Amazon has raised the bar—technology roadmapping for businesses

It’s a new day. The landscape has changed, customer needs have changed and most importantly, customer expectations have changed. To survive and moreover to thrive, businesses need to create more robust online offerings designed to meet and exceed customer expectations while positioning their business for growth and profitability. This is a tall order and one that must be thoughtfully approached. 

Online buyer expectations

When thinking about how to meet the needs of customers, it’s important to start by understanding customer continually evolving needs and expectations. Business-to-Business (B2B) buyers expect and are loyal to companies that can meet expectations by delivering consistent, high-quality experiences everywhere customers want to do business (e.g., in-person, over the phone, via email and online). 

Companies can learn a great deal about delivering an excellent customer experience from a company such as Amazon. Amazon has set the bar very high for Business-to-Consumer (B2C) and now B2B services. Companies can no longer look past what’s happening online and rely solely on gaining business through traditional channels. Taking a closer look at retail, according to Internet Retailer’s analysis -commerce represented 14.3% of total retail sales in 2018. Amazon accounts for 40% of U.S. online retail.

B2B buyers are people not just businesses

Businesses do not buy from businesses; individual people buy from businesses. The same individuals who purchase from a company like Amazon in their personal lives may also purchase from Amazon and other suppliers in their business lives. Pulling from their shopping experiences, buyers expect the same level of quality service whether they are shopping for business or personal needs. 

The internet is a critical location for buyers to research, compare products and ultimately purchase from. Over 89% of B2B buyers use the internet during the research process. To be considered, companies must have a vast online presence and the ability to allow researchers to convert from research to purchase quickly.

B2B e-commerce (online purchasing) accounts for more than 90% of all e-commerce, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Providing customers with a high quality, customer-centric online business support system is key to long-term customer acquisition and loyalty. A solution that goes beyond online ordering and focuses on supporting the customer as their overall business is a necessary differentiator that can become a source for customer stickiness. 

Start planning today for tomorrow

Creating robust e-commerce capabilities designed to induce customer stickiness takes time and planned allocations. Most companies do not have unlimited money or unlimited people to deliver upon large development initiatives. If your company is considering a development project; for internal process improvements or for external customer use, I recommend taking a step back and looking at the project from a bigger view. I recommend thinking about the project as it relates to your vision for what the ideal state of technology in your business may look like and where you want it to go in the short and the long term. 

The best way to start bringing a technology vision to life, without investing in the technology itself, is through the documentation of a technology roadmap (digital roadmap). According to Wikipedia, a technology roadmap is a flexible planning technique to support strategic and long-range planning, by matching short-term and long-term goals with specific technology solutions.

The creation of a technology roadmap will help the entire organization gain alignment around vision, goals and desired outcomes of internal and external technologies. 

There are several methods to creating a technology roadmap. The roadmap within each company will look different, as it needs to be customized to the current state of the business / technologies within the business, the needs of the business and the resources (money or and people) available to support the roadmap. With that said, use the high-level steps below as a guide to conducting the research, starting the planning and identifying the resources necessary to implement the vision. 

· Align Company Goals: Review company goals and determine where technology fits into the overall picture. 

· Listen to Customers: Determine what customers are looking for from your business. You may want to Voice of the Customer research to gain this insight directly from customers. 

· Cast Vision: Agree on and document vision for what long-term, multi-phased development would produce, with the objective of meeting both the needs of our customers, to interact with your company how they want to do business, and the needs of your company, to grow while increasing profitability. Ensure the vision aligns company goals and what customers are asking for – and even more, what customers are not asking for but would be delighted to be offered from your company. 

Think big, don’t allow yourself to be limited within your vision.

· Document Development Goals: What will success look like once you reach your vision? Determine how you will know once you’ve arrived at success with key performance indicators. 

· Create Strategies: Determine how you want to strategically tackle your goals. You may determine that quick wins, based on customer insights should come first. Or may determine that you want to first build a strong foundation. Each company’s strategy will be unique and needs to ladder up to the ultimate vision. 

· Map Steps: Create a high-level list of the steps needed to move your company from where you are today to where you want to be—to achieve the vision, goals and strategies.

· Define Tactics & Pricing: Once you have your strategy and steps in place, document potential roadblocks, gain high-level ballpark pricing and resource estimates. 

· Establish Phases: Development projects take time and resources. To ensure a successful implementation, divide the development into manageable phases. Pacing and spacing the development into phases will provide for smaller investments and on-going checkpoints for financial and success tracking.

The roadmap you develop will be a guide. It should not be fully set in stone. The world changes and evolves, business conditions change and evolve, and customer expectations change and evolve. To that end, the technology roadmap you develop will function as your technology blueprint, but it needs to be flexible enough to allow for changes and evolutions that still ladder up to the vision. 

If you need help casting the vision or in creating a technology roadmap, Williams Brand Consulting can help. Contact us to learn more about Technology Roadmap creation and how a strategic roadmap can strengthen the future of your business while meeting the needs of your customers online and offline.