For startups, the competition that exists in the market is tougher compared to the organizations that are already settled and have established a brand reputation for themselves. To tackle this competition, digital transformation (DX) has helped quite a lot and this statement does not only apply to startups but to larger businesses as well. For startups, however, the digital transformation gave a fair opportunity to be visible to a global audience. Moreover, these startups have the opportunity to specifically target groups of relevant audiences.
Benefits of digital transformation for startups
The digital transformation of startups is a process that includes multiple stages and strategies. To understand how to leverage this practice, you first need to understand some benefits of the digital transformation that are leveraged by new companies in the real world.
1. Boost the brand visibility
One of the major benefits that startups get by adapting to digital transformation is the boost in their visibility. Digital transformation allows businesses to optimize their virtual marketing strategies. Startups use search engines, social media, and reviews among other strategies to reach out to a wider audience. To do that, hashtags, meta descriptions, keywords, etc are used depending on the platform businesses are using to boost their visibility.
2. More digital data to utilize
DX provides startups with more amount of digital data that can help them in framing more effective business strategies. The digital data can include demographical information of potential customers or clients, financial details, contact information, etc. Data can also help businesses against cyber threats.
3. Personalized advertisements
DX allows businesses to personalize advertisements depending on the group of potential customers they are planning to target. This customization can include deciding the specific advertisement channel, type of ads, runtime of ads, etc.
4. Enabling the Automation
Automation of business processes is also a major part of the DX of businesses. Startup companies have started automating processes like manufacturing, shipment, payments, etc. Automation is also used in the customer service segment. A report by SmallBizGenius states that as of 2021, chatbots handled approximately 85% of chats without human interference.
5. Increased customer satisfaction
DX makes it easier for customers to avail of your services or to reach out to your business in case of any queries. This benefit not only increases the customer satisfaction percentage but also improves your percentage of returning customers.
Ways you can leverage digital transformation for your startup
Now, after finishing the discussion of some of the benefits of adopting digital transformation, let’s move further and focus on how you can leverage digital transformation for better startup growth.
A. Transforming the way data is stored
As mentioned earlier under benefits, digital transformation brings a lot of data for the startup. Thus, only offline storage systems are not efficient enough to offer backup and data protection facilities that are required for big data. In that case, a startup can adopt either cloud technology or blockchain to securely store the data on virtual servers. These strategies include the process of saving data in real-time, automating cyber security, and creating regular data backups.
Regular data backups protect the data from any possible harm that can occur in the future. If data is lost due to any reason, these backups can help in retrieving the data without much loss. There are plenty of top brands like Google, Microsoft, GoDaddy, and more offer data storage solutions that startups can avail of under multiple types of packages. These packages usually vary depending on the requirements like storage space, server speed, etc.
In the case of blockchain, there are four main types of technology popular in the market-
- A Public blockchain is a distributed ledger technology that can be accessed by anyone with proper signup on the server
- A Private blockchain is limited to the organization where only specific members have access to the servers
- A Hybrid blockchain includes features of private and public blockchains. Companies use their permission-based public distribution system to allow people from specific target groups to get onboard
- A Consortium blockchain includes one blockchain server but with multiple organizations participating in it. Involved organizations have less access to the server. Also, none of the organizations have full control over the entire blockchain space
B. Driving revenues through more sources
Digital transformation opens the opportunity for startups to generate revenues through more resources apart from their original products or services. Here we are talking about the income that businesses generate from advertising on others’ behalf. Once virtually established as a known brand, startups can offer advertisement services or tie up with affiliate marketing to display pop-up ads on their digital channels like websites or mobile apps. These advertisements will bring in extra revenue that can be beneficial for short-term or long-term business growth.
C. Leverage opportunities to collaborate virtually
Brand collaborations are known as one of the most effective ways to promote a business. With the help of the connectivity that digital transformation brings to the table, collaborations can benefit startups as well. You can collaborate with competitors or even businesses from other segments, especially the well-established ones, to promote your brand through them. These promotions can be collaborative advertising, getting featured on their websites, paid reviews, etc. Such collaborations create a better trust level in the mind of your target audience.
D. Reduced probability of human errors
Digital transformation, including technologies such as AI and machine learning, reduces the possibility of human error. In processes such as customer service, manufacturing, shipment, etc, digital transformation allows businesses to automate them to a certain level. Thus, the workload on human resources gets reduced as well. Digital transformation is also allowing businesses to keep a real-time track of their operations to predict different events such as delivery schedules, requirements of raw materials, etc. In short, by combining a few technologies from the modern world, digital transformation is enabling businesses to make their day-to-day operations more efficient.
Key takeaways
Well, digital transformation is an evolving process that keeps leveraging new emerging technologies as they come into the existence. Thus, there will always be new ways to leverage it from time to time. However, these points that we mentioned above are some of the most important advantages that digital transformation enables for startups. Hopefully, you find these points helpful. Now, before we wind up this blog, let’s once again go through a few important points discussed above for a short revision.
- Digital transformation allows you to reach out to more people from more markets
- Digital transformation lets you advertise your products, services, and brands across multiple platforms
- To handle, store, and secure big data, digital transformation technologies like cloud storage solutions or blockchain solutions are important
- Data backups allow businesses to retrieve data lost due to data corruption, possible cyberattacks, or hardware/software failure
- Enabling the automation gets easier with the digital transformation
- Involving digital transformation strategies in processes like customer service, manufacturing, shipment, etc reduces the possibility of human errors
- You can collaborate with other brands to promote your startups virtually
- Digital transformation enables you to utilize more resources to drive revenues. Advertising other brands are one of such sources of revenues
- Digital transformation gives startups an opportunity to increase the customer satisfaction level by offering quick customer resolutions and 24×7 availability of chatbots to assist them
