Digital Excellence Series — Digital Strategy

This article is part 1 of a 3-part series on Digital Excellence. For more content like this check out my blog and sign-up for my newsletter at chrisventura.co

There is an interesting facet of working in an industry that is changing as fast as it is understanding itself. As soon as I feel that I have a grasp of what the most effective digital tactics are for any given strategy, they slip through my fingers as other digital teams push the boundaries and find new outcomes reshaping my ideas of what was possible.

Innovation in products and technology are a big driver for these differences. Simpler and more targeted ways of achieving goals and solving customer needs are reaching mainstream adoption. For many this means banking incremental improvements in an ongoing and methodical way. For others it means redefining whole markets and business models.

For digital teams this is a constantly transitioning landscape, where adaptability becomes paramount to success. Over the years that I have worked in digital, I have uncovered for myself a fundamental rule and model that has helped me form my approach to digital challenges. I call this model the “Trinity of Digital Excellence”.

As the name suggests, there are 3 key pillars to this trinity; Strategy, Culture & Structure.

Through this model, I am able to commence with new teams or companies with a frame of reference for determining the performance of teams in their digital activities.

Each pillar acts in harmony with the other and no single pillar is subordinate to another.

There is, however, a general order that I follow when constraints of time or access are present in the team or environment that I am working with. Starting with Part 1 — forming a clear and communicable Digital Strategy.

Digital Strategy

In this model the first and generally easiest to achieve goal for an organisation looking to propel their digital offering forward, is through establishing a clear and communicable strategy. This strategy should take into account business goals, customers, market forces and technology constraints/freedoms. This is typically the first area considered when business leaders look to enhance their digital capability or presence and is the area we will focus on in this article.

To breakdown an approach to forming a coherent digital strategy — I take a layered approach. Starting with an understanding of the overall business strategy of the organisation, followed by the market in which it operates, the customers of the product or service, the channels available to reach those customers and finally the execution or tactical plans.

Business strategy

Before digital strategy can be effective it first needs to have clear alignment to the over-arching strategy of the entire business. Often, the process of doing the work to develop a ‘digital’ strategy, simply reveals areas of the business strategy that need attention. Remember that a chain is only as strong as it’s weakest link.

The whole concept of a digital strategy can sometimes feel like a transient, ethereal concept, hard to nail down into a specific department or area of responsibility. This is true and an important part about what makes digital a great vessel for uncovering the shadow areas that are holding businesses back from truly excelling. It is this intangible nature that a lot of businesses struggle with — particularly, businesses that have always relied on being able to clearly communicate where a specific task or process sits in the business ecosystem. ‘Digital’ when at it’s most effective, sits through all areas of the business, like the nervous system in the human body. We’ll come back to this concept when we explore organisational structures in relation to digital excellence.

One of the challenges facing many Digital leaders tasked with forming a digital strategy for a business is the need for this strategy to consider all aspects of the business. Too often strategies are formed by well intended digital teams in isolation and then struggle to be adopted outside of their specific areas of influence. Sponsorship at the highest levels is key to giving a digital strategy a chance to be understood and embraced by the culture of the institution. Equally, investment must be made in ensuring leaders in all areas of the business, understand that digital considerations are a necessary aspect of their own side of the business strategy. A shared input strategy to the digital vision of the business, yet championed by an individual, can set a good foundation for business-wide adoption further down the track.

Market

Understanding the market landscape in which the business operates is paramount. Effective analysis of the market will illuminate the competitors existing in the same space and the sizing of opportunities, as well as trends that may reveal where the market is heading.

Some or all of these elements may already be expressed in a well-structured business strategy. So, in the digital context, the analysis can often times rest more heavily on what competitors are doing in their digital channels, the sizing of opportunities in that digital space and the trends that may support or hinder each.

By analysis of what digital activities are being conducted in the market by other organisations in the same space, we start to gain clarity in what opportunities exist and what level of investment may be required to compete in certain areas. (E.g. Short & long tail keywords, social segments, video, etc).

Much of this information may already exist out in the market, so it is beneficial to reach out to partners (agencies or otherwise) to share what insights each has uncovered about particular market penetrations and segmentation’s.

Customers

Understanding customers is critical in ensuring a product/market fit and determining the right channel executions.

A true culture of curiosity is extremely valuable in ensuring that the right information about a customer’s needs, behaviors and motivations filter back through the business. Each year, investment in user-centric teams continues to climb across many organisations as the significance of the work these teams do and the research they conduct can be traced back to the bottom line.

UX (User Experience) teams are a valuable resource when provided the right support and time to generate value. However not all companies, in particular those earlier in their funding access, will have the funds to recruit a dedicated UX team. What’s equally apparent, is that even companies with large-scale UX teams, are not reaching the outcomes with their customers that their UX investment may suggest.

This is where we start to see the gap between businesses that are culturally and truly, customer-centric and those that are not.

To be truly customer-centric an organisation will include all employees in this culture of customer curiosity and all will be motivated to wear the UX hat. One component of this approach, is looking at how employees of a business can continuously engage and process feedback/information that comes from customers themselves and what tools are available for them to do this effectively.

Through better understanding of customers, the business is able to effectively segment its audience, tailor its execution and channel its selection accordingly. Many digital strategies neglect to include how employees of the organisation are to action insights or information gleaned from customers, whether that be on phone calls, support ticket enquiries or at live events.

Any opportunity for business to gain customer insight into its working processes will enable it to make sense of customer needs and turn this into shareable and understandable information. The level of collaboration and open organisational structure (covered in detail in a later post), will determine how effective the organisation is at moving this knowledge around the business and into the hands of those tasked to take action.

Channels

The next layer in the drive for digital excellence is to assess the digital channels in which the business will operate. Digital channels are avenues to reach your customers and should be well defined prior to execution. Each channel should support and enhance other channels that exist in the ecosystem. One example of a channel strategy that leverages the strengths of each other channel is illustrated below:

In this straight-forward example, we would analyse the relationship between the public website presence of the business, how traffic reaches the blog on that website and how social can enhance promotion of the blog content.

Along with the inter-dependencies, each channel may still have its own primary objectives — for example a lead generating website. The site may look to funnel traffic through a number of micro-conversions before ultimately converting the user at its primary conversion point (contact form, live chat session etc.). Similarly, the blog’s primary goal is to drive the authoritative positioning of the brand in a particular area relevant to its audience and market position. The social channel is focusing on developing a following of users and perhaps using this channel as a place to have faster communication to its customer base.

Whatever the primary goals of the channels selected, some secondary goals that directly relate to other channels in the space should be considered and well understood across the teams managing the channels. An interconnected channels strategy can multiply the effectiveness of any digital strategy.

Execution

The channel execution involves a 2-way process — delivering the message to market through the selected channels as well as processes for handling responses from the market that filter back through the business.

Executions are the actions taken by the team members to ensure the digital strategy is realised as it was envisaged. Therefore, what is equally important to the pushing out of information, is the managing of information within the business. All teams should be well informed and up to date on how customers are responding and what new learning’s are arising that can further facilitate the digital strategy and execution.

A typical issue that arises when executing on a channel strategy is when this is not considered within the wider digital ecosystem in which the business operates. For example, many businesses (not all) will have different people maintain ownership over certain channels — it is important then to ensure that consistency is maintained in the messaging that reaches audiences across these different channels. Channel ownership separation can help a business structure its team for focus but this needs to be equally supported with consistent communication and alignment to the message that goes out. Customers simply do not care that your social channel is managed by a different team/person as your website channel — it is one brand and should be — one voice.

If you made it this far, thank you! This post is a high-level overview of some of the main considerations when forming a digital strategy. I’d love to hear about any ideas, approaches and challenges you may have faced around the nebulous world of digital strategies — simply leave a comment below.

In Part 2 — Engaged Team Culture we will look at how agile, iterative processes and empowering leadership can help teams stay aligned to be as effective as possible in their execution.