Generation Z, or Gen Z for short, is the new generation poised to refine and redefine the way the world shops. Retail brands want a slice of this ever-growing pie, vying for attention from this coming-of-age consumers, predicted to account for approximately 40% of all retail traffic, by as early as 2020.

The global retail industry is predicted to grow to a staggering $31.88 trillion by 2023 (an increase of 5.3% since 2017). Retailers are not only expected to meet the needs of these consumers with slick, user-friendly mobile apps, but also create delightful online experiences, that leave them wanting more.

Let’s explore the nuanced buying habits of the millennial generation, and how technology can create & augment seamless omnichannel retail experiences.

Gen Z ─ The Always-Connected Generation

Gen Z shoppers (born between 1995 and 2014) have been raised in one of the most diverse societies in history, with greater access to information and equality across genders and races. As such, they are steadily changing the way we shop, what products we buy, and how we decide on which brands to support, based on their values.

Generation Z shoppers as a group tend to be:

• Happier with access to rather than ownership of products
• Comfortable switching brands if retailers don’t add value to their lives
• Smart with their money and prefer to price shop to find the best deals
• Socially conscious and aware of brands that share their values
• Eager to be co-creators with retailers and be part of the design process

These characteristics are a subtle yet significant difference from previous generations, where the expectation for products were met, but with little to no say in their design, purpose, or creation. However, trends are shifting, and Gen Z is proving that they care more about collaboration and community access than keeping everything for themselves.

“This generation desire involvement in the entire chain of activities that brings a product to market — from conception, design and creation, to marketing and retailing, even to funding and rewarding.”
─ Pricewaterhouse Coopers: “TNS Retail Forward”

In this regard, social media has played a crucial role in the lives of millennials and Gen Z, dominating their retail experiences in the past few years. These platforms offer an accessible space for these generations to engage with brands everyday. Users can scroll through their posts while in line at a coffee shop, tap to see the prices and product names, and subsequently purchase them, as shown in these social media posts, all within a few minutes.

On average, people check their smartphones, about 50 times per day. Their interactions may range from browsing social media sites (60%), making mobile payments (31%), to using voice assistants for information (64%); with them being marked as some of the top activities. These numbers back up the business case that retailers must be interacting with customers on their devices─lest their brand be left in the dust.

According to a KPMG survey, Gen Z consumers prefer brands that personalize user experiences and gain loyalty from their customers. For example, Dresden, an eyewear retailer lets its customers create their sunglasses by offering interchangeable lenses and frame parts. Similarly, Birchbox asks its customers to share their beauty preferences, and in return, the company creates a customized box with a mix of different brands for them.

But what specific technology tools are retailers using that get results from a group of consumers that have never known a world without smartphones or the Internet?

Technology That Augments Retail Experiences

With their smartphones being as essential as their shoes, Gen Z believes that retailers exist both on their devices and on the street. That means retailers must be there for them in those spaces as well, encouraging organic touchpoints that feel more like a conversation with an acquaintance rather than a business transaction with a large corporation.

For one thing, the customer service associates that Gen Z customers connect with must be helpful and well-informed about brands, products, and services that are available. In fact, 40% of shoppers state that their in-store experiences would be significantly enhanced by a sales associate with deep knowledge of both the company and its products. Knowing this, it’s easy to understand why Gen Z shoppers value experience above anything else.

These savvy, plugged-in shoppers seek opt-in services, two-way dialogues, and mutual rewards from their retail experiences. IBM conducted a recent study and found that over half of Gen Z consumer would switch brands in a heartbeat, if they felt that the company’s products and services were average or subpar. Those from the Gen Z crowd are more willing to share their data with organizations, when compared to previous generations. However, they need to be aware that it’s being used to add value back into their lives with rewards programs, notifications about sales on products they’ve liked, and incentives to invite their networks.

Some retailers are already successfully capitalizing on the obsession of GenZ with social media and are using it for their benefit. For instance, clothing retailer Hollister regularly connects with Gen Zs on Snapchat to get real-time product feedback.

Voice Assistants coupled with home AI systems is another technology that is reshaping the course of retail. A recent survey suggests that Gen Z is more enthusiastic about voice assistants compared to their predecessors. In fact, in the US nearly one in five consumers have purchased a product using a voice-controlled device in the past year.

For Gen Z, speed and availability are a priority. Tech-first retailers like Amazon understand this and innovate to meet this new-age consumer demand. Amazon has introduced Amazon Go that allows shoppers to leave the store without having to check out or use a credit card to pay. Instead, their account automatically gets charged.

Gen Z values experience and Augmented Reality is helping retailers to offer engaging user experiences. Take for instance, Sephora, a leading specialty retailer in beauty introduced a new 3D augmented reality mirror. This AR-based mirror tracks the precise location of a user’s facial features and applies eye shadow colors directly on the video feed from a camera.

A Case for Omnichannel: Technology Success in Retail

Retail leaders should keep a simple yet important truth in mind when developing their omnichannel experience for the next generation: online for efficiency, offline for experience.

A recent IBM study found that a whopping 98% of Gen Z visit stores to discover products in person; of those, 67% visit brick and mortar stores “most of the time” to browse around, even as they’re on their devices checking out competitors’ offerings and prices to find the best deals.

Gen Z shoppers continue to expect that their in-store experiences will complement their online visits to your brand, not simply mirror it. They are the first generation to be born into a world where the Internet and smartphones have always existed. As such, they intuitively understand that online and offline interactions will be different, and they expect retailers to understand this, too ─ or they’ll take their business elsewhere.

And this is crucial for retail leaders to note, because this generation makes up one-third of our global population, and they’re going to account for approximately $3.5 trillion in annual household spending.

Here are a few examples of how leading brands expertly use technology to create these sought-after experiences for Gen Z shoppers.

Omnichannel Retail Leaders

Walmart has been making impressive strides to chip away at the market share from their primary online competitor Amazon by buying up e-commerce companies, a strategy that enables them to merge both offline and online assets and take advantage of their newly-acquired partner tech experience…instead of building a technology-focused platform from scratch.

We partnered with Digital Mall of Asia to merge both online and offline customer experience in their latest offering, the Virtual Trial Room, which allows customers to browse through and test out products just as they would in a store. This gives them the impression that they haven’t missed out on anything, even though they are unable to visit in person, but rather gain the same value from the comfort of their home or office. Digital Mall of Asia, a first-of-its-kind initiative by Yokeasia Malls Private Limited is an amalgamation of real estate and digital space. It is a unique concept that introduces digital malls with digital shops, where an individual can buy, sell and rent. DMA brings together the best of offline and online worlds – the shopping experience of an offline mall where brands have dedicated shops and convenience of online shopping where we get unlimited selection and benefit of buying anytime, anywhere.

Companies are also utilizing applications such as geotargeting and geofencing to offer clients promotions and discounts via their smartphones while they’re near or in stores. American Eagle, for example, uses geofencing to send consumers loyalty points and rewards when they are trying outfits in the change rooms. Starbucks and McDonald’s both use geotargeting to send coupons and deal reminders when you’re walking within the vicinity of one of their stores.

Whether retailer leaders choose to pursue a technology-forward path using AI or augmented reality applications such as VR mirrors to “try on” outfits, to cover their bases with their in-store interactions to improve customer service and engagement, or even combine the two for a powerhouse omnichannel approach, retailers need to keep in mind that they should be offering valuable, unique experiences to the Generation Z crowd that they couldn’t get elsewhere.

Conclusion

It’s important to stress that a retailer’s omnichannel path is just that – a journey, not a destination. Customer conversion happens across multiple channels, not just in-store or online. Omnichannel options will continue to evolve with both advances in technology and shifting consumer behavior, so be sure to revisit your marketing efforts regularly to ensure you are meeting consumers where they expect to be heading, not simply where they’ve been before.

Technology has caused major upheaval in the retail landscape — from smartphones to social media to e-commerce — and has permanently altered both the ways in which retailers entice customers and the way people shop.

Individual consumers can more readily adapt to new technologies; smart retailers, however, are taking a futuristic approach to adopt technology to entice the consumer, by researching which established and emerging tech will help to further their brand and presence both online and offline.

People still value shopping for the inherent experience of picking out the products they need and love and don’t view shopping as simply transacting with retailers. Omnichannel approaches consider how people use technology and offer repeatable, consistent service that anticipates what they’ll want.

Shifting Consumer Behaviors Online and Offline

According to Forrester’s The State Of Retailing Online 2019 report, stores are growing but so are eCommerce expenses. So the industry continues to face the reality of physical store dominance combined with the necessity of digital presence. In fact, it goes beyond mere digital presence but fully optimizing various digital technologies and channels. In this context, it is important to highlight that many enterprises confuse multi-channel presence as being omnichannel. The former is about gives an opportunity to interact with the brand across channels but the latter makes it personalized and seamless. A truly omnichannel experience is a catalyst for both online & offline purchase – such shoppers spend 15% more per purchase than those who shop just on one channel.

The influence of digital in offline purchases is also a reality. According to a 2018 article, multi-touchpoint consumers are very valuable, and, by 2021, digital touchpoints will influence 41% of U.S. and 38% of E.U. offline retail sales.

A report from Digital Consumer Study also found that over 50% of consumers say they have used their mobile device to price-match, research product information, or make a purchase within the last three months.

Retailers are using technology to offer customized online experiences

Research shows that updates and changes in mobile payment, customer service chatbots, and AI-driven digital assistants have catapulted mainstream adoption of technology in retail, creating the feel of more “bespoke” shopping experiences. With more intuitive technology comes the ability for retail leaders to manage a nuanced approach to their omnichannel strategy.

Taking a cue from this shift in consumers’ shopping habits, retailers are striving to build relatable marketing campaigns, friendly customer service, rewards for customer loyalty, and personalized shopping suggestions that can help create an amazing omnichannel experience.

Retailers are using new-age digital solutions to engage with consumers offline

Consumer offline buying behavior has been shifting as well, and while more than half of shoppers view online shopping as cold and impersonal, three-quarters of cross channel shoppers expect the same high-quality customer service online as they would expect to receive offline.

A report from Ernst & Young (E&Y) states:

“Compared to offline grocery shoppers, high-use early adopters of online grocery shopping reduced their spending at physical grocery stores (by 18% in the first month and 4.5% over two years). Interestingly, shoppers’ new spend on online grocery sites was higher than their reduction in offline grocery dollars, indicating that online grocery platforms might also cannibalize offline retailers with overlapping assortments such as restaurants and drugstores.”

How omnichannel retail experiences are changing with technology

Omnichannel incorporates multiple touch points through both technology and in-person interactions to curate a seamless user experience for consumers. Importantly, it differs from multi-channel, in that omnichannel accounts for every platform that users will access and integrates these multiple channels so effectively that a consumer’s interaction is consistent across websites, social media accounts, apps, and in store.

Retail leaders should keep in mind that the priority or focus in developing a seamless omnichannel experience for consumers is not strictly to drive sales and revenue, but rather to build and maintain customer loyalty in their brand(s), creating lifetime customers.

Channels Involved in Omnichannel Experiences

Buying cycles have changed due to digital experiences. Mobile apps now offer rewards programs for customer loyalty and coupons for discounts both online and offline, and more than half of people state that they’d be willing to get discount notifications and coupons via text message. Almost one-third of shoppers browse products at a nearby retail store and then shop online to find the lowest prices and confirm quality.

Online shopping is undeniably convenient, but it’s still an inherently impersonal channel; 75% of cross channel shoppers want the same quality of customer advice provided online as in-store (chatbots). Digital assistants offer customized product suggestions with the personal information consumers share online. Voice assistants can offer faster, more personalized customer service, after either an online or offline purchase is made.

Customers also use mobile technology while in the store, great news for companies with a mobile marketing strategy. This includes push marketing using location-based advertising for suggested products while walking through a store; displays that offer on-the-spot, discounts-based, past-purchase history; mirrors that provide a 3D view of customers wearing products; and real-time inventory checks on items in-store.

Social media content marketing has reshaped the way we shop, too (for example, Instagram’s recent update to allow users to immediately purchase products they see in their feed).

Omnichannel Retail Experiences in Retail Today

Large offline retailers such as Walmart have focused resources on building up their online shopping support; on the flip side, online retailer Amazon has been acquiring brick and mortar stores, such as Whole Foods or their pilot AmazonGo location in Seattle.

• Digital Mall of Asia (DMA) recently announced a partnership with Robosoft to recreate in-store experiences through a “high-tech virtual mall,” where customers can try out digital products much like they would in store.

• In the States, Bonobos has created a store where customers can visit and try on various items, but they must purchase online; termed a “guideshop,” these stores “guide” customers to find the perfect fit. Orders are then placed online and shipped to their homes.

In conclusion, retailers can create a memorable experience through a seamless, nuanced approach. Staying abreast of changing technologies and updated methods of communication with consumers will enable you to adapt to changing consumer wants and needs. It’s “Digital Darwinism,” a world in which the most adaptable companies will survive.

The financial services industry is at a crossroad of digital disruption in Fintech and legacy systems. The wave of digital transformation which has impacted several industries including retail, media, and transport is making great strides in the financial services industry with several non-banking innovators providing both clients facing and back office technologies.

The last few years have also seen several acquisitions of finance technology software providers by banks and holding companies. These acquisitions have the potential to define the norms in the industry and the way in which software is deployed and utilized by money management firms including wealth management firms, RIAs, hedge funds or pension funds, fund managers, and large banks.

As these money management companies embrace technology, their bet is on offering their clients great solutions that deliver fully-integrated workflows. Even though this sounds compelling, there are several emerging industry trends that currently pose a challenge to this ostensible emerging paradigm.

This article will explore some of the challenges and opportunities provided by Fintech in the banking and financial services industry.

Challenges faced by the current financial services sector

Legacy Systems

To begin with, the likes of computing power, extensive connectivity, large data storage, and advanced analytical solutions provide a feasible digital alternative to both financial institutions and customers. It also poses several challenges for these money management firms. Even though this was inevitable, banks are finding it difficult to strike a balance between its legacy operations and the emerging technologies.

For decades, financial institutions have been dependent upon localized ‘on-site’ computing technologies. Therefore, the rate of adoption of disruptive Fintech solutions has been restricted by various factors, including a lack of better understanding of the technology in financial services.

Shrinking Fee

As money management companies are witnessing fee compression; the financial services industry is shifting its focus towards cost containment. This has seen several physical manifestations of this including the rising number of merges in the asset management space. This poses a unique challenge to the bank and software solution provider model as their acquisitions will mean that the companies can only achieve their ROI by significantly cross-selling to their client bases.

Think of it this way, as a money management firm facing razor-thin fees, what will be your priority? Not boosting your spend on technology in Fintech. On the contrary, investing in software to provide comprehensive solutions to the client doesn’t seem a great idea when there is a constant pressure of reducing costs. Such money management firms will then need to either charge extra up front or charge more on the back end.

Lack of Specialization

The myth that software solutions increase efficiency falls flat particularly in the financial services industry since most software solutions that are known for doing everything generally often lack specialization. In other words, most technology in Fintech cannot handle one particular functionality if it is known for having a great feature in another area.

This poses a great risk to the money management firms since investing in a software solution may help them at a given point in time, but not in the longer run. As the requirements of companies continuously evolve and as the industry’s priorities change, the technology that might appear ahead of the curve today may probably be behind the curve in months to come.

Innovation

Innovation is another challenge facing the large bank and software provider model. Technology in financial services has been changing as fast as the blink of an eye. So, when the vendor sells their solution, it is usually nearing the end of its innovation life cycle. The seller usually sells the software to the larger banks in the hopes of being able to continuously innovate and keep abreast with the latest technology to maintain its growing market share.

But there is a fundamental glitch: most of these large banks that use these software solutions serve a huge client base, who operate on different software versions. This makes technology updates even more difficult. With digital transformation in Fintech, the future of software is moving towards artificial intelligence, big data, advanced analytics, machine learning, and cloud computing. However, in reality, the technology currently being used by the clients mostly do not align with this model.

New Business Models

The rise in technology companies has forced several large money management firms to acquire these start-ups in order to remain relevant. However, there are emerging business models as well, which pose a challenge of inconsistencies within the industry. The digital disruption is causing banks and solutions provider to rethink their business models that align with their goals.

For instance, one way of operating is when the bank continues to be the face for customer interaction android offer products in a segment where they do not have the capabilities. While this is great for the customers, who will benefit from more product choices, it will also allow the banks to generate fee-based revenues from the software provider. This is one such model, and it is up to the money management firm to decide whether they want to acquire, partner or outsource Fintech provider. But these different models eventually create differences within the industry and provide inconsistent experience to the customers.

The rise of digital banks is another shift that the current banking industry is witnessing. According to a study, visits to bank branches are expected to drop 36 percent between 2017 and 2022, while mobile transactions are expected to grow 121 percent in the same period.

One such digital bank Revolut provides a finance app that enables currency and cryptocurrency exchange. Users can also control their finances by setting up a budget and tracking their daily spends. In 2018, Revolut has more than 2 million users. Another such mobile bank N26 allows its customers to open a bank account and manage money using their mobile devices.

Advantages of Fintech in the Banking and Financial Services Industry

The digital transformation in Fintech provides a great opportunity to large banks who can automate much of their manual tasks. It can help banks provide comprehensive solutions to deliver services directly to their customer’s mobile devices. Such technologies can also help banks to send sensitive communications with the help of encrypted Internet transmissions and also broadens the horizon for the banks to use cloud computing and save cost spent on data centers.

As rightly quoted by Jamie Dimon, Chairman & CEO of JP Morgan Chase “Hundreds of startups with a lot of brains and money are working on various alternatives to traditional banking.”

In addition to this, several Fintech companies like OpenLink, TransferWise and Poynt also provide point solutions in areas such as remittances, payments, savings and investments, trade and invoice finance, lending, and insurance. There are robust models being created for Anti-Money Laundering-Know Your Customer (AML-KYC) compliance, underwriting and risk management, credit scoring, collections and recovery, customer service, capital markets activities, etc.

Traditional banks are also collaborating with the new-age FinTech to create a mutually beneficial partnership.

For instance- Goldman Sachs works with Symphony, which develops a secure way for sell-side and buy-side firms to collaborate keeping compliance in place. Blend Labs works with banks and financial institutions to develop an efficient underlying technology for mortgage lending. BBVA Compass has teamed up with OnDeck to offer loans to small businesses that would not otherwise qualify for bank credit.

PayTM one of the largest e-commerce payment system and digital wallet company of India, has partnered with leading banks to offer traditional services augmented by technology. The company has partnered with ICICI Bank, to announce an all-new initiative where users can get interest-free short-term digital credit. Called Paytm-ICICI Bank Postpaid, the new offer lets Paytm customers get instant credit for things like paying for movie tickets, bill payments, flights, as well as physical goods. It has also collaborated with Induslnd Bank to introduce a facility that creates a fixed deposit when the customer balance exceeds $16K (INR 100K) at the end of the day.

Final Thoughts

All the opportunities and challenges posed by Fintech in the financial services industry call for a new model for large banks and conglomerate. Instead of offering monolithic systems to the customers, it is time that these money management companies along with challenger banks look at customized and specialized solutions that have the capability to offer a suite of functionalities integrated with by APIs.

Innovation and competition will play a leading role to shape the future of digital transformation in Fintech so that they change according to their clients’ requirements. Least to mention, that this digital transformation in Fintech will eventually lead to the lowering of total systems cost.

Apple announced a slew of software updates for the Apple family of devices, including the iPhone, iPad, Mac desktops and laptops, Apple TV, and Apple Watch at the WWDC Keynote on June 3, 2019.

Let’s take a look at some of the highlights of the announcements:

iPadOS

A surprise announcement (missed by the tech news portals prior to the event  too) was the announcement of a new OS, exclusively for the iPad With their larger screens, Apple is pushing the boundaries on what you can do on an iPad. With the functionality gap widening between iPhones and iPads, Apple decided to split iOS and give iPad its own dedicated OS called iPadOS. iPadOS is built upon iOS but provides additional capabilities to build experiences that are unique to the iPad. I’m guessing you can still run your iOS apps on iPad but if you want your app to take advantage of the unique interactions of an iPad, you’ll have to create an iPadOS app development.

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Some of the features include:

• Side by side apps, expose, file column views for more productivity
• File sharing – iCloud drive folder sharing
• You can plug in thumb drives, SD cards, external drives, import photos from your camera
• Desktop class browsing on Safari iPad (desktop site instead of mobile site)
• Downloads manager
• Font customization
• Use and buy custom fonts
• Improvements for text editing using Multi-touch
• Lower latency from 20ms to 9ms
• Redesigned Pencil tools
• PencilKit API

It seems like they’re really focused on making it a productivity machine rather than a casual device to consume content on (which I feel was the main focus of the iPad when it first came out). The emphasis is on multi-tasking, multi-touch gestures and an all-new home screen with an ability to pin widgets. Some of the features showcased (pen drive compatibility, column view of files, sharing of folders) make it amply clear that the intent is to keep working towards it being a replacement for laptops.

SwiftUI

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SwiftUI is a new Apple framework that will allow you to create user interfaces with code. You can build UIs across iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS and tvOS apps and it also comes with out of the box functionality for interface layout, Dark Mode, Accessibility, right-to-left language support and internationalization. Xcode 11 has a new way to design UIs without having to write any code. I will be downloading the Xcode 11 beta to check this out.

RealityKit

I haven’t spent much time playing around with ARKit myself but I’m still surprised by how cool these experiences are each time I see them. I was really impressed by the new RealityKit announced at WWDC that will allow you to create interactive AR experiences from a library of 3D objects and models. This drag and drop RealityComposer will allow people to create AR scenes even if they don’t have an extensive background in 3D graphics or 3D modelling.

ARKit 3

Two improvements they’ve made to this latest version of ARKit is around People Occlusion and Motion Capture.In the first demo, Apple showed people walking around in front of and behind of objects without messing up the order that they appear in. There’s some sort of automatic depth detection going on so ARKit knows the show the object behind or in front of the person.

In the second demo, Apple showed that you can perform motion capture on a person without any special equipment. Just point and record!

WatchOS

The Apple Watch has come a long way since the Series 1 when it was a companion device to the iPhone. Later it can be a stand alone device too with SIM support. With the next version of WatchOS, you can build apps specifically for the Apple Watch without the need for a companion iOS app. There are also new watch faces, cool new APIs for things like streaming audio or to allow your app to run for an extended amount of time. The Apple Watch also gets its own App Store. Apple also showcased health capabilities with activity trends, hearing health, cycle tracking (available on the Health app on iPhone too) and a redesigned health app dashboard (using ML for determining which metrics to show you).

tvOS

The tvOS app gets design enhancements, ability to add multiple user profiles, in-sync lyrics and more. You can now use Xbox  and PS4 controllers with the new tvOS.

iOS 13

Announcements pertaining to iOS were expected to be the highlight of the Keynote. A few tech blogs had already highlighted features like system-wide dark mode, new designs for Apple’s own apps etc. For me, the emphasis of iOS 13 was on improving performance. Here are a few examples:

• Face ID unlocks 30% faster
• App downloads are 50% smaller, app updates are 60% smaller
• Up to 2x faster app launch speed

Aside from the above, dark mode was showcased. It gives a whole new playground for designers to think through the visual experience of their apps.

Apple has always offered privacy as a key differentiating factor relative to competition. In a significant move, they announced “Sign in with Apple” as an option to social logins. This option also has an ability to mask one’s emails ID when having to share it with other services or apps. With the ‘hide my email’ option the app would only see a randomly generated anonymous email address – an announcement which got a lot of applause from the crowd.

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As an extension of the privacy initiatives, Apple announced new features and hardware for HomeKit, its framework for smart home devices. On display yesterday was HomeKit Secure Video, which analyzes videos from smart security cameras locally before encrypting and uploading them to iCloud. HomeKit enabled 3rd party routers were also announced which have firewall safeguards for connected accessories.

MacOS

There has been a lot of buzz about Project Marzipan months ahead of this WWDC. Turns out it is actually Project Catalyst which helps developers bring iOS apps to the Mac. It will be made available in the next version of macOS – named Catalina. Another interesting announcement was Sidecar which enables an iPad to be used as an external device.

Other notable announcements include Siri’s ability to read messages which you can respond via voice and it works with any app using SiriKit.

Here’s a 13-minute round up of the key announcements:

Digital transformation is reshaping every industry and enterprises are finding ways to adapt to the rapidly changing business environment. Business leaders have acknowledged that organizational culture is one of the key aspects of driving business success. In a recent Deloitte study, 82% of the CEO’s and HR leaders agreed that culture drives competitive advantage.

No wonder prudent enterprises are going beyond integrating newer technologies to adapt to this new reality – they are revamping their organizational culture to digitally transform. Take for example the case of the Economist Group. The publishing business has always focussed on selling advertising space on its print and digital medium as a revenue source. However, digitization has lead publishing houses to offer integrated marketing solutions including customized content, events, etc. This new market demand requires enterprises to not just have the technologies to meet the needs of the new-age customers, but also a trained workforce to implement them. The Economist Group realized that for adapting to these demands, they will have to retrain the workforce and support them in working more collaboratively.

This approach was no longer about selling individual products for short-term it was about consulting and helping businesses and building long-term relations with the clients. To achieve the same, the company introduced its ‘’Fast Forward’’ initiative aimed not just at the sales team but also the support teams like finance, programme managers, event organisers, etc. The program included a learning-based platform with a UI similar to social media platforms and also had elements of Gamification to make the process engaging and encourage the employees to complete the training. The process involved everyone from the top management to the executives.

According to Michael Thomas, training director, the Economist Group–

“The program really pushed people to work collaboratively and to build relationships across different functional parts of the business. So we had sales working with events and finance and programme managers – it was very successful.”

An organization, in a digital transformation world, isn’t just a set of digital processes but also includes the work culture and the set of practices and attitudes that are key to implement digital transformation and succeed in a digital world.

So far, digital transformation has been about inculcating consumer-facing technologies or operational processes at some level but organizational culture is an aspect that is given the least importance when it comes to crafting a digital transformation strategy for any enterprise.

According to this study – almost 94% of the business executives equate “digital” mainly with technology, and only a small fraction that is, 6% defined it as “going beyond technology alone to reflect a mindset that embraces constant innovation, flat decision-making, and the integration of technology into all phases of the business.”

But why is it critical to include cultural transformation as an important, rather one of the most important aspects of an enterprise’s digital transformation strategy?

Here’s what Rob Roy the Chief Digital Officer at Sprint, said about how adding the ‘people factor’ to their digital transformation strategy, steered their journey in the right direction –

‘’We started using the phrase ‘digital transformation’, migrated processes and tools to be more digital, and created a dedicated business unit, and thought we’d automatically see that transformation happen. For example, we decided to do more sales online. When we set it up, we then tried to force customers down the digital path. But many of them weren’t ready. The spirit of what we were doing was correct, but a complete understanding of what we were trying to do wasn’t there. After six months, we learned that just because you say it, it doesn’t make it so. A digital transformation isn’t about digitizing a channel or simply doing more things digitally. It’s a much broader scope than that. We’re really looking to improve and simplify customer “moments of truth”—and all the supporting processes that build a true omnichannel, world-class experience. We’re now working with each area in the business to help everyone think and act digitally for the things they control. And we’re starting to see real gains in productivity, simplification, cost reduction, and building on earlier gains focused on sales.’’

The above example substantiates the fact that digital transformation will not happen in a company where the culture is not in place. However, on a positive note, business leaders realize this gap. In a Capgemini survey, 62% of the executives agreed that organizational culture is one of the biggest hurdle impeding the progress of digital transformation.

So what Exactly is a ‘Digital Culture’?

Company culture inculcates a range of attributes from a company ’s day-to-day operational processes to collective experiences and value system of the employees, leadership’s role, vision, etc. A digital culture has a different approach to all of these attributes vs a company which isn’t digitally matured. According to a report by MIT and Capgemini, digital culture comprises of the following attributes.

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• Customer Centricity: digitally matured enterprises look at everything from the customer’s perspective, their processes, internal and external, are geared up for simplifying customer journeys across every touch point.

• Innovation: a digital culture supports calculative risk-taking, go beyond standard processes and adopt disruptive technologies in order to explore newer ideas.

• Data-driven Decision-Making: the use of data and analytics to make better business decisions.

• Collaboration: a digital culture, is collaborative and encourages the creation of cross-functional, inter-departmental teams to optimize processes and increase efficiency.

• Open Culture: a digital culture reaches out for partnerships wherever necessary, instead of trying to do everything in-house.

• Digital First Mindset: a digital culture works on a mindset where digital solutions are the default way forward.

• Agility and Flexibility: a digital culture instils speed and dynamism in decision-making and accelerates the ability of the organization to adapt to changing demands and technologies.

As stated by TN Hari, Human Resources Head at Big Basket (a leading online grocery platform of India)

”In today’s digital world, it is imperative for organizations to adopt advanced technologies to improve efficiency and remain competitive. However, every organization will be having their own digital requirements and hence their own unique digital transformation journey. To bring change and align the organization for digital transformation, it will be important for business leaders to identify what kind of digital transformation their organization needs and the outcomes, even more important will be communicating this to their teams and aligning them to the vision of the organization.”

Challenges in Achieving a Cultural Change

By now we have established that digital transformation requires a cultural turn-around for any enterprise and it can be an uphill task to reshape the set processes, attitudes, behaviours and practices to adapt to the new digital reality and the challenges can be many and intimidating.

Here are some challenges that business leaders might face while revamping their organizational culture for the digital world:

1. Inertia in letting go of existing processes and culture

According to an HBR study – one of the most baffling problems which business executives face is employee resistance to change. An enterprise built on traditional and rigid processes and culture will naturally be averse to change because sticking to old processes is easier for employees than starting from scratch.

As pointed out by Professor Deborah Ancona MIT Sloan School of Management –

“Employees will resist because they still see the old behaviours as critical to their success and central to who they are while seeing the new norms as risky.”

Precisely why they continue to stick to their good old ways, and in the process, lose sight of the new envisioned goals and values of the business. However, in a digital world where technology is an integral part of people’s life, it is easier to establish the benefits of adopting newer technologies, if communicated in the right manner; and this onus lies on the business leaders.

As TN Hari, rightly puts it across

‘’We are reaping the benefits of digitization in our day-to-day lives. People are already accustomed to using technology to simplify their personal lives and they understand how it can ease their routine and mundane tasks. Then why will they not look at digitization from a similar perspective in their work lives? To bring about change, it will be critical for business leaders to show their teams, what’s in it for them? How technology will help them improve their efficiency and accelerate their progress in the organization.’’

2. Infrastructural costs

Driving a digital culture is not just a human thing, rather it needs a full-fledged infrastructure in place. This infrastructure, unlike the traditional IT systems, has much more than some hardware and legacy software platforms. It requires a range of things including products, mobile applications, social, cloud, data analytics and automation, all this can mean a huge cost to the enterprise and hence acts as an impediment.

3. Resource allocation

Adding new digital processes introduces a slew of newer tasks to the workflow of an organization. With newer operational tasks being added, there is a need for allocation of resources who can tactfully navigate through the newer processes. However, at times enterprises are not geared up to scale their resource allocation within that time frame, and that makes digital transformation difficult.

4. Inefficient adoption of automation

A digital culture focuses highly on automation. Which means moving away from the manual processes. Most people comfortable in a traditional culture are reluctant to let go of the manual processes that they have been using for decades and are always iffy about breaking off their comfort shells and adapting automation. And thereby, even when infrastructural processes are in place, automation is not effectively implemented in the enterprise.

5. Upskilling challenges

Digital literacy amongst the employees is one of the major roadblocks when it comes to instilling a digital culture. For employees used to traditional processes, it will require proper planning of a training module to incorporate digital competencies in them, which can be a challenging task. Businesses will need to invest heavily in organizing training sessions and mentorship programs to ensure success.

How to Create an Organizational Culture to Accelerate Digital Transformation

According to a study by Mckinsey, culture is the number one barrier when it comes to digital transformation.

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As complex it might sound to solve this part of the puzzle, planning ahead with the right strategy will ensure success for enterprises while getting ready for a digital future.

Here’s is how business leaders can lead the way for instilling a digital culture in their enterprises:

1. Define what digital transformation means for your organization

In broader terms, digital transformation might mean adopting technologies to improve efficiency and simplifying lives for your customers. But, every enterprise is at a different stage when it comes to their digital transformation journey, and hence individual organizations will have their own definition. It is imperative to know where your organization stands, and where do you want to reach and why.

It is important to identify answers to these questions and even more important is articulating it to your team and aligning them to the bigger picture. So that they don’t see technology as a threat or inconvenience, they see the bigger picture and technology as an ally to reach there, together.

2. Encourage disruptive thinking

Technology is disrupting industries and turning norms on their head. In a scenario like this, if your team keeps doing things the way they did or thinking the way they did, the organization will remain where it was albeit with the implementation of some digital platforms. For your team to appreciate a digital culture business leaders should reward disruptive thinking, ability to take calculated risks and even creative failures.

3. Imbibe leadership characteristics in employees

Change is never easy, thus it requires dynamic leaders to lead the way and bring change. Leaving this task to just to the C-suite of the organization will only delay the progress. Business leaders should identify leaders across functions to lead the way. Organizations can encourage leadership characteristics by creating opportunities for employees. For instance, a North American financial institution that was undergoing a digital transformation made it a practice to rotate meeting leaders, which empowered a wider variety of people in meetings. Enterprises should encourage leaders to become mentors to their team or encourage action.

Breeding leaders will need decision makers to give independence to their teams and let them make choices and decisions and feel safe while doing so. For instance, to signal change at Cisco, executives in certain divisions gave up their offices, so the company could create team rooms; the company also started allowing employees to choose the workspace and tech tools that best fit their individual roles.

3. Don’t hire for the ‘job’ hire for the organization

In a digital world where technologies change every fortnight, it is rather short-sighted to hire candidates for a ‘specific job’. Digitally mature organizations allow employees to wear multiple hats. Thus, hiring for a specific skill or tech speciality will leave you holding a lot of outdated talent. Instead, businesses should list down the qualities that will lead to a bigger, stronger, forward-thinking organization. Prudent leaders should work toward creating a workforce that will move your company and digital culture forwards.

4. Revisiting organizational operating model

In most organizations, a change in culture is first run as a pilot with the senior executives of the company. If the pilot is successful it is then rolled out to the company. However, the drawback of this approach is the traits of the executives with whom the pilot is conducted and approved, do not exist in the broader organization. The approach that applies to a mid-level manager may not work for the intern. Hence, there is a mismatch in the motivation levels within the organization to adapt to the new culture. To bridge this gap it is important that organizations re-look at their basic operating models, review systems, etc. New practices need to be implemented basis the context of the various organizational functions. Rolling out a generic strategy might not work. For instance, while embedding a digital culture, Adobe Systems abolished its annual performance management reviews, replacing them with real-time “feed forward” sessions that focus on upcoming goals.

In another example, leaders at a life sciences company reviewed their company’s “DNA statement” to ensure that the principles and the company’s systems supported the new digital culture.

In Conclusion:

As rightly pointed out by Ian Rogers, Chief Digital Officer at LVMH –

“The big moment for an organization is when they have embraced the fact that digital transformation isn’t a technical issue, but a cultural change.”

To reshape your organization’s culture and making it digital ready will require business leaders to think beyond the realms of technology. Dig deeper into their employee attitudes, organizational processes and not shy away from reshaping and altering whatever is necessary to accelerate their digital transformation journey.

The banking & finance industry has seen tectonic changes over the last few years. With the advent of smartphones and mobile applications, many consumers choose to bank on their mobile, buy financial products on digital platforms, reducing their dependence on visiting a branch or brick & mortar office. Living in a digital world has created its own set of challenges for both end users and enterprises. Alongside this digital savvy, demanding consumer is another audience (in developing markets largely with a rural bias), which is yet to experience the entire gamut of banking services. They are expected to fuel the growth of the entire banking sector, driven by rising incomes.

Earlier, a bank account at a branch was for life. Today, switching brands to suit one’s financial needs – be it investments or loans, is easier than ever before. So there is no room for complacency in the banking sector as brand loyalty cannot be taken for granted. Millennials – a sought after segment for many categories are earning and their trust factor vis-à-vis banks will be measured solely by digital experience of services. They would be a demanding lot as they seek self-service dashboards, are comfortable with humanized banking with natural language support and demand curated recommendations on financial products.

Our interactions with consumers tells us that they have a stronger emotional connect with technology and new-age brands such as Apple, Uber, Amazon, and Google. The ability of some of such companies to blend experiences from the physical and digital worlds is also admired by consumers. The perceived ease of use and delight of digital-only products (e.g. Dropbox) is sought to be emulated across all digital experiences. Unfortunately, banks have not been known to provide great customer experiences either in the offline or online world. Nearly half of millennials using mobile banking are dissatisfied with the existing online banking services.

Many enterprises with no legacy banking experience may seek banking licenses with a digital-first and branch-less strategy. They can collaborate with FinTech partners to acquire and own segmented customers and offer a wide-range of services as opposed to legacy institutions, which were primarily a safe vault for deposits or lending to one-off needs. As compared to traditional banking brands, FinTech players anyway have an edge when it comes to better user experience.

In this context, banks are at a higher risk than ever before of losing customers. They will have to adopt a top-down strategy comprising five pillars of innovation covering Business, Technology and Operations.

Not just money-keeping but lifestyle enrichment

Banks remain one among the many domains, which can potentially own the customer for life and fulfil an individual’s aspirations and needs. Hence, banks can play a far greater role than mere money keepers. They can offer a suite of services to match both lifestyle and life stage requirements of individuals. This could include anytime advisory, spend analysis across financial institutions and touch points, life-style goal planning & tracking, consolidated analysis of assets & liabilities, need-based in-app marketing, rule-driven payments automation and more.

Based on lifestyle services (e.g. shopping, bills, recharge, tax, fees, EMI, ticketing, travel, transportation, toll pay, grocery, entertainment, donation, stocks, mutual funds, insurance, deposits, person-person payments) and past transactions, a bank can make just-in-time recommendations and make customized offers. They have an opportunity to be the single life-style app unifying loyalty, rewards and cash back with frictionless redemption. For example,our primary objective while revamping the app of a large private bank was to upgrade it from a merely transactional app to an all-purpose platform. We partnered with the client and created an app which wasn’t just a transactional platform, but offered a seamless and delightful experience to consumers, with features like one-touch payments, bill payment reminders, AR based smart ATM locator, etc.

Data of customers and their preferences should move across channels (app, web, wearables, bots, social, smart TV, kiosk, branch, call center, advisor, distributor) and will be expected to be available, rendered or resumed on most-preferred channel at that moment or location with secure authentication.

Customer Experience is the new business battleground

Many enterprises are familiar with the concept of Design Thinking and acknowledge its role in shaping customer experiences. But there is scope to apply this discipline across all aspects of a business. Many of the enterprise apps in the market may be colorful in design, but weak on purpose, interaction style or blending cutting-edge innovations. Enterprises too are grappling with the problem of app abandonment both in consumer-facing and employee-focused apps. There is ample scope for design thinkers and data scientists to partner with software engineers to create digital solutions, which delight.

Banks should think holistically to offer a great customer experience beyond just the digital interface. In the US, while lots of millennials use and prefer digital banking almost 50% of them wouldn’t even consider switching to a digital-only bank. Beyond the digital world, banks can also consider hybrid solutions – a personalized greeting at branch entry via facial recognition and BLE, extended service hours through virtual remote services, the option to have a video call with a bank representative, a plug & play service at a branch resembling a café and so on.

Don’t just thinks apps, think enterprise grade platforms

Gone are the days of IT teams executing monolithic applications from disparate vendors as sequential projects and siloed business units resulting in a roadblock to faster innovation to markets. Many large enterprises have now carved out separation of responsibilities between the CTO, CIO, CD and CMO. Enterprises should decouple Digital from Core via Open APIs (e.g. PSD2 Open Banking Standard in UK) and monetize services usage by partnering with best-of-breed service providers built on open-source technologies via a plug-n-play integration.

Each business application across business units should be well architected as a collection of cloud-ready enterprise-level micro-services that can be discovered, re-used and deployed across the Enterprise in its lifetime.

Automation which delivers better processes & results

Many financial institutions have only scratched the surface on operational process and customer interaction automation. Typically, it has been automation of easy mundane back-end jobs and less of a hybrid approach of humans and robot’s judgment working in tandem. Successful digital transformation initiatives must focus on enterprise productivity, contextual interactions and real-time recommendations with customer at the center.

Robotic Process Automation is one form of automation that enables an enterprise to be agile, lean, data-driven and customer-centric by speeding up tasks non-intrusively and 24×7 operational. RPA unifies enterprise-level data to bring context to customers, integrates regulatory compliance into SOPs with exception reporting, delivers always-on services and enrich human interactions. Hence, convergence of RPA and AI covering client and server-side applications must drive enterprise revenue and profitability, cross-sell to customer’s precise needs, prevent fraud and non-performing assets, as opposed to seen as disparate technological innovations.

Financial institutions must certainly bring automation to software development, deployment and rollout to markets faster. This would involve adopting Agile practices at scale. These could be in-house or with innovation partners by institutionalizing DevOps best practices of Continuous Integration, Deployment and Monitoring of services. Another area of automation is just-in-time marketing driven by AI, location intelligence, big-data driven customer profiling.

Actionable insights at the core of decision-making

Big or small decisions in enterprises are based on the right information. Today, the need is to go beyond information and depend on insights. Such insights can be drawn from every conversation, transaction, relationship, complaints, social sharing between customer and bank or between customers, and not remain siloed inside proprietary application as MIS reporting. In a 2018 survey, senior industry professionals placed open APIs, Analytics and Conversational Interfaces among the top 3 technologies which will have an impact in banking.

Analytics is enabled at edge of the network and at servers on cloud and utilized real time to bring value to customers. Such insights can be put to use in customer micro-segmentation, cross-sell and product holding analysis, customer profitability and lifetime value analysis to name a few.

Dashboards are useful, but the real value lies in interpreting the data in order to anticipate what your customers want faster and accurately  than your competition and acting on it.

Summary

Banking will remain across generations to come. The entities, actors, relationships will take different shapes. Financial institutions  must think customer-first and user scenarios to drive service features and not invest upfront in off-the-shelf products without knowing how to realize the enterprise vision on time and budget.

A customer-focused data-driven company, which measures critical moments of interaction to cross-sell or up-sell has an edge in the future. A reliable long-term partner who can provide the right advice, design a human-centric experience, engineer a scalable solution, and launch or enhance defect-free cloud-ready solutions to market is key to success.

Last Thursday, we conducted a webinar on how to build and grow an audience for mobile apps. The webinar was conducted in association with Pyze Inc., with Nikunj Sanghvi and Prabhjot Singh being the hosts. In case you missed the webinar, here some salient points discussed.

First, some hard truths:

• 77% of users never use an app again 72 hours after installing.
• 34% of app usage lasts less than one minute
• 92% of the 4+ million apps fail

It was emphasised that the chances of success will increase only if the app engagement increases and we give enough reasons for the user to keep using the app again and again. And the only way to improve app engagement is to make every user interaction memorable and delightful.

Further, the following tips were shared on building apps for growth:

1. Use device sensors & features: smartphones and mobile operating systems come with incredible features nowadays. Apps should attempt to make use of device sensors, integration with in-built hardware features, OS gestures to improve interactivity and engagement. The WWF Together app was showcased as a reference.

2. Appeal to user instincts & emotions: understanding the consumer and using insights about their behavior towards the category is a key element for success. This was demonstrated through the use of a ‘bargain’ (a trait common among Indians while shopping) feature in an e-commerce app

3. Architect with scalability and flexibility in mind: an app which scaled from a simple recharge and bill pay app into a full-fledged e-Commerce space one was showcased – the scalable architecture helped them build customizable UIs to showcase products in different verticals

4. Think beyond the app: in many cases, it helps to think of your offering as a service, and not just an “app”

5. Adopt new features and update often: frequent updates help apps to remain on top of users’ minds and drive increased engagement and growth.

6. Go native when applicable: a native app has access to features and hardware that a cross-platform app often does not

The second half of the webinar focused on organic growth. It was highlighted that while some top app publishers generate over
$1M of revenue a day, most app publishers make less than $500 a month. The key, it was pointed out is that app publishers who use data intelligence are growing while a majority struggle. Top apps from Facebook, LinkedIn, King, Niantic, Supercell & others use sophisticated intelligence to Engage, Retain & Grow users.

The 5 pillars of growth intelligence are:

• Deep Understanding of user behavior
• Behavioral User Clustering & Macro analysis
• Right-time per-individual Interactions
• Automate engagement, retention & growth
• Personalized content, experience & interactions

Want to know more? We have a recording of the webinar which you can watch at leisure. Just head over here to signup and we will send you the link.

A recent PricewaterhouseCoopers study suggests that out of 10,640 projects done by 200 companies across the globe, only 2.5% managed to complete 100% of their IT projects. Lack of planning, resources, and activities are some of the reasons for this rate of failure. However, organizations are now working towards reducing the rate of project failure. According to a report by Project Management Institute the project failure rate has substantially reduced from 70% to 55% in 2017. Some of the factors that have contributed to the reduction of failure rate are using a strategic approach to project management and adopting an Agile approach.

RFP is the first step towards starting the journey towards a successful project. From repeated delays in software releases, exceeding budgets to development issues these predictable obstacles can be avoided by writing a succinct request for proposal (RFP).

In this article, we have collated more than ten best practices to follow while writing an RFP that can build a successful digital partnership.

Project Overview

The first step to creating a quality RFP is to introduce the purpose of your proposal. Clearly state the goals, metrics, and ROI the RFP is designed to address. Be brief and to the point in this section, as more details about the project will follow in the subsequent section. The overview should provide a view of your business objective, baseline goals, and proposed solution.

Company Background

Clearly articulate your business and the services or solutions your enterprise provides. Chances are that the service provider is unfamiliar with your organization and has questions even after visiting your website. You should talk about what makes your company unique and why the project you are working on matters.

Project Goals & Target Audience

Clearly explain your goals and what you intend to accomplish with the project. Prioritize the goals so the vendor will understand the relative importance and can respond accordingly. Describe the end user or the target audience of the project. If there are multiple users clearly define each as this will help the vendor understand the overall scope and reach of the project. For example, the main target audience may be “consumers”, but be sure to define other user groups such as “administrators, content providers, suppliers, etc.” The clearer you are, the better the responses will be to the RFP, which in turn will allow you to make better decisions and produce more quantifiable outcomes.

Scope and Deliverables

This is the part where you will elaborate on the scope and key deliverables for the project. Describe the features, functions along with the associated deliverables with as much detail as possible. If you can, provide examples from other projects or describe how the end user will use the feature. If there is a specific technology you require, include that in the scope description. Don’t forget to define ongoing support requirements and SLAs (Service Level Agreements) as part of the scope. These are often overlooked at the beginning of a project and can cause cost overruns in the end. Include any documentation that supports the scope such as wireframes, technical architecture or user personas.

Project Timeline

Even though you may not know the actual timeline to complete the project, you should provide the desired dates for critical milestones. This will allow the vendor to provide reasonable estimates for the duration of each project phase. If there is a hard deadline to be met, be upfront about it.

Looking to craft compelling digital experiences for your enterprise? Here’s a handy template you can refer to. Download now.

Technical Requirements

This is one of the most critical section of an RFP. This will lay out all the technical and complex requirements of the project. This section should clearly outline both technical and functional requirements for the project. For instance, if your project requires a design solution to be done, then the details and the expectations like user-friendliness, accessibility, compatibility with multiple devices, etc. should be mentioned here. Some other key points that can be included in this section could be:

• Infrastructure requirements and guidelines – details of the infrastructure like a requirement of a cloud platform details of the deployment environment, etc. should be captured here.

• Operating model requirements – This should capture the dependencies and the expectations from the operating model from the vendor.

• Functional requirements pertaining to both front-end and back-end should be added in this section.

Main Point of Contact

Generally, there should be a single point of contact that the vendors can reach out to with questions and comments. It is also useful to provide the names and contact details for critical members of the client project team. For example, the technical and UX lead, project sponsors and SMEs. Allowing access to these people will improve the accuracy of the vendor’s response.

Budget and Selection Criteria

Be open about your budget, even if it is only an estimate. Providing the service provider with a target budget is a part of setting clear expectations and ensuring you get a quality response. Some clients do not provide a budget target in RFPs, assuming that the vendors will provide lower estimates. In actuality, the result is usually budgets that vary widely by the vendor which makes it difficult to accurately compare scope, effort, and cost.

You should also include the selection criteria you will use to award the project and evaluate the vendors. Vendors that do not meet those requirements should be excluded at the beginning of the RFP process, not at the end. This will save everyone time and effort.

Finally, in some industries (government, education and financial services), there are legal and regulatory requirements for selecting a vendor for a project. Be sure to address those in the preparation of the RFP.

Ongoing Support

One of the questions you must answer when preparing an RFP is, will the project require ongoing support post-launch? Some clients have their own in-house support team for bug fixes, maintaining uptime, providing reporting and analytics. For these clients, it is a best practice to include a “transition period” in the RFP that allows the vendor time and budget to educate the in-house support team on how to support the project long term.

If you will need the vendor to provide ongoing support, establish clearly the expectations around SLAs (Service Level Agreements), escalation and communication channels. Some vendors are not set up for long term ongoing support, and knowing that could be a critical decision point in selecting a vendor.

Provide Example and Samples

If your project has been inspired by other products in the industry, provide a few examples of it. Whether it is the design, the overall experience, or any other specific, discrete feature, explain what you like about them and why. When you give samples of the things you want, you are able to better explain your vision and clarify any doubts that the vendor may have.

The Format of your Proposal

Are you supposed to submit the proposal in a set PDF or an MS Word format? Are you required to sign and notarize the hard copies? Is there a specific font and format to be used (single or double space)? These are some of the questions that you need to keep in mind while writing an RFP. While all these may seem to be standard questions, it is often overlooked by the writers.

Final Thoughts

Great RFPs are easy to write provided you know what to include in them. These are some of the essential elements of an RFP that can help you forge lasting relationships with the vendor. Even though these points may appear overwhelming, but chances are that you already know about them and are including it in your RFP. But, this isn’t an exhaustive list of things that can be included. If you know where to put what content then you can make the vendor’s life easier in deciding whether to respond to the RFP or not.

An in-depth RFP shows that you have invested time in thinking through the details and are serious about the completion of your project. After all, the better the RFP is articulated, the better will be the vendor response.

An exhaustive, in-depth RFP is critical for selecting the right vendor and ensuring that there are no mismatches between the expectations from a project and deliverables. As they say ‘well begun is half done’, a well written RFP is the first step to ensure successful on-time project completion.

At Robosoft, we believe in simplifying lives through delightful digital experiences. Across enterprises, digital product owners and IT Services teams are responsible for initiating, overseeing and executing mission-critical software projects. All of these involve decision making which can impact the success of the project – from selecting the right digital partner to the writing a comprehensive RFP. Through a series of blogs, we will attempt to provide useful guides for such digital journeys. Our first one is about writing an effective RFP. We hope you find it useful. Got a suggestion? Write to us.