I was at a Digital Transformation conference last week. Of those that attended I'm not sure anybody went back to the office hoping to transform their business.
The presentations where all on bits of tech. Tech for this and tech for that. Tactical this, tactical that. Nothing about how we empower the employees to be digital. Nothing about a digital strategy.
We met with a company this week that sell digital transformation. They actually told us they did "social selling" and didn't need us. Explain to us how you do social selling we asked. They said, we write corporate content. ( Just so people know, this is content about the company and its products.) They then inmail it to people.
We asked them how that was going, they said it was OK.
We asked them how it was really going, they looked sheepish and then said "shit".
So I asked the senior person in the room, what he did whenever he got an inmail and he said "delete it", I asked the Marketing Manager what she did when she got an inmail and she said "delete it". They then looked at each other and you could hear the penny drop.
Sending inmails is not social selling, it's cold calling on a social network. You interrupt somebody and then pitch. Welcome to lead generation in the 1990s! Oh but it's on a social network so that makes it digital. Sorry it does not!
Here lies the problem. People expect to use the same tools and techniques in 2019 as they did in 1990. The view seems to be that being "digital" is all about the 1990 world but using what we have in 2019. So taking content nobody wants to read and stuffing it through social media (instead of emailing it or sending it in the post where nobody read it).
Companies must seek outside help if they are to transform. They need to seek best practice and advice to empower the employees, future leaders and change agents within your business.
Just doing what we did in the past an applying to the "new world" does not work.
What got you here, won't get you there.....
This week we also met a Managing Director of a Retail company that is transforming itself. The MD is on social ...... and gets leads through this.
He is also transforming the relationship he has with clients, treating them like humans. NOT seeing every opportunity to sell to them, back actually creating relationships. Creating relationships where people come back, time after to time to buy. Creating relationships where people recommend their friends. I've already recommended two people. How many retailers do you recommend to friends? None I bet!
Digital is about tech, it's about thinking about things differently. And if you want some advice, we are here. No hard sell.
Every company and every industry needs to chart its own digital transformation. There is no cookbook and no set of ingredients that you can or should blindly follow. Instead, companies must be willing to address and reform everything about the way they work — their people, their processes and their technology.
unknownx500
