WHY IT MATTERS: Digital Transformation

WHY IT MATTERS: with digital transformation comes new tools and techniques that we need to learn to keep our privacy. These are 5 of them.

WHY IT MATTERS: there are many options to consider when building a mobile app. This paper helps determine the best decision to make.

WHY IT MATTERS: we all think bandwidth is infinite but real world tells us that networks are very slow - even 3G - and that developers should be more careful about their page size to ensure they load fast and give users an enjoyable experience. Been doing web and digital for 20+ years and I am still surprised that we have to fight for every single KB we put on a page.

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I remember a time in the late 90s early 2000s when cutting cost meant outsourcing to India. Today, it seems the trend is moving to digital. This stat from BofA is quite clear: digital saves costs.

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This is a research project that exposes the privacy vulnerabilities of our mobile phones and the apps we install on them...

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This is an annual bag of goodies.

Highlight #1: retail stores are closing at record pace while Amazon opens stores. This is such a huge trend because it transforms stores from a mini-warehouse into something else: a destination for experience, service, and training. Think Apple store with the highest sales per square foot, genius bar, classes and a showroom. Amazon has pushed its Amazon GO, no lines, no registers concept and it is rolling it out slowly. This is just the beginning...

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We consume our digital mostly through our phones already and this trend is bound to continue for a while. This new OS from Google may shed light into options for the future where developers will be able to write one version of the mobile app that runs on all devices...?

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We've been warning that our consumption of Internet will move to the mobile devices since 2005 when Google bought Android and Apple started work on the iPhone. This report from Comscore comes in to support that with actual numbers. In particular, and close to my field of expertise, it looks like most of us already consume digital on our mobile phones in the grocery store more than any other category...

Also, the analogy with the hierarchy of needs is dear to me as I wrote about the Hierarchy of digital needs recently... http://fmcs.digital/blog/pyramid-of-digital-needs/ 

I wrote about this in the past numerous times and it is great to see HBR and others recognize this important trend: companies are sitting on huge amounts of information they can use to extract meaningful information and share it with their clients and employees to attract and retain them.

For example, look at jawbone and how they do it

• http://fmcs.digital/blog/what-one-million-people-sleep-patterns-tell-us/ 
• http://fmcs.digital/blog/proof-sleep-happiness-jawbone-analyzes-56m/
• http://fmcs.digital/blog/bedtime-stories-learning-from-sleep-data-from/ 
• http://fmcs.digital/blog/how-did-the-napa-earthquake-affect-sleep/ 

I love to say that technology and digital in particular can bring huge benefits rapidly but that the impact of changes must be analyzed and addressed. Now Starbuck is in reactive mode after popular online orders are impacting in-store customers.

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Change management and impact on humans and current processes is Paramount, especially now that we live in an omni-channel world.

Amazing insights into the mobile industry state and trends.

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Andreessen Horowitz, and Benedict Evans in particular, have been known to spot trends long before everyone else. Here again, it appears they are making predictions about retailing - following in the steps of the print industry when Internet came along. Not certain I agree about the parallel but I agree that mobile and AI and other technologies will impact and transform the retail world in the near future. However, as opposed to the print media, retailers often sell physical goods that cannot, for now, be 3D printed at home. So either you pick them up in the store or get it delivered by FedEx or a drone. 

That being said, retail stores are bound to transform in showrooms and service centers as I wrote about in the past. And this is a major shift that many will fail to take.

A review on real-life beacon deployments in retail store tends to demonstrate a resurgence of proximity geographic location tracking.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

Digital transformation strategies require that customers are tracked in the real world as much as they are in the web-world. This often means that the mobile devices we carry enable a seamless digital communication - tools to push promotions and notifications while we walk the street or store aisles. To do so, retailers must know where you are and geofencing is not enough anymore. Beacons come to the rescue and mobile OSes - both Apple and Google - now build into their APIs very good location services which allow mobile app developers ways to connect with users in a very personal way. Using GPS location is not sufficient, especially indoors, so beacons are a must and reports such as this one show that our physical world has become a forest of digital beacons to track our every moves. We all thought this technology was dead after the initial failure of the 2013 Apple announcement. However, all retailers should now include geolocation and proximity tracking in their digital strategies and mid-term roadmaps, as it has apparently moved from the lab to the real world.

More on location services in the OSes, see the following links:

https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/UserExperience/Conceptual/LocationAwarenessPG/Introduction/Introduction.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40009497-CH1-SW1

https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/location/index.html 

A study of 250K people over 2011-2015 timeframe across 33 countries in OECD shows that most users can barely operate their computer of mobile phone.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

Digital transformation strategies and roadmap often fail to allocate sufficient effort/budget/time/resources to accompany employees and users with the proper change management. This study shows why: most people don't know how to perform simple computer tasks. Put them in front of a new software or technology and they will fail, or even worse, they will discredit the solution so as not to show their inability. Accompany them and recognize that they need help and they will succeed in their transition. And you will succeed in your digital transformation.

A very interesting article on the changes that could happen in the telecom industry with the evolution towards Internet of Things and 5G technologies.

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The paper highlights many important questions and decisions that players in the telecommunication industry must answer. I argue that similar questions must also be had in other industries, such as in Retail for example. 

A short run down on personal technologies coming our way soon.

WHY THISI S IMPORTANT

I've been speaking about the impact of digital technologies to transformation our personal lives and the opportunities this brings to business for a while in my "me.com" and "we.com" conferences (http://fmcs.digital/conferences). Looks like there is even more to it than originally I anticipated with the convergence of InternetOfThings, AI, BigData, and wearables. Your employees in the future will be even more connected and digital and companies should take notice and leverage it to 1) improve productivity 2) support work-life-wellness balance 3) tap the social networks to their benefits (ie. social recruiting).

A detailed explanation of how buffer has refactored its android mobile app source code to be more efficient and better organized.

Bluetooth 5.0 technology will enable new devices and applications.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

With new wireless devices and beacons being deployed in stores and cities, retailers should prepare to embrace wireless devices and solutions in the coming years. This should become part of their digital strategy.

A report shows that letting customers order ahead using mobile apps converts to higher sales order value.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

Retailer have invested in mobile apps in recent years mostly use them as marketing tools to notify customers of promotions, etc. With recent trends showing that customers download less and less apps to concentrate on a few well known ones (Facebook, etc.), retailer must find new ways to have their customers use their apps. Looks like if you allow customers to save time by pre-ordering their meal, it becomes a hot and customers spend more. Good to know.

Outstanding 20 minutes video that explains what geofencing is and how to it, them in layman's terms.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

We all carry mobile devices in our pockets so we are all targets for beacons and geofencing by retailers and brands. We were just getting used to being tracked everywhere we go online, and now we have become targets in the physical world as well. It is essential that we all know what level of tracking we are subjected to.

On the other hand if you are a brand or a retailer, you must know about beacons and geofencing and ensure your marketing team includes it in their digital strategy otherwise you may be missing out over your competitors.

Outstanding 20 minutes video that explains what beacons are and how to use them, in layman's terms.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

We all carry mobile devices in our pockets so we are all targets for beacons and geofencing by retailers and brands. We were just getting used to being tracked everywhere we go online, and now we have become targets in the physical world as well. It is essential that we all know what level of tracking we are subjected to.

On the other hand if you are a brand or a retailer, you must know about beacons and geofencing and ensure your marketing team includes it in their digital strategy otherwise you may be missing out over your competitors.

Beacons promised to revolutionize marketing in stores. They were supposed to be everywhere by 2016 when they launched in 2014. Today they are nowhere to be found. This article identifies reasons for this, which are related to the immaturity of the technology and lack of operational support.

The post contains a number of very useful links.

Interested in a review of the potential for beacons? Then you should also read this post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shane-paul-neil/is-ibeacon-marketing-fina_b_10508218.html 

A recent survey and study confirms that shoppers want to receive notifications on their mobile phones when they are in store.

related article: http://www.the-cma.org/resource/leadership/enhance-customer-experience

study: https://www.the-cma.org/Media/Default/Core/Library/Publications/Using_Digital_Solutions.pdf 

Explains how runkeeper uses eCommerce to reward customers and achieve impressive conversion rates of 4% to 7%.

WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT

We too often think of eCommerce in classic, undifferentiated terms: catalog of products, shopping cart, checkout. This paper offers an interesting twist to the whole thing, embedding eCommerce within the mobile app and unlocking certain products based on goals achieved by customers. Retailers should apply this approach to leverage their eCommerce platform beyond the classic website: behaviour-based rewards, special categories, loyalty-based commerce, mobile commerce, social commerce, etc. The eCommerce platform should become a platform not merely a transactional tool.