Creating a Consumer-Centric Value Chain Through Digital Transformation

Within businesses, supply chain professionals are under constant pressure to improve efficiency. Competition continues to increase and customer expectations are at an all-time high. Previously, manufacturers focused on their product and its features, not on whether it was in sync with the needs of the consumer. With the rise of digital analytics, however, the consumer has taken the reins, changing the ballgame for companies that now have to change their product strategies so they’re more about us, the consumer, than them, the producer.

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But how do they achieve this?

Craft a strategy for the digital age

In this customer-led world, a successful customer strategy is key – one that uses sophisticated data analytics tools, massive amounts of rich customer data, and an agile, test-and-learn technique for developing valuable new product proposals. Businesses need to partner with their customers to co-create products and services that align with those customers’ needs.

Creating a winning customer strategy can be nerve-wracking when digital disruption has you worried about how to stay relevant to your customers, stay ahead of the competition, and stay profitable in highly volatile markets. These concerns can be assuaged by customer journey mapping and user experience design, which are crucial for implementing customer-centric changes. These activities should be strengthened by training, technology, innovation, and design thinking, which help businesses adopt cross-functional, customer-centric operating models and enjoy the economic and reputational rewards of an enhanced customer experience.

Improve your customer experience

Investing in customer experience enhancement can produce a substantial competitive advantage. Leading consumer brands achieve twice as much revenue growth as their competitors by designing a better customer experience that inspires brand loyalty.
Building an effective customer experience through calculated vision and design will pave the way for a successful transformation. This can be achieved through:

• Customer experience analytics that bring the voice of the customer into the boardroom, providing perspective and enabling leaders to assess returns. Collecting customer feedback using surveys and focus groups helps you accomplish this by providing a more unified understanding of customer preferences and observed behavior. You will be able to forecast customer trends with greater accuracy and devise more effective sales, marketing, and customer service processes.
• Embracing design thinking to craft engaging customer experiences. Add the concept of customer-led “service design” to your product design process – a complete framework that enables you to see how clients and prospects connect with your brand and product, and shows all the various stages customers experience as they interact with your online channels, from awareness to consideration to purchase.

Digitally integrate your marketing, sales, and service

Traditional companies need to transform marketing, sales, and service silos into an integrated process for attracting, acquiring, and engaging customers – all seamlessly connected to agile supply chain operations.

• Transform marketing: Recognize your customers’ needs and form marketing strategies according to those needs. Sophisticated analytics and intelligent use of customer data will align your marketing efforts with fact-based insights.
• Transform sales: Offline sales channels need to be transformed, digitized, and then fully integrated with your purely digital channels. Your sales operations need to move away from the product-centric approach towards consumer-centric.
• Omni-channel integration: Multi-channel customer contact for each transaction is now the norm. Customers favor mobile channels now, so your business should have a mobile channel strategy that offers a more personalized experience.

Conclusion

By implementing customer-centricity with a focus on the economics of the customer experience, you can drive profitable growth, create actionable insights and strategies for customer focus, and operationalize them. Use digital technology to create strong market intelligence and opportunities for personalized consumer interactions.
Digital BI and analytics powered by machine learning can go a long way towards realizing your consumer-centric approach to product development, and can be leveraged into strategic decisions that improve business performance, profitability, and customer relationships. To learn more, please contact Visionet Systems.