What does Digital Transformation look like? 5 real world examples

Before you take a look at the 5 examples of five well-known digital transformations, you may want to familiarise yourself with Digital Transformation itself, or check out other blogs on Scenario Planning, Change Management, or Porters Five Forces.

What is Digital Transformation?

By now business leaders know that in order to grow and become competitive within the market, they must be able to exploit all opportunities. There are many different ways in which they can do this however the use of technology to either radically improve performance, or deliver value to their customers has become the number one way for businesses to improve overall efficiency and performance. 

Digital Transformation is a term which in its simplest form allows these businesses to do this, whereby recognising a technology which you can harvest and introduce within your business, and understanding how to implement it correctly can offer you positive results. These results will ask us to consider our business model and look for ways to improve our processes and become operationally efficient. 

Digital Transformation can be very big i.e. company wide, or smaller where it only affects a particular department or unit within your business. These business transformations vary across different industries whether you find yourself within the manufacturing industry, the healthcare sector or finance industry, the outcome will always likely be the same if you are successful. 

Ways businesses are implementing Digital Transformations

1. Improve customer experience: More and more businesses are using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to implement Chat Box to their websites to allow for customers receive instant communication.
2. Automate processes: Technology is allowing businesses to speed up their workflows, freeing up time on general tasks and allowing employees to make better decisions and use of their time. 
3. Improve communication and collaboration levels: Implementing key systems and applications such as Project Management software systems or communication systems such as Slack can allow your business to improve the communication across the whole company. 

5 real world examples of Digital Transformation 

McDonalds Digital Transformation

Starting with a brand that almost everyone is going to be familiar with is McDonalds. This business is known for their fast food globally and are now the world’s largest food service brand with over 36,000 restaurants in over 100 different countries. 

McDonalds in the UK alone is known to serve over 4 million customers each day, and with the high customer demand for their service, in 2015 the company wanted a way to improve their customer satisfaction and did this by recognising the opportunity within implementing a digital transformation. 

They did this by implementing the self-service Kiosks which can now be found in all their restaurants, removing the need for face to face communication with the cashier and speeding up the time of order and delivery. This also allowed the company to re-deploy staff members and make better use of their resources. 

Overall this initiative helped improve overall consumer experience, ensuring their loyalty to the business. However, it wasn’t long until competitive rivals KFC and Burger King followed suit. 

Netflix Digital Transformation

Many of us know in order to keep up to date with the movies and tv shows which everyone is talking about, Netflix is our best option to do this. This digital platform hosts a series of movies, TV shows and documentaries where their mission is to entertain the world. 

In terms of valuation Netflix currently sits at $149 billion, and a lot of this success was the company’s ability to recognise the future and conduct a digital transformation to meet consumer demand.  

Reed Hastings, Netflix CEO, wanted to improve customer experience and satisfaction and in doing so, he went to Blockbuster with an opportunity. At this time, Blockbuster was set up as a video rental service which was performing well, however in 2007 technology was starting to advance more and people were becoming more comfortable with using it.  

Netflix through their online viewing system were able to address customers concerns which existed with Blockbuster, such as paying late fees, and by solving these problems through a Digital Transformation they were successfully able to deliver new value to customers and change their buying habits and effectively how they watched movies all together. 

Dominoes Digital Transformation

Many of these successful brands have the ability to change and improve their performance even when they are growing each year and hitting revenue targets. However, Dominoes are a company which implemented a digital transformation in order to survive within the market. 

Dominoes is a fast food pizza chain and is recognised in many different countries as the world’s top pizza delivery service provider. In 2008 dominoes wanted to reinvent themselves after a series of backlash and criticism from their customers,  and in doing so recognised that technology may be the stepping stone to doing this. 

Therefore by embracing technology to enhance customer experience, and in doing so Dominoes created a platform for consumers to easily order their pizza and track their delivery, increasing value and creating a greater customer experience. 

This example shows that digital transformation if done correctly can change your business model and offer a new way to evolve your brand image. However, it may be best not to wait until you find yourself within a state of business survival as you may not always find yourself with a successful outcome like Dominoes did.

Nike Digital Transformation

Digital transformation has been at the forefront to Nike’s strategy for their entire existence where the company strives of their consumer experience capabilities. Nike is a multinational company which manufactures and supplies athletic apparel to the public while employing up to 80,000 people worldwide. 

Nike has become successful through becoming a digital first company where they focus on delivering premium customer experience. This has mainly been built around the introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems though the Nike app or other customer loyalty systems such as the SNKRS app. 

Nike is continuing to exploit new technological opportunities with the likes of Web3 and the Metaverse to continue to meet and satisfy consumer demand. The company’s ability to keep on top of technology and apply digital transformations at the right time is one of the main reasons why they are outweighing their competitors each year. Therefore if you are a business who is considering implementing a digital transformation through your own business, it could be said that Nike’s success shows us we should probably ‘just do it’.

Starbucks Digital Transformation

All coffee lovers will be familiar with the coffee chain Starbucks who are known across the world with the brand built in 80 countries with over 32,000 stores. Like other well known bands, Starbucks recognised the benefit of introducing a digital transformation and in 2017 introduced ‘Digital Flywheel’.

This initiative focused on transformation based on customer rewards, personalisation options, payments, and ordering. By introducing cloud-based platforms Starbucks improved their capability for rewards and ordering of their products, while also managing inventory and production effectively.

Through the use of technology Starbucks have also implemented Artificial Intelligence in regards to their app, allowing them to personalise their product offerings and offer rewards and incentives based on their consumers preferences. The CEO of Starbucks has stated that he wants to continue to harvest new technology and has put this digital strategic focus down to why Starbucks has become the most popular coffee brand in the world today. 

Summary

That’s an overview of Digital Transformation and five real world examples within business. If you would like some support and guidance in around this, or other areas within Digital Transformation, contact ProfileTree today and we would be happy to help. Don’t be afraid to check out our videos on our Youtube Channel too.