Fast-Track Your Digital Transformation Endeavors – The Salesforce Way

Ten years ago, we couldn’t have cared less if the new cafe in the town had a website. Now, we don’t trust one that doesn’t. If your business has an online presence, you’re a part of the digital transformation.

In the latest publication^[i], ‘2022 Gartner Market Guide for Digital Adoption Platform’, 14 out of 40+ vendors in the digital adoption space today are recognized as Representative Vendors. The report also estimates that by 2025, 70% of organizations will use digital adoption platforms across the entire tech stack to overcome insufficient application user experiences.

As the digital world is gaining momentum, businesses are actively looking for ways to transform, adapt, expand, and compete in new markets. By harnessing new and emerging technologies, companies can more readily respond to dynamic customer expectations driven by digital natives.

In 2022, where almost every business has an online presence, there is still room for companies to go fully digital. While it’s a great step to have a website, there’s more to the transformation than just having an online presence – a robust SaaS provider like Salesforce should be ever-present in all of your core business operations.

Salesforce, from its inception, has provided top-notch products to businesses, be it basic or customized. Salesforce specially designed its platform for customization thus, saving time and stamping out costly software conversion problems.

In this blog post, we’ll take a look at how organizations are adapting to digital transformation by leveraging digital adoption platforms and how Salesforce is empowering them.

Businesses Adapting to New Technologies & Shifting Towards Digital Transformation – A Statistical Picture

Companies’ investments in digital transformation initiatives have increased due to the pandemic. Businesses are now leveraging the latest technologies that support flexibility, increase efficiency, and boost productivity. As digital technologies become ingrained in every function, businesses will undergo dramatic changes and make a shift toward digital transformation. According to research^[ii] –

• 90% of businesses are prioritizing an increase in capital allocation toward digital transformation.
• 95% of finance leaders in the US (and 72% globally) say artificial intelligence (AI) will be crucial for the finance function of the future.
• 75% of organizations are likely to make considerable investments in the IoT and app-and web-enabled markets.
• 73% of businesses are likely to make considerable investments in machine learning.
• 58% of businesses are likely to make considerable investments in augmented virtual reality.

Well, these numbers pretty much speak for themselves about the constant rise of investment in digital adoption platforms, don’t they?

The growing need for automating repetitive marketing tasks, retaining customers, and providing personalized experiences are some of the major factors to drive this massive growth.

Great CX + EX = A Top Priority for Modern Businesses

The success of any business depends on its relationship with its customers and employees. That’s why a consistent focus on, and alignment between customer experience (CX) and employee experience (EX) is critical to success.

In the last decade, CX was a top priority, but now EX is also gaining traction and becoming a top priority for businesses. According to a report from PwC^[iii], 73% of customers point to experience as a critical factor in their purchase decision. The pay-off for companies with a great CX – a 16% price premium and higher customer lifetime value. For employees, it’s not just about monetary benefits. McKinsey found that 70% of workers want their job to be a significant source of purpose in their lives.

When EX and CX are aligned, it can have a huge impact on a business’s performance. In fact, businesses that prioritize EX and CX together witness double revenue growth. When Forrester^[iv] looked at what sets apart customer-obsessed firms, they found out that their employees were 28% more likely to report being happy at work, which led to higher employee accountability, more innovation, and lower attrition, among other advantages.

By 2023, organizations at advanced stages of digital transformation will find that poor CX and EX are their biggest barriers to further success. Therefore, it will be more important than ever for businesses to level up their CX and EX game to thrive in this digital age.

How Digital Adoption Platforms Will Prove to be a Cornerstone in Digital Transition

A digital adoption platform (DAP) can enable employees to navigate the onboarding process caused by transformational change management. It guides them on how to finish tasks, get familiar with the newly deployed technologies, and help them learn on the job. Here’s how DAPs will empower businesses to grow better:

1. Increased Data Collection: In the current data-driven world, all businesses tend to collect large volumes of data. But the real benefit of this acquisition lies in analyzing this data and deriving valuable insights from it. These actionable insights can in turn help the organization improve their existing decision-making processes. A DAP has the potential to integrate both data acquisition and business intelligence capabilities. It creates a way by which the various departments of user organizations can interpret the data according to their requirements. Consequently, an integrated and unified view of the various business operations can be designed easily.

2. Improved EX and Software Competence: When it comes to successfully implementing change in any company, it can often be difficult to implement employee training programs on a large scale. However, trying to adopt new technology without providing employees with the right tools to adapt, can often end up creating a large amount of frustration and dissatisfaction, resulting in higher employee turnover rates. Fortunately, this can be avoided by using a DAP, as it enables businesses to successfully personalize change management by customizing the learning process for each employee and ensuring that managers and team leaders are delivering the right content to the right people at the right time.

3. Enhanced Digital Culture: Organizations can provide their employees with technologies that are customized according to their environment. This allows the smooth functioning of the business structure which in turn encourages the digital culture. While DAPs allow easy integration of data and resources, they also help in the process of digital development of the organization. Employees are able to improve their skills and learn better while deriving the benefits of digital transformation.

4. Managed Disruption & Ensured Adoption: By deploying a DAP, you can facilitate end-user adoption immensely. It helps users understand processes and tasks by offering step-by-step guidance. Once your employees and customers understand the processes, there is a lower error rate, ensuring that the business runs smoothly. A DAP ensures that users understand every function of your entire tech stack and what to use it for. Thus, your business will operate at optimum value, providing maximum return on investment from your technologies.

A DAP is not just a guidance tool but a comprehensive strategy that operates with your existing system or infrastructure to create a smooth digital transformation process without starting from scratch. A DAP will empower all aspects of the business from employees onboarding/offboarding, and user/customer onboarding to learning & development, and much more.

Salesforce’s Innovations Pave the Way Towards Accelerated Digital Transformation

A big part of Salesforce’s growth strategy is its constant innovation and that’s why it has emerged as one of the powerhouses in the enterprise software industry. With Salesforce’s products and solutions, businesses can get a great potential for achieving sustainable, transformational, change management goals of any size or scope.

For example, Slack helps employees connect better with each other and the apps they use every day, from anywhere. Einstein AI empowers everyone to work more productively, engage with empathy, and scale loyalty-building customer service. And Trailhead, a one-of-a-kind learning hub, offers free, fun trails to help your workforce learn Salesforce-essential skills.

To deliver a superior customer experience, Customer 360, the world’s first real-time CRM connects your marketing, sales, commerce, service, and IT teams around every customer. And with Salesforce Genie, a customer data platform, every interaction becomes automated, intelligent, and real-time putting a little magic at every team’s fingertips.

Big or small, a widget maker or a vendor of digital wizardry, Salesforce’s groundbreaking technology and products can help you empower your digital transformation journey, all while giving you a competitive edge.

The Bottom Line

The business realm is in a state of transition. Customer expectations are evolving and new technologies are making an impact on the way businesses operate both internally and externally. And it’s about time we embrace that change – The Salesforce Way!

Ready to Thrive in the Era of Digital Transformation Using Salesforce? Let’s Talk!

Statistics References

^[i]https://go.walkme.com/dap-nrtv/Gartner
^[ii]https://www.ey.com/en_gl/workforce/as-digital-adoption-accelerates-will-you-do-less-or-be-more
^[iii]https://www.pwc.com/us/en/services/consulting/library/consumer-intelligence-series/future-of-customer-experience.html
^[iv]https://www.forrester.com/report/The-ROI-Of-EX/RES145895