Category: Technology

Customer Experience or CX may be the single most important factor that could make or break a business in today’s customer-centric market. A good product, a great marketing team, and competitive pricing can all amount to nothing if the customer experience isn’t up to the mark. As more and more businesses head towards brand transformation, it is vital that they keep the customer experience at the center of things.

In this blog, we will discuss why a memorable Customer Experience is key for brand transformation and how you can achieve it for your business.

How Important is Customer Experience?

Before we get into the importance of customer experience, let’s have a look at what that term really means.

Gartner defines customer experience as “the customer’s perceptions and related feelings caused by the one-off and cumulative effect of interactions with a supplier’s employees, systems, channels or products.”

A take on the definition of what a customer has come to mean today was brought out in this interesting article: “In a connected business reality, everyone in the ecosystem of your business is a customer: from employees and investors to partners, buyers and their networks, including the various players in the value chain from manufacturer to end consumer and back. In other words: all stakeholders.”

Customer Experience then is much more than achieving customer satisfaction. Everything a brand does play a part in forming the customer experience. A study by the Temkin group brought out that CX is made up of three components – success, effort, and emotion. The study showed that out of all the three, emotion played the most significant part. Affecting the emotions of customers through a concerted effort by the brand is what customer experience management is all about. Does it pay off? Definitely. As the study goes on to show, “companies that earn $1 billion annually can expect to earn, on average, an additional $700 million within 3 years of investing in customer experience.”

The benefits of Customer Experience extend to much more than revenue, though that is a pretty great factor in itself! A Walker study found that customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator by the year 2020. This is of prime importance in brand transformation as the key goal of this transformation is to differentiate a business from its competitors and get ahead of them.

Related Reading: Find how Robotics and AI can help improve the customer experience

Ways to Enhance the Customer Experience

Ensuring that Customer Experience is the best it can get is a complete discipline in itself. Customer experience management (CEM or CXM) is the function that works towards streamlining every interaction between an organization and its customers. The goal is to foster brand loyalty in customers by ensuring that every touch point in the customer’s journey with the brand is satisfactory. The Customer Experience must be memorable and for the right reasons.

The most important factor in creating a good CX is to have a 360-degree view of customers.  Starting from there, the customer’s journey is optimized at every point to ensure a consistently positive experience. Consumer research, a thorough knowledge of market conditions, and an organization’s culture, vision and mission are some factors to keep in mind when designing a customer experience strategy for your business. This will ensure that the strategy takes into account all departments in the organization and not just those in customer-facing roles.

Customer Strategist Journal lists six key areas of the digital customer experience:

1. Reachability

2. Service convenience

3. Purchase convenience

4. Personalization

5. Simplicity and ease of use

6. Channel flexibility

If you notice, many of these key areas are linked to the channels used by customers. The Genesys State of Customer Experience research brings out that 83% of consumers say the ability to move from one assisted channel to another, such as moving from web chat to a live conversation, is desirable. However, only 50% of businesses support such cross-channel interactions. This is definitely something to be considered. Let’s look into this in detail.

Unlike a few years ago where customers would communicate with brands either through email, telephone or directly visiting the company, today’s connected customer has various channels at their disposal. Websites, Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp, and public forums are being used to contact and interact with brands. They expect customer service to be available and top notch in all these channels. This makes the brand transformation complicated, as delivering flawless customer service through every one of these platforms is challenging to say the least. If you fail, you know they are going to switch brands, which are available at the next click.

Channel Switching is another related challenge. For example, a customer could raise an issue through email and then request for escalation through a call and leave negative feedback on social media. The customer would expect the brand to be aware of his/her different interactions, respond and resolve the issue satisfactorily.

This challenge can be addressed with a few measures:

1. Centralization of interactions and data

   This gives all customer-facing executives the necessary information to deal with issue no matter which platform is used.

2. A unified stand

   The goal is to make the customer feel that it is one conversation, even if they are talking to different teams. This requires all teams to be equipped with the resources, information, and vision to show a unified stand and represent the brand consistently.

3. Engage with customers on their terms

   Customers prefer using different channels according to their convenience. They will not appreciate being directed to the channel that is convenient for the brand. This makes it important to identify and respond to them in their own terms.

Related Reading: Check out other blogs to know how a streamlined workflow can improve customer service.

Apart from addressing Channel Switching, there are a few important measures that brands need to keep in mind if they want to deliver a seamless and satisfactory Customer Experience. Here’s listing a few of them.

1. Go Mobile

   The Genesys report showed that “when interacting with a business for service and support, 78% of consumers surveyed use a mobile device. And that number jumps to 90% when working with millennials.” This makes it extremely important for brands to provide mobile-optimized solutions including apps, which focus on ease of access and interaction with the brand.

2. Weave CX into your entire structure

   The goal of Customer Experience must be all pervasive throughout the organization. A customer experience strategy must be designed and weaved into the core of your business. Your vision and mission must include this commitment. An example is Dell Computer. Their mission is “to be the most successful computer company in the world at delivering the best customer experience in the markets we serve.” Employees have this on their ID cards and every bulletin board in every office has a sign that reads “The Customer Experience: Own It.” 

3. Know your customers

   Understand your customer completely. Use technology to its fullest to derive insights into customer behavior and demographics. Getting detailed and actionable insights will help you plan your customer experience strategy effectively.   

Personalize! Personalize!

The most important aspect of getting your Customer Experience strategy right is personalization. Hyper-personalization is what the customer demands, and it is vital for brands to adopt measures to ensure this. At Fingent, we help brands build custom applications and solutions to achieve this for their customers. Let’s talk.

Do manufacturers need custom software solutions?

When Fingent started operations nearly two decades ago, we had the vision of helping organizations solve business challenges using technology. As we have helped numerous clients in the manufacturing as well as other industries, we have seen one thing – there isn’t a one-solution-fits-all software in the world that fits the needs of every organization. Each organization is unique.

While this is the most obvious benefit of custom software development, there are many other benefits that it brings to your organization. Let’s have a look at them in this blog.

How Custom Software Helps Manufacturers

Technology and software have become integral to the manufacturing industry. Irrespective of what the product is, manufacturers have recognized the role of good software in every aspect of their business. Right from design to implementation, production to shipping, employee management, to invoicing, and client relationship management (CRM) to predicting customer demand – there is no function that can run effectively without the help of good software. This makes software perhaps the most important element in your business. It stands to reason therefore that we consider in detail on which software suits your business best.

In that vein, let’s discuss the 5 benefits of custom software in manufacturing:

1. Better Production Planning and Control (or PPC)

In today’s competitive environment, lead times are getting shorter and price pressure is getting tougher. In addition, today’s consumers demand make-to-order manufacturing and hyper-personalized products. This is a tall order and requires highly optimized production processes, which focus on effectively allocating the internal resources of the company. This includes manpower, materials, and machines. Custom software will help you optimize processes more effectively than out-of-the-box software. This is because the software will be customized to include the right mix of resources and production needs, which are unique to your business.

2. Effective Monitoring of Machinery and Processes

Each manufacturer and product require precise process workflows and specifically calibrated machinery. Any change, however small, in the process or machinery can cause huge setbacks in production and eat away at your profits. A good custom software, which is specifically designed for your process flow and machinery, will help you track and monitor even slight changes. This will help you detect and rectify issues before they snowball into a major problem.  

3. Insightful Business Intelligence

With AI, IoT and machine learning adding exceptional capabilities to software, it has become possible to collect and process data to derive precise actionable insights. Business intelligence software helps managers have their finger on the pulse of every function in the organization and obtain an insight into the workings of the organization as a whole. These insights can be used to fine-tune inventory management, employee management, and other functions. Unique organization-specific data can be analyzed in real-time, allowing business leaders to make sound decisions without having to pour through lengthy and complex reports. Data mining, automated reporting, benchmarking and predictive analytics capabilities are features of Business Intelligence software, which are invaluable to manufacturers in achieving cost and time efficiencies as well as meet customer demand effectively.

4. Customer Relationship Management and Customer Service

With a custom CRM software for your manufacturing business, you can achieve better client relationship handling, faster responsiveness to customer demand and queries, and reduced customer dissatisfaction. Accurate Demand Forecasting helps manufacturers detect trends and cut the time from the concept phase to market delivery. This will ensure that you are keeping up with the competition and giving your customers exactly what they need. A custom CRM solution also helps figure process errors in real-time and ensure that the products are high-quality. It helps in creating an intelligent supply chain through insights into operations, order processing, inventory management, warehousing, and distribution chains. A CRM will also keep track of warranties, scheduled service calls, etc. to help serve customers better and maintain good customer relationships.

Related Reading: Find how custom software can benefit your business more.

Why Custom Software Is Better Than Off-The-Shelf Software

Although “custom” is often synonymous with “expensive,” this isn’t the case when it comes to custom software for your manufacturing business. The scalability, ease of integration and other benefits that come with custom software far outweigh the costs of initial investment. Some of the pros of custom software are:

1. Competitive Advantage

In today’s age when technology can be one of the most important competitive advantages, it is important to stand out from the crowd in this area. Using a mass-produced software gives you the same or lesser functionalities as your competitors.

2. Scalability

While off-the-shelf software might work for your start-up phase, these aren’t easily scalable, and the technology used could become obsolete with time. Custom software, on the other hand, can be designed to provide the scalability required for your individual business. This will help you have a solution that is perfect for your business while avoiding costs associated with major software overhauls every time a technology becomes obsolete.

3. Performance

Since off-the-shelf software aren’t customized for your business, they have many redundant features that you may never use for your business. This unnecessarily increases the amount of space required and load times, thereby decreasing performance. Custom software is sleek and only has the functionalities that your business requires. This makes it faster with improved performance.

Related Reading: Find how to make the right choice between off-shelf and custom software development.

Get Custom Software for Your Manufacturing Business

Despite knowing the benefits of custom software development, many manufacturers shy away from investing time and resources on this. They feel it is a daunting task considering the effort and resources needed to implement a custom solution. It need not be a difficult task at all however if you have the right help.

With decades of experience in custom software development, Fingent can help dismiss these fears. We help simplify the process for you, giving you the peace of mind to concentrate on your core business while we take care of the complete development and implementation. Get in touch with us to discuss more.

Video:  Custom Software Vs Off The Shelf – Dileep Jacob (Head of Operations, Fingent Corporation)

Why should businesses invest in custom software development?

The need to transform digitally has created a scenario where enterprises are constantly investing in new digital solutions to either make life easier for operations or help them explore new revenue streams in the digital space. However, there are a lot of misconceptions that prevail in the market with regards to digital solutions. As soon as a business announces that it is ready to invest in digital, they get bombarded with ready-to-deploy and off the shelf digital tools that are provided by several players in the tech industry.

But is investing in readily available solutions the best way to gain a foothold in digital adoption? Not always is what industry experts say. It is important for enterprises to invest in custom software development to empower their business growth with a more personalized digital arsenal. Several executives may argue that custom software development is a costly affair, but buying commercial off the shelf software could do more harm than good in the long run if it is not tailored to your objectives.

Here are 5 reasons why investing in custom software development is important for your enterprise.

1. Complexities in Systems Integration

Different areas of your business operations may find tools from different vendors to be useful. However, these tools may each have their own technology infrastructure requirements, architectural differences, different development methodologies and varying levels of implementation support. As an organization, your technology ecosystem needs to work as a streamlined single unit, capable of delivering value across your business.

For integrating systems from multiple vendors, a considerable effort is needed and this could outweigh the advantages offered by individual systems. Such a scenario calls for creating a suite of operational enterprise applications, custom made to fit the objectives of your business. Every custom software, thus built would follow common standards in development and execution, thereby creating a flexible and interoperable enterprise technology stack.

2. Scalability restrictions

Ready to deploy enterprise solutions are often advertised to be scalable for large workloads. But when unique requirements of your organization require flexibility beyond the scope defined by the software development company, then you are left with expensive software that cannot scale up with your business demand. This is another area where tailored and custom software development can be the game changer in your technology landscape.

Components of such software can be built keeping in mind the objectives specific to your business areas and not just a standard industry requirement. Hence, when scalability requirements arise, a custom built enterprise software will be able to accommodate your unique business and process workflows accordingly without creating new challenges for the teams handling your enterprise applications. This is vital for SMB’s as their growth ambitions would definitely require a scalable technology backend to support a critical business process.

3. Future proof innovations

Innovation is at the heart of every competitive business environment today. The more you innovate, the greater will be your chances of satisfying diverse consumer interests. When enterprises buy expensive and ready to deploy software from reputed vendors, they often limit their own dimensions of innovation. Such businesses are often forced to either wait till the software vendor comes up with the desired innovation or they may have to again purchase a new software if their existing application vendor is not in a position to add the new feature anytime soon.

Having your own custom software built will enable you to experiment and bring on board innovative concepts faster and without depending on other technology vendors to do it for you. This can help in greater market competence as your brand would be recognized as a forerunner rather than a late adopter for innovations that consumer’s desire.

4. Existing technology support

Many times, businesses invest in new digital solutions by blindly following trends in the market. It could be possible that the technology that they already have may just need a few tweaks and upgrades to provide the exact same or even better features that a totally new commercial off the shelf software can provide. Bringing a new digital solution from a vendor into your existing technology ecosystem can cause challenges not just in systems integration as mentioned above, but may also create instances where large effort is needed to maintain existing software that serves other core business processes.

When businesses go for custom software development, they have the liberty to build new capability on top of existing enterprise applications and hence saving considerable effort in development as well as reducing cost escalations. Having a team to customize existing software is a better alternative than engaging one to implement a third-party solution from scratch and then follow it up with expensive customizations to further suit your business requirements and objectives.

5. Compliance with standards and processes

Even the best of digital solutions from world-class vendors may have compliance issues with the standard rules and processes adopted within a business. The makers of such software may have included recommendations from industry recognized standards, but very often a business may have to think out of the box while running their daily operations. This leads to their core processes and standards being subjected to deviations from what the industry follows.

When third-party digital solutions are directly brought into such deviation prone business scenarios, there will be issues with compliance policies and standards. This is yet another scope for custom software development to take center stage and empower businesses with the flexibility to meet their unique compliance requirements. This is also true when government and other geopolitical influences require custom standard or compliance implementation rules to be followed by enterprise applications. Areas such as data privacy and consent management would be under multiple legal and judicial networks.  A region and a third-party digital solution may not be flexible to handle such variances.

Any technology implementation done today should be closely linked to business objectives, and enterprises need to have a clear idea on the business use cases that a particular technology could solve. With custom software development, it is possible to have a clear picture of the quantifiable value every investment in enterprise application development is made.

This will prove to deliver more ROI than a fully-fledged third-party digital solution implementation where your business may often be at the mercy of the vendor’s technology prowess. If technology is not your core forte, then you need to have the right advisory and consulting partner to help drive the most value out of your custom software development initiatives.

With years of empowering some of the world’s best businesses with custom software development, Fingent can be the right partner to help you build the technology backbone of your business. Get in touch with us to know more.

Imagine you are a salesman and you have logged into your system with the dashboard pulled up in front of you. Viewing the dashboard with a horde of information on it can turn out to be a very overwhelming experience. Bar charts, pies, metrics, numbers, arrows, percentages, ratios and what not go swimming in front of your eyes. Do they make any sense or do they end up confusing you? Does it include an intuitive interface allowing seamless navigation or is it cluttered and poorly organized? Well, it all depends on how well the sales dashboard is designed.

Recently, Fingent was approached by a client to develop a sales dashboard for their customers who are real estate agents and brokers. The requirement was to develop a portal for the agents and brokers to log into and a dashboard which gives a snapshot of their business performance. With this real estate platform, realtors should be able to access third-party applications to help them with the various stages of their business process.

Related Read: The Tech Disruptors in the Real Estate Space: What to Implement First?

Fig 1. Wireframe of Dashboard Designed for a Real Estate Agent

Fig 2. Sample Mockup Designed for a Real Estate Agent

In the real estate industry, data is often unstructured and unaccounted. This platform allows agents to prospect leads, manage and follow up on them, view the status, close on them and ultimately account for the costs and commissions.

Fig 3. Wireframe of  Dashboard Designed for a Real Estate Broker

Fig 4. Mockup Template Created for a Real Estate Broker

Expectations from a Good Sales Dashboard

A well-designed sales dashboard is like a good storyteller. It tells you a story complete with the setting, the characters, the main plot, the conflicts, and a conclusion. This should all flow in a seamless, logical way as the eyes of the user move from the top of the dashboard to the bottom; gauging information, which is crucial to making accurate decisions.

Salespeople usually juggle with a lot of numbers. They have numbers related to revenue, sales pipeline, products and services, customer base, forecasts, financial data etc. These numbers help them analyze and make critical decisions on the next move to steer their business forward to success. If these numbers are all scattered around, a salesperson may end up spending precious time gathering data and in the process slip on making important decisions.

Now, imagine if all these numbers come across as a story. Accordingly, the salesperson is able to quickly view the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of their business, make a conclusion and plan for the next moves. That is what a good sales dashboard aims to achieve.

A good sales dashboard gives an unbiased true picture of the day to day workings of one’s business. It provides an illustrated view of KPIs and other information crucial in the sales process.

Related Read: Ok Seriously, How Important Is Data Visualization?

Besides, a well-designed sales dashboard should also offer access to real-time data. With this real-time data, salespeople can continually monitor the sales pipeline and activities for making crucial decisions.

The design is yet another leading factor in ensuring better user experience. The logical arrangement of the metrics and other information contribute to effortless navigation all the while ensuring that the most important information is accessed first.

Designing a Sales Dashboard

Now, on the other hand, designing a sales dashboard is an equally daunting task. How do we represent all those numbers in a visually pleasing and logical manner? Furthermore, which numbers to choose from the many, that would ultimately matter the most to the client.

Keeping in mind the following tips will help you design an effective sales dashboard.

1. Getting Your Story Right

A good understanding of the client’s business and its KPIs will help you build the story. Identifying the pulse of the business by tapping on which will give you a correct understanding of the business’s lifeline is the key. Following are some metrics that are generally used in sales –

• Revenue 

This is the key indicator denoting how well the business is doing. Revenue is compared over time (monthly, quarterly, yearly) or with the projected versus actual revenue.  It can also be compared to the costs and expressed as a return on investment (ROI). Another way of representing it is to show profits after all the costs are deducted from the revenue. Finding out from your clients which figure would best be useful to them will help you in the design.

• Forecast

  The client can integrate a system to predict their future sales and revenue based on their past backlog, current pipeline, employee performances, market conditions etc. Showing this data on the dashboard will help them see the direction their business is taking.

• Sales in Numbers and Value

From where is all the revenue coming? Is it from just one product or are all the departments making enough sales? These questions can be answered by displaying the sales in numbers and value. This will give more clarity on the inner workings of the client’s business.

• Sales Pipeline

 The sales pipeline reflects the number of deals in each stage of the sales process. The stages can be open leads, qualified leads, face to face meetings, proposal stage, and closed deals. The number of deals in each stage will help the salesman asses whether they have enough incoming leads to sustain their business, and also whether they have an appropriate distribution of deals to meet their sales targets. It also helps in forecasting revenue in the near future.

• Lost Deals or Backlog

Negative metrics such as the number of lost deals or the backlog from the previous financial cycle, on the dashboard help in critical decision making. It can tell the salesman where their business is lacking and what it is that they need to focus on.

• Conversion Ratios

Conversion ratios tell the efficiency of the various stages in the sales process. Numbers such as these – the ratio of open leads to qualified leads, the ratio of qualified leads to closed deals, the ratio of open leads to closed deals etc. help in understanding where the work is getting piled and identifying the bottlenecks faced in the business.

• Attention Required/Overdue items

Salespeople would appreciate if they can get hold of a list of items on the dashboard, which needs their immediate attention. Overdue tasks is another area which needs to be highlighted in the day to day functioning of the business.

• Performance

 A metric that reflects the sales effectiveness or achievements of a salesperson in line with the company strategy and targets would summarize their performance and also act as a motivating factor to push them towards achieving more.  

2. Making Data Comparisons for Deriving Insights

One can gather meaningful insights from data when a comparison is made. Therefore, the way these metrics get compared side by side to derive a logical conclusion is downright important.

Should the metrics be compared with respect to each other? For example actual revenue against forecasted, lost deals versus won deals, sales backlog against the pipeline etc.

Or should it be compared with respect to time? Daily, weekly, quarterly, year on year, year to date etc. Making a comparison should ultimately help the salesperson answer the right questions.

3. Building your Story on Actual Data

Getting real-time data is really helpful in determining the best way of representing it. If it is fictional data, then one must stick to keeping the proportions right. Each chart has a specific type of data that it represents. For example, a pie is used to represent parts of a whole, a funnel represents a progression and a line displays variation over time of different series.

When you use actual data, you tend to realize that some charts do not look as good as you expected and maybe you should think about representing it in some other way. Or, that some numbers are better off shown as numbers itself and not compared to other figures as part of a chart, because it might end up skewing the chart in one direction.

4. Following General UI/UX Principles

Following the general UI/UX principles of good design makes the dashboard visually pleasing and easily navigable. Since most people read from left to right and top to bottom, aligning the widgets on the dashboard in the same order as the story progresses, helps in seamless navigation. The top left space on the dashboard is where the eye falls first. Placing the most important piece of information there ensures high visibility.

Leaving enough white spaces and keeping the dashboard uncluttered will help the user assimilate the information better. A sales dashboard should be concise with just the right amount of information for the salesperson to make an assessment of their business.

5. Keep Reinventing

Nobody gets it right the first time. Redesigning the dashboard a couple of times gives you a better perspective each time and helps you discover the one which will ultimately win your client’s heart.

Related Read: Make Your Data Visualization go Viral: 10 Quick Tips

Wrapping Up

Bringing things into perspective or distilling the essence from a mix of information is what a sales dashboard is all about. Companies have been relying on such visual representations to get an overview of what needs to be done. Particularly in the area of sales, such close visualizations of a range of data can indeed prove helpful for salespeople to gauge information as it is intended and make decisions crucial to the sales process. Owing to its importance, it is downright necessary to build and design a sales dashboard in accordance with certain principles.

By taking into consideration the key metrics that define the sales process, it is possible to delineate the entire workflow and pipeline to an easily identifiable visual form. Such a dashboard brings more clarity in the process, enabling salespeople to understand and apply the necessary changes. We did just that with our client by formulating an effective sales dashboard. This would ultimately help them leverage sales data to contrive practices that push their business forward, all the while accelerating efficiency and ROI.

Did cell phones really help real estate agents? Yes, without any doubt. Cell phones did transform the industry by taking away all the limitations concerning mobility. Real estate agents were able to keep in touch with their clients irrespective of geographical barriers. Besides, agents can get in touch with their prospective clients while on the go and vice versa.

Technology has ushered in new possibilities in the real estate industry. Mobile phones constitute just one facet, whereas there lies a diverse array of technology tools and solutions capable of disrupting the real estate market altogether. As real estate is a people-focused business, more leads for a broker meant more sales. And real estate technology does bring in new ways to improve sales.

Being a real estate agent, thinking that technology will leave you jobless is entirely baseless. The truth is, failing to utilize the latest technologies will certainly make you lag behind and miss out on some of the huge benefits that await you. In fact, a recent survey by the real estate brokerage Owners.com reveals that home buyers are increasingly seeking technology-based tools from real estate agents.

With real estate turning more fast-paced and competitive, buyers are on the lookout for agents armed with real estate software tools to streamline the home buying process and help them make informed decisions quickly. In fact, the Real Estate in a Digital Age report by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) identifies several tech tools like social media, MLS site, brokerage’s site etc. apart from cell phones and email as catalysts to produce quality leads in a real estate business.

Related Read: How Realtors Are Winning Tenants With Innovative Mobile Apps

Real Estate Agents Still Holds Significance

We all know that nowadays a majority of buyers are doing most of their home search process themselves. Different mobile apps, websites, and digital platforms open up a wide range of potential properties based on the buyer’s interest. There are even alerts and notifications for new listings that exactly matches a buyer’s interest.

In a majority of the cases, we find that the buyers are doing most of the legwork when it comes to actually search for property listings. But that’s just an initial search and occupy only a small portion of the overall buying process. Once they find their listing, the buyer needs to call in an agent to physically get into the home and inspect it or even to draft a proper offer for submitting.

Even though it is clear that while buyers are increasingly adopting technology-based tools, they still require the guidance of a real estate agent to minimize delays and seamlessly guide the buyer to the closing process. Relying heavily on technology may present a risk, particularly in commercial property sales where the buyers are trading in millions. An agent’s expertise is highly sought after to effortlessly navigate the buyer and settle on the best listings that will guarantee high ROI.

Technology-based tools allow buyers to take some steps or responsibilities of the agents themselves. They can find the listings and close in the process without the assistance of an agent. However, it will never act as a full replacement for the expertise of a professional realtor.

Related Read: Real Estate Industry in the Digital Era

Technology is still inadequate to deal with several tasks that come under the work process undertaken by a real estate agent. From consolidating the list of documents to getting around the loopholes in placing offers and drafting contract term and policies, the role of a realtor gains the upper hand and stays relevant where technology fails.

According to a report by the National Association of Realtors, buyers still prefer working with a real estate agent for around 87 percent of the time to find properties worthy for sale or purchase. Many home buyers still rely on the advice from a trusted real estate agent when it comes to acquiring, selling or leasing properties.

However, technology tools clearly lack the ability to gauge specific information concerning a property such as its future value. Experienced realtors, on the other hand, can easily assess whether a highly rated property do carry any expected value and thus guide the home buyer to make an informed decision.

Technology will actually allow an agent to do an improved business. It enables an agent to better engage with their customers, optimize their business and zero in on deals that earn them the most profit. Besides, technology makes realtors more efficient, which helps them serve a larger client base with utmost satisfaction.

Digital transformation is now a key aspect of every sector. And it has been there with the real estate industry for years. The biggest trend now is probably the change in the mindset of agents by embracing technology to serve buyers who are increasingly tech-driven.

Technology Helps Realtors Serve in Many Ways Possible

As a real estate agent, what should you do?

As an agent, can you think of doing large volumes in a traditional way? You will find that it is really hard to extend services to your customers. However, technology can help agents serve a lot more people at the same time. Selecting the right technologies will allow agents to become more efficient – to serve more buyers in less time, resulting in more revenue generated.

Using a property management software can also help real estate agents make the buying process of their clients easier. With mobile apps making a big impact on the industry, agents are provided anywhere and anytime access to data and reports thereby extending more opportunities to share with their clients. The evolution of mobile apps has made it easier for both agents and buyers to communicate efficiently, schedule showings and meetings, and moreover make the entire process simpler. Besides, most of the apps available now are trying to organize things easier for agents.

Technology gave agents access to a huge amount of real estate data. These data can support the agents to take better decisions and will eventually provide them more opportunities. With the entire world shifting to data-driven practices, leveraging big data from real estate dealings and applying machine learning and AI helps make better recommendations and crunch out valuable insights that provide agents an overview to make clear and accurate decisions, which bring out more efficiency and revenue.

Related Read: How real estate technology helps predict property prices

If the buyers are performing their own searches, they get a better picture of the market, making things more realistic about what their budget will allow. On the other side, sellers will come to know what their properties are worth. But, they still need assistance to accomplish their goal of buying or selling, which means that technology will continue to revolutionize the market. However, when it comes to decision making, the customers will keep their trust with a real estate agent.

Down the line, agents who admit technology as a tool that can be adopted as a new way of conducting business and building successful relationships will ultimately lead the way. The key thing is to zero in on the right technology means that reaps true value. Teaming up with a sound technical partner having deep expertise in crafting successful technology solutions for the real estate industry will help identify and deploy the right one.

Related Case Study: Investing in PropTech solutions aids real estate firms streamline and digitize their existing processes. See how we came up with an innovative web-based application for a leading real estate brokerage to integrate their processes around a single platform here.

[Courtesy – Saïd Business School, University of Oxford]

With the Industrial Internet, Industry 4.0, industrial robots and more, the manufacturing sector is seeing sweeping reforms in their processes and core functions. These reforms are making them faster, bigger and better and all of this has been possible because of digital transformation.

Digital transformation has changed the face of the manufacturing industry. From behemoth machinery and an army of workers, manufacturers have transformed themselves to a sleek, modern and more efficient entity. This blog will explore how digital transformation has made that possible. We will also see the most important digital trends in the manufacturing industry.

The Importance of Digital Transformation in Manufacturing

Change has been constant in the manufacturing industry. Right from the Industrial Revolution of the 1700s to today’s Industry 4.0, the manufacturing sector has had to adapt to the changes in political climates, economic upheavals, and technology. As technology fast forwards in our times, it is imperative that manufacturers keep up. The only way they can prepare their businesses for the digital revolution of our day is through digital transformation. Here are a few ways in which digital transformation is benefitting the manufacturing industry.

1. Keeping up with Customer Demands

A recent Harvard Business Review study of 75,000 people, showed that the most important factor in building customer loyalty towards an organization is the reduction of effort. Be it in collecting information on products, customer service or getting their needs met faster and more effectively, customers value the path of least effort. This is where the speed of innovation comes in. Manufacturers need to create products that are software-enabled and connected, and they must do this before anybody else!

A digital factory design where development, production, and other cycles aren’t siloed is imperative to this. Digitalization makes it possible for all these cycles to work in tandem and innovate much faster.  The vision of a “smart factory” is that it can make critical product decisions about customer demand, design, material selection, scheduling and pricing, all in one process. This would speed up innovation, create personalized products and enhance the overall customer experience exponentially.

2. Refining Processes

Manufacturing is largely a process-driven industry, so there is an incredible amount of focus on process refinement. Digital transformation makes this possible in many ways. Automation of processes is a major step in that direction. This reduces manual errors, helps automatically detect production inefficiencies, allows for the pre-testing of new ideas more economically and helps optimize the performance of workers.

Predictive disruption analytics, KPI monitoring, and other digitally enabled tools help in refining processes as they are happening. This allows manufacturers to identify weaknesses and make improvements quickly. Machine Learning enables instructions and intelligence to be built into the machines as they are developed and deployed. As these machines are intuitive, they learn from the environment and aid in the continuous process refinement.

3. Revenue Gains and Cost Reduction

A PwC survey of over 2,000 participants from companies in nine major industrial sectors and 26 countries, predicts that Industry 4.0 will drive $493B in revenue gains and $ 421B in cost reductions globally by 2020.

These numbers are realized by the many opportunities brought in by digital transformation. The digitization and integration of vertical and horizontal value chains help bring a cohesive focus to the organization’s processes and production. The creation of new digitized products with analytical capabilities and integrating new methods of data collection and analysis helps manufacturers understand and cater to the needs of customers more effectively. Disruptive digital business models allow for a more agile approach throughout the organization and thus optimizes performance and cost. All this and more contribute to significant cost reductions and an increase in revenue.

Digital Transformation Trends in Manufacturing

Different technologies have opened up a wide area of possibilities in the manufacturing industry. Here are 3 Trends that are doing wonders in the manufacturing space.

1. IoT And Industry 4.0

61% of enterprises say that the “Internet of Things (IoT) plays a role in their digital business strategies with manufacturing and high-tech leading all other industries.” The manufacturing industry is evidently recognizing the critical impact of IoT in gaining a competitive edge. In 2016 alone, IoT, accounting for more than $178 billion in revenue. There are many avenues where IoT has helped streamline and simplify manufacturing processes. It is also a key component of Industry 4.0 and enables connected devices. This allows for the streamlining of internal operations and the optimization of products and operations through insights from the cloud.

Industry 4.0 has also made possible the trend of mass customization, which is characterized by a better and more effective response to the demands of customers. Connectedness and mobility have led to faster innovation and response. Logistics and supply chains have also benefited greatly from this connectedness.

Related Reading: Find how IoT is reshaping industries. 

2. Machine Learning 

Machine Learning has elevated the processes and operations of the manufacturing industry in many ways. A PwC study entitled Digital Factories 2020: Shaping the future of manufacturing showed that the adoption of machine learning and analytics by manufacturers to improve predictive maintenance is predicted to increase in the next five years by 38%. Advanced machine learning algorithms are able to identify and implement improvements in processes and operations, thus leading to reduced costs and increased revenue.

A study by The World Economic Forum (WEF) discussed how manufacturers are recognizing the ability to combine emerging technologies including IoT, AI, and machine learning to improve asset tracking accuracy, supply chain visibility, and inventory optimization. Thus, in various ways, Machine Learning is greatly contributing to lowering the cost of production, improving the speed of innovation and operations and enhancing the customer experience by accurately identifying and meeting customer demands.

Related Reading: Check out this infographic to learn more on the disruptive innovation: Machine Learning.

3. Advanced Robotics

Robotics is no more confined to the realms of accomplishing repetitive assembly line tasks. Robots are now intuitive, trainable and have the ability to mimic human attributes of dexterity and critical thinking. This makes them a formidable force in manufacturing.

Robots with advanced sensors and collaborative ability are now being deployed in hazardous environments to collect information and data pertinent to the manufacturing industry’s needs. This contributes greatly to providing safe working environments for humans. Apart from the physical robotic machines, Robotic Process Automation (RPA) has also grown in importance. RPA goes a step above and beyond physical tasks and replicates human thinking ability and transforms processes and operations to the next level. Recently, the term ‘cobot’ was coined by professors at Northwestern University in America. This underlines the significant progress in Robotic Process Automation (RPA) where robots are now able to collaborate with humans in the workspace.

Related Reading: Read on to know how robotic process can help accelerate business growth.

Owning Digital Transformation

There can be no doubt that digital transformation is the way to go if manufacturers want to keep up with competition and stay relevant. Capitalizing on these digital trends for your business need not be a daunting task. At Fingent, we help manufacturers make sense of digital transformation and adopt it successfully. We can help you make a success of your digital transformation. Get in touch with us and see how.

Over the past couple of years, digitization has enabled technology-driven small companies to outclass established business houses worldwide. With industries ranging from taxi-services to banking, transforming digitally, more and more enterprises are realizing the importance of making digitization their number one priority. The tech-savvy consumer base, which consists of the population below the age of 30 and covers 50% of the global population, is considered to be the key driver behind this realization. Such folks have the rising affinity to expect every business organization they interact with to provide the fastest and most satisfying experiences each time. As a business, turning deaf ears to customer’s expectations can lead to unrevivable consequences. From AI to blockchain, IoT and RPA, the list of digital innovation you need to pay attention to are huge.  

It’s nearing the first quarter completion of 2019 and we thought this would be the perfect time to show you the digital innovations that we believe will reshape businesses in the coming months and future years. Here are our top 5 picks from technologies that enterprises need to watch out for by 2022:

Flexible Cloud Computing

When cloud computing became mainstream a couple of years ago, there was a rush from enterprises to build their technology competence on the cloud. This resulted in several businesses having their own private cloud ecosystems that supported their own limited digital innovations. Today, many available digital tools require a complex network of cloud resource. This has reshaped the cloud computing ecosystem which has now transitioned into intelligently connected networks that have Public, Private and Hybrid cloud partitions working in sync to help businesses derive value from technology running on these platforms.

Different IT workloads may need to be run simultaneously over multiple cloud platforms to achieve enterprise goals and this has resulted in the so-called Multicloud saga. This is one area which will see more developments and interest from the business community in 2019 as the previous year saw major cloud service providers acquiring or developing solutions to club their multiple cloud ecosystems to serve client interests.

Related Reading: Find how a cloud platform like INFINCE can help businesses leverage technologies more efficiently.

Blockchain in Mainstream

The past couple of years saw considerable investments from the business community in the blockchain. We believe there will be mainstream applications coming out in 2019 that will revolutionize areas such as data security, digital identity verification, and intelligent automation. Sectors such as BFSI, logistics, regulatory bodies, and government agencies have already started using blockchain to set up complex autonomous verification and validation systems that require minimal human intervention, thanks to the capacity of blockchain to be immutable.

In the coming years, more mainstream consumer-facing areas of businesses would be driven by blockchain based autonomous operational interfaces and it could set the stage for innovations akin to self-driving cars. Many technology companies would be coming out with mainstream solutions having blockchain essentials embedded into their core and these would further enhance business capabilities for enterprises worldwide.

Related Reading: Find how blockchain technology can transform the supply-chain industry.

Digital Modelling

While this concept has been around for a while, we think it will make more impact this year as more companies are investing in this front. The idea is to create a digital persona for every product or service business has to offer its customers. This persona would be used to arrive at choosing the right supporting digital enablers like data generators (sensors, IoT enabled devices, etc.) as well as the right decision path (data models and implementations of data science to arrive at success models). Such persona would be used to ascertain an offering’s readiness to the market, the cost required to maintain it viable, the processes and business models that need re-defining to support it and so on. The entire exercise though a bit complex will bring about a strategic advantage to adopters as their business offerings would be more aligned for digital success than competitors.

Related Reading: Digital innovation is transforming today’s business. Find how your business can benefit from digital transformation too.

Immersive Experiences

2019 will see consumer experiences moving to a more immersive phenomenon where almost everyone from a local retail shop to an e-commerce giant will offer interactive experiences courtesy of technology like augmented and virtual reality. Gartner says that by 2022, nearly 70% of all businesses would be using immersive customer experiences in some form on an experimental basis. Such immersive technology will find its way into numerous consumer-facing scenarios like demonstrations, virtual assistants, field services and so on. With gadgets supporting immersive experiences like smart glasses and wearables being available for very affordable prices, the consumer base requiring such experiences will grow tremendously in the coming years. The possibilities are limitless and businesses small or big can capitalize on this opportunity to improve their competence.

Related Reading: Check out the ongoing battle between AR and VR and find which technology has the potential to mainstream first.

Conversational Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is no longer a trend to watch out for because it has already gone mainstream over the last two years. Today, the focus should be on solutions that have been made available by harnessing the power of AI. One major solution that has gained attention now are conversational bots. From websites to major apps, a multitude of consumer-facing interactions is now handled by programmed bots that can interpret queries and respond intelligently.

Be it ordering food from a restaurant, booking a cab or even carry out a banking transaction, tech-savvy consumers are increasingly depending on personal digital assistants or bots to aid them in every step of the way. The proliferation of smart devices like smart home speakers, wearables and other IoT enabled home and personal electronic devices have created immense possibilities for a business to connect more effectively with end users. Today, you can ask your smart coffee maker to brew a coffee in the most precise variants of taste and smell without even having to touch the coffee maker. You can simply ask the personal assistant on your phone to do so.

Related Related: Find unconventional ways Artificial Intelligence is driving business value.

The top technologies mentioned above concludes that 2019 and the years to come is going to be a breakthrough year for several technological innovations. Business leaders need to hone their digital skills to keep pace with the rapidly growing market. On the positive side, most of these technology platforms or solutions come in affordable subscription basis and hence it is pretty much accessible to any enterprise despite their business size. However, the biggest differentiator for your success is the right technology advisory and implementation.

This is where our consultants at Fingent can become your best asset. With years of experience in empowering multiple businesses to achieve their digital aspirations, our world-class services can help you achieve your digital dreams seamlessly. Talk to us to know more about how we can help you embrace the above innovations and much more into your mainstream business operations.

Fingent Now at Melbourne!

Be it the discovery of transforming technologies like GPS Maps, or be it the home of a smart future hub like Tonsley Innovation District; Australia has always been marked for renowned digital disruption. Accelerating this culture of rapid technological evolution, Fingent has spread wings of technological expertise and sophisticated software solutions in this land of innovation.

Responding to the growing technological needs of existing customers and visioning to transform the budding industries of Australia, Fingent is all set with a new office in Melbourne, to deliver the best technological assistance.

Before we dive deeper into Fingent’s global expansion, let’s take a look at Australia’s booming industries.

An Overview of Australia’s Fastest Growing Sectors

According to the 2017 Industry Employment Projections Report, released by the Australian Government, these four major sectors are expected to grow rapidly over the next five years.

Healthcare Industry

Due to Australia’s aging population, the overall healthcare and social assistance sector are expected to grow by 16.1 percentage in the coming years. With such rapid growth, adopting digital transformation is turning into a necessity more than an option. A few technologies that are trending in today’s healthcare market are blockchain, AI, augmented and virtual reality.

Education and Training

The educational industry is one of the constantly growing sectors of Australia. Being the third most popular study abroad destination in the world, the Australian education market is expected to grow at a rate of 12 percentage in the next five years. Technologies like AR, VR, and IoT are constantly implemented in this sector to maintain growth stability.

Retail Trade

Retail trade in Australia is expected to grow at a rate of 3.7 percentage in five years. With the increasing growth in food, motor vehicle, fuel and other store-based retailing, the industry ranks second in the high-demand occupations of Australia. Keeping up the pace of such growth, retail providers are adopting cutting-edge technologies to enhance their customer experience.

Construction

With an annual increase of 2.8 percentage, the construction industry is not only growing in size but also by productivity. To maintain this pace of growth in the sector, the construction business providers are constantly integrating proptech solutions to provide with the best services.

Rapid growth and the need for digitization in most of the major business sectors makes Australia the economy to foster technological growth. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Fingent is expanding presence in Australia with expertise software solutions, professional services, and support capabilities.

“Innovation through collaboration is growing in Australia. Almost one in five Australian business actively collaborated with others when implementing innovation in 2018, and we are excited to be a part of this growth. We are optimistic about the new opportunities that Melbourne has to offer. ”

-Dileep Jacob – Head of Global Delivery, Fingent

 Fingent’s Vision

Currently, Fingent is one of the leading providers of custom web and mobile software and enterprise integration services in the world. With a strong foothold in the major industries like Real Estate, Healthcare, Retail, Education and Finance, Fingent has an active client base across four continents. With development centers in India offering constant technical solutions at attractive prices, the office at Melbourne will aim at providing personal attention and timely communication to clients situated in the Asian-pacific regions.

Fingent’s purpose-built solutions have enabled numerous enterprises to streamline their unique business process and leverage the existing technology assets to foster business growth and value. Fingent’s expertise lies in empowering industries with the appropriate technologies that can transform their business system and drive overall success. With trending and sophisticated technologies like Microsoft, SAP, Mobile, Data Analytics, Cloud Computing, and Open Source, Fingent aims to deliver not just technology solutions, but practices and insights that can help business in Australia to transform to industry leaders. Through the office at Melbourne, Fingent focuses on extending personalized services and strategic support to the leading enterprises of Australia.

About Fingent

Fingent is a software development company that develops custom software to enable our clients to operate more effectively, more efficiently, and with more resiliency. Since 2003, Fingent has developed web and mobile software solutions that have been key to our clients’ business success. Our technology and industry expertise enables us to deliver sophisticated solutions rapidly and on budget. For us, it is not only about delivering software but also about partnering and playing a part in business efforts to shape a brighter and smarter future.

Despite the industry buzz over the past few years, benefits realization and simple operational stability after go-live are arguably the biggest challenges companies are facing when implementing their new ERP systems. Recently, 60% of organizations failed to realize the business benefits they expected from their ERP implementations!

Among the business management tools available today, numerous studies illustrate the key factors to consider before choosing an ERP system for your business. The “Clash of the Titans” report by Panorama Consulting summarized quantitative results from hundreds of ERP implementations across the globe. The results showed that implementing the SAP ERP system, and implementing the Oracle ERP system produced very different results for different businesses!

For instance, an Oracle customer spends less on its implementation. Compared to this, a SAP customer is able to offer an implementation timeline that is relatively close to what was forecasted to be.

Another research considered a data set of over 2000 respondents from 61 countries, to illustrate the value of the people’s respective ERP implementation. The results showed that SAP held the largest market share of three vendors, with a 22% share.

The Key Factors That Make SAP Stand Out

• SAP or Systems, Applications, and Processes deal with data planning.
• The use of SAP has been compatible with large corporations such as Microsoft and IBM. Oracle, on the other hand, stands for Object Relational Database Management Systems (ORDBMS) and can be hosted in a number of platforms.
• SAP is a business management tool that allows real-time tracking in addition to the management of sales, finance, accounting, and human resources.
• SAP does not follow the traditional information system management where each management tool is considered as an individual system that operates independently.
• SAP integrates business applications using ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning Software) and on the other hand, Oracle, an Object Relational Database Management System (ORDBMS), is used in enterprise environments.
• Development and deployment in SAP can include Oracle as a database system as it can be integrated with numerous databases.
• SAP performs with a single information pathway alone for their entire enterprise and all other common information.
• SAP applications cannot interact with their own systems but can interact with other processes in order for tangible business events to happen.
• SAP ensures easier functions of management. This includes integration and other functions.
• The SAP model runs on a programming language of the fourth generation. It is known to us as Advanced Business Application Programming (ABAP).

Related Reading: Check out how SAP HANA technology is the new game changer for industries.

On the other hand, Oracle is an Object Relational Database Management System (ORDBMS) that comes from the massive Oracle Corporation.

The Oracle Database Management System is created with at least a single instance of a particular application. These specific instances are specific processes of the operating system, also benefit the storage!

In a nutshell, the key differences between Oracle And SAP are as follows:

Related Reading: Find reasons why you should use SAP and how you can plan a budget for it.

Who is King In The Area Of Business Software?

SAP and Oracle compete mainly in the areas of Business Software like ERP, CRM, and SCM. SAP is said to have more installs than Oracle in bigger companies. Let’s have a walk-through across some key reasons:

• SAP Being The Pioneer

SAP ERP ran to the list first. SAP was already well established as a full ERP solution when Oracle was just starting to establish a Financials package for companies! By virtue of being first, SAP is well embedded in this environment.

• A Much Better Integrated Solution

The core SAP ERP modules were built from scratch to full integration. So when a change is made, all other related modules are updated immediately. This comes useful when you extend it with a CRM or SCM functionality.

• Mind-Share And Brand Recognition

Most companies/ people tend to have considered ERP implementation also as a status decree! They believe it increases their brand value.

• Support Factors

SAP has a much larger pool of developers and consultants with a much larger installation base!

Read: 5 Tips For Getting The Best Out Of Your ERP System

CIO Strategies Matter! – How SAP Drives Ahead Of The Game!!

There are several case studies to validate why SAP is preferred over Oracle by many Business and CIOs. They are as follows:

• SAP being the pioneer in ERP implementation

As SAP has been the leader and the pioneer in implementation, it preferred over Oracle with a brand value which indicates ERP leadership and preference.

• SAP is an in-house built product

SAP was built in house. It has worked with industry experts to evolve the ERP processes and is able to build a robust solution. It allows customers to customize SAP functionality and yet get the client specific processes defined in ERP.

• Robust integrated and scalable ERP

SAP has designed a highly integrated ERP which has world-class performance and scalable to multiple solutions. It also easies integrations with 3rd party solutions.

• IS –Solutions

SAP has provided additional IS solutions which are optional but they allow businesses to have specialized processes on single ERP which is well integrated and reap benefits for “best industry solutions”

• SAP Analytics

Integration on ERP and BI is notable and provides unbeatable performance and flexibility to define reports. Analytics based reporting Management to take real-time decisions

• SAP Support services

SAP provides class support services which give Business assurance of resolution in critical situations.

• SAP provides implementation methodology and Best practices and Tools

These tools provide a fool-proof implementation road map and reduce risks during the course of implementations. Following this guidance one can implement SAP in as less as 4 months; which means faster ROI.

• SAP Hana Features

SAP HANA with its “in memory” capability ensures super speed of processing data. The new UI solutions via Fiori give top class User experience.

In a nutshell, hiring the best qualified, focused and unbiased ERP can make your business more successful. So stay focused with our latest articles and blogs on SAP versus Oracle ERP implementation to go-live successfully!!

Digital Adoption is crucial for the success of an organization. Businesses understand this and are going full steam ahead in ensuring that they are completely equipped digitally. While the IT department is primarily hands-on with digital adoption, it is becoming increasingly clear that business leaders must also roll up their sleeves and get involved with the digital goals of the company. This blog will discuss why this is important and how it makes for better business leaders.

Digital Adoption

Digital adoption in the most elementary sense is to achieve a state of functioning where all the organization’s digital tools are used to their full capability. Digital Adoption also involves getting stakeholders, including customers and employees, to use these tools to the best.

If the company has a whole repertoire of digital tools, it doesn’t mean that they have successfully implemented digital adoption. It can only be a success if these tools are being used to their full capacity by the organization and its customers.

How Digital Adoption Makes You A Better Business Leader

Talking about the top executives in today’s organization, Dion Hinchcliffe, VP and principal analyst at Constellation Research says that they must “match the pace of change, fall behind, or lead the pack.” Continuing on what is expected of business leaders particularly the CIO’s today, he says: “That’s the existential issue at stake in today’s digitally-infused times, where bold action must be actively supported by out-of-the-box experimentation and pathfinding … The CIO this year must be both a supremely masterful priority juggler and an effective digital leader from the front.”

This is what today’s business scenario demands a true business leader. Leaders are expected not only to be digitally informed but to be able to lead their company into digital transformation. Digital adoption must be the focus of their efforts. Here are a few ways in which digital adoption can make you a better business leader.

Related Reading: Find how digital innovation is transforming today’s business.

1. Leading Change and Growth

One of the qualities that define a capable business leader is his ability to be a visionary and lead his organization towards growth. In today’s world, growth is becoming synonymous with the company’s ability to keep up with technology and digital transformation. Business leaders stand to benefit the most as their company moves forward and adopts the best of digital technology.

And yet, according to a KPMG study, more than 56% of digital initiatives fail due to lack of leadership. As this shows, good leadership can make all the difference between success and failure of digital adoption. The mindset of a leader and his/her dedication to digital adoption will direct the mindset of the rest of the organization. Digital disruption calls for a positive attitude towards change. It calls for a change in the culture of the organization. Encouraging innovation and experimentation is also key to the success of digital adoption. All this can only be achieved if the CEO and top-level management embrace and lead the change.

2. Gaining Customer Insight

Today’s business is more customer-centric than ever. The success of an organization is dependent on its understanding of customer preferences and behavior. In the digital age, there is no better way to gain customer insight than through digital adoption.

Jim Swanson, former CIO of Monsanto is an excellent example of leaders who leverage a company’s IT to deliver growth and value in the business. Discussing digital transformation in terms of customer centricity and the role of leaders, he says: “We talk about automating operations, about people, and about new business models. Wrapped inside those topics are data analytics, technologies, and software – all of which are enablers, not drivers. In the center of it all is leadership and culture. You could have all those things – the customer view, the products and services, data, and really cool technologies – but if leadership and culture aren’t at the heart, it fails. Understanding what digital means to your company – whether you’re a financial, agricultural, pharmaceutical, or retail institution – is essential.”

That is where the magic lies. Understanding digital and understanding what digital can do for your customer-centric goals is where you will find success. When business leaders understand this vital concept and become champions of digital adoption, then the company will see real growth.

Related Reading: Find how machine learning boosts customer experience.

3. Nurturing Curiosity

Curiosity is an important attribute of growth and change. To step out of their comfort zone and embrace growth, business leaders must cultivate and foster this important attribute. In a PWC survey of 1,322 CEOs in 77 countries, most CEOs pointed out to the importance of being curious. In order to keep up with the turbulent business scenario and stiff competition. Michael Dell, Chairman and CEO of Dell, says in the report: “The one attribute CEOs need in the future to succeed, that I would place my bet on, is curiosity. From curiosity comes learning and new ideas. In businesses that are changing very rapidly, if you’re not curious, if you’re not learning, if you don’t have new ideas, you’re going to have a real problem.”

Curiosity plays a vital role in embracing digital technology and helping employees adapt to change. Fostering a culture of innovative thinking and intellectual curiosity will help the organization move forward with digital adoption and make the best of it. Conversely, digital adoption will help business leaders build curiosity and lead their organization towards innovation and success.

Embrace Digital Adoption

The importance of embracing digital adoption cannot be overemphasized and it must start from the top. It has been estimated that there will be US$15.7 trillion in global GDP gains from AI and digital by 2030. If you want to rake in some of this revenue, there are no two ways about it – go digital or go home is the verdict! Fingent helps business leaders worldwide in their journey towards digital adoption and transformation. Let’s have a chat and see what we can do for your business.

Related Reading: Check out how AI is driving business value across industries.