Digital transformation: Do it now, and do it well

Digital transformation can seem a little daunting, overwhelming, or even a bit confusing. But digital transformation doesn’t need to be a massive, expensive project taken on all at once. In fact, it should be more of a smooth transition into evolving the way in which you are already doing business with your members.

Your members will continue to come to your business for the same reasons, but how and where they prefer to receive those services and interact with your business has changed. Your members – especially those among the financially active Millennial and Gen Z demographics – are expecting your business to meet their desire and expectations to expand the channels of business and communication into the digital realm.

But, you have to begin this transformation, before it’s too late.

There are three main reasons why your organization should start building a digital strategy right away:

1. Growing Competition

Waiting too long to begin making your digital transformation could result in losing your most relished members to more digitally-apt competitors. To keep your members, you need to compete with the growing number of organizations that are after your member base. The strongest among these competing organizations can be bucketed into two categories:

1. 1. Traditional, financial organizations that have already vastly expanded their digital capabilities to meet their consumers’ needs.
   2. FinTechs and non-traditional organizations that are taking consumers from traditional financial organizations.

What all these competitors have in common is that they have taken the time to figure out what their consumers want, and have evolved their services to meet their particular needs and expectations.

2. Member Engagement & Enablement

Communicating with your members on platforms they engage in everyday can be a huge money maker for your business.

Consider how you interact with your preferred retailers today, versus how you interacted with them just a few years ago. These businesses have adapted to make life easier for you and their other customers. To successfully engage and satisfy your members, you too need to figure out what your members expect of you so you can start meeting those expectations.

There are numerous communication channels you can utilize to transform and personalize relationships with your members, such as video messages, emails, mobile apps, social media posts and text messages. You don’t need to start using every single channel all at once, but you should dive into the channels that would result in the highest penetration and engagement among your members.  Leveraging information you have on hand about your members can help you to identify which channels your members would likely value most.

3. Leveraging Data

You may not be aware of it, but you have plenty of data on hand about your members, you just have to know where to look and how it can be utilized. Properly leveraged data can help you establish patterns in your consumers’ behaviors at a group or individual level, so you can evolve and optimize your business strategies with your members at the forefront.

Building this kind of data-driven, member-centric strategy will surely reduce your risk of losing new or current business to competitors; but you have to start now!

Visit our website to learn more about how you can build a strong digital strategy that is right for your business and members.