of strategists or executives who question the logic of a selfie. Seriously. Born digital is the result of empathy and inspiration to do something extraordinary in the truest meaning of the word…something that is designed for a new generation…purpose built to deliver unique and exceptional experiences.

Born digital is deliberate and it is inspired. But to conceive it takes vision to see what others do not and courage to do what others will not or cannot.

“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” – Peter Drucker

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

Your Workforce is Disengaged: Here’s What To Do About it

Change is in the air. With disruptive technologies hitting businesses from the outside in and the inside out, how companies invest in technology and ultimately how people use it to get work done is under significant re-evaluation. At the same time, the rising workforce clash between older and younger generations is also pushing HR to radically reform management processes and education programs.

Indeed, change is the air. In fact it’s imminent. But change is never programmatic nor is it ever easy.  And, all too often, change is a reactive response to areas of disruption rather than a proactive step to head it off.

With so many factors affecting the future of business, where do leaders focus? What do they prioritize?

This is a worldwide issue. As Gallup research shockingly revealed in late 2013, only 13% of employees around the world are actively engaged at work. What’s worse is that more than twice that number is completely disengaged, toxic and at risk of spreading negativity to others.

It only gets worse.

Deloitte released its Global Human Capital Trends report in in 2014, which included insights from 2,500 businesses in 90 countries. The report’s author Josh Bersin observed a sobering trend, “the message is clear:  companies are struggling to engage our modern, 21st century workforce.”

Key findings from Deloitte’s report include:

86% of business and HR leaders believe they do not have an adequate leadership pipeline (38% see it as an urgent problem)
79% believe they have a significant retention and engagement problem (26% see it as urgent)
77% do not feel they have the right HR skills to address the issue (25% urgent)
75% are struggling to attract and recruiting the top people they need (24% urgent)
Only 17% feel they have a compelling and engaging employment brand.

 

I can sum up my response in one word, “yikes!”

Between Gallup and Deloitte, there’s a screaming sense of urgency that should rattle executives into action. That data is overwhelming. The fear is real. The risk of not doing anything about it or not trying hard or fast enough is self-destructive. What’s clear is that the solutions are not easy. And without leadership commitment, solutions are implausible.

There’s something else to consider. With new technology a constant disruptor and the next generation of employees (Generation Z) already exhibiting different behavior sets than that of Generation Y, we can assume that change isn’t a one-time affair…it’s continual. Therefore change must of course begin with people…by them and for them. To lead though, not just react to threats and trends, requires a more substantial approach. We are talking about changing the culture of the company to be more innovative, adaptive, and resilient.  That takes leadership.

Culture starts with vision…a vision for where we are going and why. Leadership must also lead and not rely on processes and systems. People must believe that leadership is relentless in its pursuit for a living and inclusive culture that everyone can stand behind. To design and foster a new culture also takes empowerment against that vision, inclusion so that everyone feels that they are part of its DNA, and most importantly instilling and building trust among leaders, managers, and especially employees.

Complicated yes. Effective, yes. Deloitte found that work teams which have high levels of inclusion outperform others by 8:1.

From there, businesses must overhaul and humanize their performance management process. A new vision sets the bar higher for everyone.

This requires new standards, processes and systems for…

Management
Performance
Training
Communication
Collaboration
Reward and recognition
Leadership behavior

 

If it’s one thing you can bet on moving forward is that people, and how you lead and inspire them, will become one of your greatest assets if not an absolute competitive advantage. But what research and experience is already showing is that to succeed here now and in the times ahead takes a reboot of the approach you have today.  Just because things have been done a certain way doesn’t mean its going to work in a time when people, what they value, and the technology they use are radically different that the aging infrastructure that manages them today. This is a time for innovation. This is a time to re-write the employee handbook. And, this takes leadership, not management.

ctrl-alt-del

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

Image Source: Shutterstock

Made in Detroit: How Shinola’s Good Ole Fashioned Business Values Outperform the Status Quo

You don’t know s#!t from Shinola.

Ever heard that saying before? This World War II era colloquialism caused a movement to revive the American watchmaking industry and with it bring to Detroit yet another chapter in its storied history in manufacturing.

This year at SXSWV2V, I was fortunate enough to interview Shinola president Jacques Panis live on the main stage. He’s not only the president of a thriving lifestyle company contributing to the resurgence of Detroit, he’s also incredibly genuine and humble. More so, Panis is building a business that’s focused on people, inside and out, and is equally passionate about bringing back the art of design and production to everyday products we take for granted today.

From a town made famous through its vehicle manufacturing, Shinola has reinvented the model of manufacturing watches, bikes, leather goods and more. Please take some time to watch and learn how Shinola has grown and found success through believing in its people, utilizing a unique workspace and forging an unheard of partnership with the College for Creative Studies all why gaining trust through engagement and transparency among its customers.

The team at SXSW just released the full interview. They don’t usually do so and I’m thankful as I get to share with you one of the most refreshing and inspiring conversations I’ve had in a while.

Please make the time to watch this and do take notes and do take action. It’s long, I know. But, this is one of those rare stories that offers precious lessons in how to do business in a digital world. Shinola started with a vision and then brought it to life through a culture of  people, purpose, and promise (the new 5th, 6th, and 7th additions to the outdated 4Ps of marketing).  Shinola reminds us of the importance of doing business in a bygone era where quality, commitment and core values counted for everything.

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

Originally appeared in the Summer 2014 issue of BizTech

Let Digital Natives Be Your Guide in Defining the Future of Work

Don’t let complacency undermine your company’s hyperconnected present and future.

Pervasive technology fundamentally changes how people communicate, discover and connect. With smartphones and tablets serving as digital ­appendages, we focus on small screens throughout our day, every day and in all we do. Technology’s biggest impact, however, is not so much on the devices or the apps we use, but on our behavior. Specifically, it affects how we learn, how we buy, how we work, and how we influence and are influenced.

This behavior modification is ­significant because we take for granted the processes and systems in place to manage employees and customers. Although our personal activities are radically changed by mobile technology, we still tend to base how we work, market and sell on dated principles designed to optimize tasks from a very different time.

A Radical Shift

To date, we’ve built upon legacy investments and operational procedures to adapt to technology and market shifts. In the 1990s, the Internet required new expertise, technology and processes for internal and external governing. The same held true for desktop PCs, notebooks, mobile and desktop phones, and telecommuting. But most of how we’ve managed transformation was done in a command-and-control fashion. IT managed technology; the HR staff led operations; and managers ensured productivity.

With social, mobile, real-time data and cloud now a part of everyday life, how people work in and outside of the office has become radically different. This is bigger than the bring-your-own-device movement. It’s about changing why and how we choose new technologies, how we roll them out, and how we design new processes for working individually and together to accomplish a work objective.

As Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl said, “It isn’t the past which holds us back, it’s the future and how we undermine it, today.”

We, the architects of the future of work, must build upon a foundation from the past, which inhibits our ability to optimally see or plan for our ideal future. Said another way, how we see the future is rooted in how we dealt with things in the past. To counter that, how we need to plan and build for the future requires that we see the human drivers behind how people use technology in their personal lives.

Doing so will help us naturally emulate and foster collaboration and engagement in the workplace in ways that are both intuitive and seamless. Otherwise, we will force people to conform to inorganic practices that will detrimentally affect morale and loyalty over time.

Look to Digital Natives

Success in business today requires new methodologies to engage and scale the infrastructure for a new generation of employees and customers. Rather than rebuff the differences in how so-called digital natives work, we should learn from and be inspired by them. It’s the only way we can truly lead. Otherwise, we’re forever doomed to react to them.

We can’t change everything at once, nor can we continue with business as usual. But we do need to take small steps in a new direction. Change actually begins with us. And it all starts with learning what we do not know. That’s the only way for us to see what it is we can’t see today and to build what doesn’t yet exist.

That future — the future of work — requires architecture, and we are its architects. But as much as our challenge is affected by technology’s impact on behavior, we cannot assume that technology will necessarily be part of the solution.

To design a meaningful and scalable ecosystem moving forward, we have to understand how people’s behavior and expectations are evolving. With technology now part of the fabric of life and with innovation a constant, solving for behavior actually depends on making our future more human.

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest

Originally appeared in the Summer 2014 issue of BizTech

Image Credit, Digital Natives: Shutterstock

The 2014 State of Digital Transformation

Today, I’m proud to announce the release of Altimeter Group’s second report on Digital Transformation. This new report is aimed at executives and digital strategists to help them (you) further understand the state of digital transformation as you plan your next steps and investments.

In our initial report, “Digital Transformation: Why and How Companies are Investing in New Business Models to Lead Digital Customer Experiences (DCX),” we learned that digital transformation was as much about technology as it was about people. It was a much more human story, one that shared insights, advice and cautionary tales from those on the front lines.

Our new report is based on a survey we cast over the last year. Its goals were twofold: 1) to unearth where companies and supporting teams are in their metamorphic digital transformation efforts; and 2) also to capture a current snapshot for future comparison.

“The State of Digital Transformation” also features expert voices as part of Altimeter Group’s previous qualitative research, including Sephora, Starbucks, Westfield, Ford, GM, LEGO, Discover, Intuit, Nestlé, Univision, a multinational financial services business, a multinational CPG company, and an American pharmaceutical company, among others.

Defining Digital Transformation

To focus our initial research, Altimeter defined digital transformation as a movement through a customer-centric lens:

The realignment of, or new investment in, technology and business models to more effectively engage digital customers at every touchpoint in the customer experience lifecycle.

From the onset, we learned that digital transformation means different things to different people, and that’s okay; we’re all learning. What’s important to realize however is that investing in new digital technologies, such as social, mobile, big data, cloud, etc., doesn’t in of itself equate to “digital transformation.” It’s about uniting individual technology efforts around a common vision supported by an updated, integrated infrastructure to effectively compete as a unified business in connected markets.

You’ve heard it before…people, process, technology. But without vision to see how markets are shifting and leadership to identify, organize and drive new opportunities, digital transformation can become yet another victim of technology-first efforts that miss the human mark. This is why we focused our research on the digital customer experience initially. It’s a tremendous effort.

Strategists often equate digital transformation with a shift in technology investment. Its true implications though span far beyond technology and into the realms of infrastructure, organization, and leadership. More so, it leads to and is inspired by a renewed focus on the entire customer experience. As you can imagine over the years ahead, digital transformation will leave in its wake modernization, improvements and innovation across everything from HR to collaboration to sales to supply chain and beyond.

We learned that 88% of executives and digital strategists stated that their company is undergoing a formal digital transformation effort in 2014. Yet, only 25% had mapped out the digital customer journey. This is  especially interesting in that participants were given Altimeter’s definition of digital transformation at the beginning of the survey.

Not surprising, a majority of strategists, 42%, reported that while they have not yet researched the customer journey, but were investing in new digital channels any way. At the same time, 17% of digital leaders are now in the process of studying the digital customer journey.

Digital transformation doesn’t just mean increasing digital investments. It means thinking and acting “digital first.”

We asked strategists to help rank the most important digital transformation initiatives they were pursuing. Here are the results…

1) Improving processes that expedite changes to digital properties, ie. website updates new mobile or social platforms, etc. (80%)

2) Updating website and ecommerce programs for a mobile world (71%)

3) Integrating social, mobile, web, ecommerce, service efforts and investments to deliver an integrated and frictionless customer experience (70%)

4) Updating customer-facing technology systems (66%)

5) Further research into customer digital touch points (63%)

6) Overhaul customer service to meet the expectations of digital customers. (46%)

In our previous report, we learned that it is a rare occurrence when digital transformation is led by the CEO. This time around, we also learned who the players are in championing or sponsoring change. Here, digital transformation is often driven by the CMO, CEO, and CIO (54%, 42%, and 29% respectively.)

Change of course is not without its challenges. And it is most interesting, yet not surprising, that the greatest antagonist to change is company culture (63%). That’s just the beginning however. Digital transformation is as much about introducing new technologies as it is seeing new opportunities and working toward them differently than in the past.

Additional challenges facing digital transformation specific to DCX include…

- Thinking beyond a campaign mentality (59%)

- Cross-functional collaboration (56%)

- Resources (56%)

- Understanding digital customer behavior (53%)

- Securing executive support (42%)

Digital transformation wouldn’t push forward if it didn’t bear fruit worthy of the effort. There are other fantastic reports, like this one by CapGemini and MIT, that cover different aspects of digital transformation. They all agree that in the end, those organizations that invest in new technologies, people, and processes to compete in digital markets realize business-level returns including market share, greater margins and profits, talent, among others.

Digital transformation impacts the bottom line. It leads to boosts in collaboration and productivity. Additionally, digital transformation helps companies assess and aspire to enhance the real customer experience.

Since our work focused on DCX, we were also introduced to more performance-oriented benefits…

1) Lift in customer engagement (75%)

2) Improved customer satisfaction (63%)

3) Higher digital traffic (53%)

4) Increased lead gen/sales (49%)

Conclusion

It’s clear. We still have a lot to learn about digital transformation: what it is, what it isn’t, and what it offers businesses that explore its permutations. But what’s clearer is that change has to start somewhere.

Remember, in the end, the key to digital transformation is to adopt technology as enabler for something bigger. Behavior, whether it’s related to customers, employees, values, or expectations, is as important (or more so) as becoming increasingly digital through new investments in strategy and technology.  Thus, digital transformation becomes a catalyst for re-imagining the overall customer (or employee) experience.

Businesses undergoing digital transformation are each, in their own way, creating new processes, forming new business models and teams, and investing in new technologies and systems to work in ways that are more relevant to the state and evolution of today’s markets. In doing so, they’re leveraging digital transformation to become more customer-centric, more human, and renewing their culture for a new generation of customers and employees.

There’s so much more to the report. Please take a moment to download it here and also share your story with us.

Connect with me…

Twitter | LinkedIn | Facebook | Google+ |Youtube | Instagram | Pinterest