Written by:
Vahe Minasyan
Senior Associate Consultant
Organizations across industries are continuously transforming the way they approach their clientele, due to the proliferation of digitally connected devices across the majority of the industrialized world. Many companies that have otherwise operated in the non-digital sector are finding that adoption of digital strategy is slowly becoming not only a critical survival tactic, but an unprecedented opportunity for growth and entry into market sectors otherwise thought to be impenetrable.
By the year 2020, an entire generation will have grown up within a primarily digital world. Their familiarity with technology, reliance on mobile communications, and desire to remain in contact with large networks of individuals and organizations will transform how the world works, consumes, and is served.1 This begs the all important questions: What strategies should companies employ to stay ahead of the digital curve in their industry? What tactics should become standard operating procedure to make sure customers and partners remain thoroughly satisfied?
The answers to those questions are highly-relative depending on varying industry landscapes, but one thing remains constant: Organizations need to keep their fingers on the proverbial pulse of the digitization trend and its evolution, and employ top teams to provide leadership in formulating strategy that simultaneously takes advantage of short term digital opportunity, and establishes solid cornerstones for long term viability, scalability, and flexibility in an ever-so-quickly changing technological world.
Through the analysis of high-profile acquisitions, we can oftentimes gauge the growth sectors of industries, as large organizations with money to burn will usually buy out competition that has a large enough competitive edge to threaten the future of their business. Not all acquisition events are due to an overbearing technical competitive advantage, but those that are illustrate how growth sectors force market leaders to pivot to stay ahead of the curve. In no other sector is this trend more noticeable than industry disrupting digital players being gobbled up by their traditionally non-digital counterparts and competitors.
Take, for example, the 2011 acquisition of Esurance by insurance giant Allstate. Historically, the process of purchasing insurance was a very brick and mortar ordeal, with lots of face to face interaction with agents, their staff, and support personnel over the phone. The internet, and more importantly, easy to access and use mobile applications that cover the entire spectrum of the insurance model, from quote to claims support, became overwhelmingly popular as advanced mobile technology allowed consumers to turn the tangible experience of buying insurance into a digital one. After the acquisition, AllState CEO Thomas Wilson expressed that he was seeking to add customers through direct channels such as the Internet as young consumers shunned agents. 2
When large industry leaders begin to shift their focus on these types of disruptive digital models, it’s clear that they’re betting on a digital future, and that future is ripe with opportunity if an organization’s strategy is sound. By 2015, there will be 3.5 Internet connected devices per person in the United States. 3What that means for organizations across all industries is that it has become and will continue to be imperative to have a digital footprint, and to take advantage of the added utility of the brave new digital world to build upon and expand product and service offerings. There is, however, no need for an organization to divert from their core business and try to cultivate a digital strategy on their own.
At CPI, our mission is to take the role of technologists and solutions architects to build, configure, and deploy strategic initiatives and corresponding platform executions to both improve the efficacy of existing competitive advantages and assets of our clients, and also allow organizations to kick down the doors and fully seize digital opportunities in their markets. Every organization’s digital strategy will be unique. From customer facing mobile applications to internal data networks and customized web applications with robust management reporting, CPI approaches digital strategy from a holistic perspective that stresses business strategy first and foremost. Success in the digital landscape is heavily dependent on a solid understanding of an industry’s core dynamics, and recognizing how the application of digital strategy to those dynamics will eventually cause disruption and lead to real, tangible, exploitable opportunity.
To learn more about how CPI can transform your organization into a high performance business, get in touch today.
1 “The Digitization Megatrend” Booz & Co.”
2 Allstate Will Buy Esurance in $1Billion Deal as Wilson Adds Online Sales
3 “The Internet of Things” Cisco Systems.”
