How To Increase Sales By Using DXP?
16 May 2022 / 5min
Regarding the Gartner research over 70% of companies are already competing in terms of the Digital Experience level. Within a decade, this number has nearly doubled – a clear sign that experiences are now even more important than price or product quality.
Digital experiences are becoming more and more relevant. If you want to build a long-term relationship with your customers, you can’t ignore their influence.
Why Are Digital Experiences So Relevant?
Not so long ago, competitive advantage was determined by just two factors: the price and quality of the product. Customer journeys were quite simple and there were fewer touchpoints that could influence the customers’ experience.
Currently, the entire purchasing process is much more complicated. The line between real life and the digital world is not so clear anymore. Customers can easily switch between online and offline channels. They’re interacting with a brand through more touchpoints than ever before (at least seven, according to the stats!). And every single interaction matters when it comes to creating a good DX.
Just look at the numbers:
- Positive experiences influence purchasing decisions in almost every industry, especially in healthcare (78%), banking (75%), and hotels (74%) (PwC).
- 42% of all consumers would pay more just for a friendly, welcoming experience. (PwC).
- Companies that invest in Digital Experience optimization report 1,5 higher growth in customer retention, repeat purchase rates, average order values, and customer lifetime values. (Adobe).
„If You're Not Moving Forward, You're Falling Behind”
90% of organizations employ people for positions related to digital experience management (Gartner). This means that the arms race has already started. Companies that now fail to ensure a perfect and consistent experience across all channels may struggle to make it up in the future. And it’s no secret that customers are quickly getting used to convenient solutions. Their expectations for digital experience are constantly growing – which means an even wider gap for companies who delay making this transition.
„You’re not behind your competitors; you’re behind your customers — behind their expectations”.
How to Manage Digital Experience: Tools of the Trade
Many IT systems, tools, and apps work to ensure a great digital experience for your customers. Those tools manage every stage of the purchase path, across all the devices customers use, and at every touchpoint. We’re talking about technology like:
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Some of these IT systems work at the front, so it’s quite easy to associate them with customer experiences (e.g., e-commerce, chatbots, self service platforms). The others run in the background or are used only by employees, so customers aren't even aware of their existence (e.g., PIM, DAM, CRM). However, each tool plays a significant role in creating a consistent digital experience.
Why Having Great Tools Isn’t Enough for Great DX
Managing digital experiences is difficult even if you have access to advanced technology. There are a lot of reasons why this is so challenging. First of all, many companies are organized into silo-like structures. Every silo is responsible only for a small fraction of the customer journey. It is focused on its own goals and does not see the big picture.
Lack of cooperation between silos combined with bad integrations between technology resources means... problems. That is how you get inconsistent, non-personalized, and utterly mediocre digital experiences despite owning great tools.
Digital Experience Platform to the Rescue
The old technology solutions are not enough for modern digital marketing needs. They can’t create personalized experiences. They aren’t able to provide constant analysis of data from multiple sources. And finally, they fail to support the complex purchasing paths of an omnichannel sales model. To meet all these challenges, you need a new class of technology solutions: a Digital Experience Platform (DXP).
A DXP can support you in all tasks related to managing experiences in the omnichannel ecosystem. Thanks to DXP, you can integrate all your technologies resources from the ground up and assign them to the specific stages of purchasing paths. You’ll never again miss any crucial information about your customers. And you will have the proper tools to use that data to provide them with better experiences.
How to Build a DXP Using Tools You Already Have?
We often refer to Digital Transformation as if it were a sudden revolution, but the business reality looks quite different: it’s more like a slow evolution. New tools appear gradually, and reaching digital maturity is a long-term process that could take many years.
If you’ve already switched your business model to omnichannel, you certainly have several IT systems to support online sales. They probably weren’t cheap; understandably, you don’t want to give up on them easily. Fortunately, you don't have to. You can use the technology resources you already have to build a fully functional, personalized Digital Experience Platform (DXP). How?
The DXP architecture should cover the technology responsible for three areas:
- Experience, which includes all user interfaces.
- Structured data, which is understood as all digital resources (e.g. product information, content, user database, etc.).
- Processes, or business logic related to processing that’s designed to support users.
You can manage each area using independent tools (some of which you may already have). The heart of composable DXP is the CMS, which integrates several other tools:
- Headless CMS
- Product Information Management (PIM)
- Digital Asset Management (DAM)
- Marketing Automation (MA)
- Business Process Management (BPM) / Apps / Microservices
- Identity and Access Management (IAM)
The number and type of tools depend on many individual factors, such as the business model, the specific customer journey, the degree of digital maturity of the company, legal regulations, and the product or service itself. A bank and a distributor of car parts (for example) will need different IT systems. Banks must by law verify their customers’ identities, so they will focus more on Identity and Access Management (IAM). IAM will be much less important for auto part distributors; they will be more interested in efficient product information management (PIM).
Pros and Cons of Composable DXP
If you choose to build the composable DXP, you will be able to:
- Use tools that you have already invested in and are satisfied with,
- Replace IT systems that do not work well for your company,
- Add some solutions that better support your customers' shopping path.
You also maintain a high level of flexibility. As your company grows, you can easily adjust tools to the current needs.
However, the architecture of a composable DXP may be complicated and will require many integrations between various IT systems. Without these integrations, you can fall into the trap of having great tools that don't deliver a good experience.
Communicating complex products and services and educating consumers in the omnichannel sales model requires new thinking models. By providing your customers with a high level of Digital Experience, you make the purchasing and self-service process more transparent and convenient. Both sides benefit from this - companies that achieve better sales results and customers with greater satisfaction with their purchases.