Though new, digital adoption solutions – also known as digital adoption platforms (DAPs) – are skyrocketing in popularity.

As we will discover, there are good reasons for this:

• Digital adoption solutions completely change the employee training landscape, delivering better results in less time
• With the right digital adoption strategy, organizations can cut technical support budgets, shrink training timelines, and boost employee productivity metrics
• Organizations can avoid becoming mired in a mire of “endless training” that delivers mediocre results

To start off, though, let’s look at what a DAS is and does.

According to Gartner, The Digital Adoption Solution (DAS) Is an Innovative, Effective Employee Training Solution

A digital adoption solution (DAS), according to the well-known research firm Gartner, is an employee training platform that leverages cutting edge technology to:

• Improve employee productivity
• Save time and money

In their research, they focused specifically on sales teams and sales tools, such as CRM platforms.

However, CRM platforms are just the beginning.

A digital adoption solutions, as we will soon see, can be used to train employees on a wide variety of other tools, above and beyond sales software.

Later, we will examine several use cases in detail.

But first, let’s explore exactly how these training solutions work.

Top Features of the DAS

Digital adoption solutions revolutionize the way organizations train their employees through a few key features.

These include:

• In-app training. A DAS layers itself atop the target software, giving trainers the ability to teach employees directly inside the application. This allows users to immediately apply what they are learning, which improves their knowledge retention and accelerates productivity.
• Interactive walkthroughs. The digital adoption platform can walk users through a series of tasks, one step at a time. This allows even brand-new users to learn complex tasks and become productive from their very first day on the job.
• Task automation. Certain digital adoption solutions, such as WalkMe’s digital adoption platform, can perform repetitive tasks automatically, with zero human intervention. This can free up employees’ time, while also greatly increasing productivity.
• Software analytics. Software analytics monitor how users engage with a tool. This can help trainers better understand sticking points, training needs, and it can also help them prevent errors.

These features combine to create a training platform that dramatically outperforms other training methods.

Advantages of the DAS Over Existing Training Approaches

Most training solutions suffer from some deficit that prevents them from delivering real results in an enterprise environment.

For instance, in-person training is personalized and interactive, but it cannot be scaled cost-effectively.

Other training approaches, such as online teaching via learning management systems, can scale – yet they are not interactive and cannot offer immediate feedback to users.

In each case, business results suffer.

In-person training is simply too expensive.

And online teaching solutions do not offer enough flexibility, immediacy, or personalization for the modern organization.

Digital adoption solutions, however, can.

These platforms offer many advantages when it comes to employee learning, such as:

• Interactivity. In-product training is interactive, and interactivity improves the employee experience, keeping them engaged, interested, and productive.
• Context-based learning. A major problem with most training is the forgetting curve. That is, the more time between learning something and applying it, the more likely people are to forget what they have studied. Digital adoption solutions beat this problem by teaching directly at the moment of need.
• Personalization. One-to-many teaching is necessarily generalized. After all, the more people that are learning a topic, the broader the curriculum must be in order to meet those learners’ needs. Unfortunately, this approach sacrifices relevance. Digital adoption solutions, however, deliver exactly the right information at exactly the right time, reducing waste and keeping information relevant and personalized.
• Scalability. Many training approaches cannot be scaled cost-effectively. On-demand learning content, for instance, requires continual updating and production costs can be prohibitive. Digital adoption solutions, however, require the same infrastructure, regardless of the organization’s size.

There are certainly other benefits – a DAS can reduce technical support costs, accelerate employee productivity, decrease frustration, and so forth.

For more information on why these solutions outperform other training approaches, consider reading other blog articles that cover digital adoption solutions.

Use Cases

Here are just a few of the many ways that an organization can use a DAS to improve its workforce’s performance:

• Employee training. Employee training is one of the most fundamental ways that a DAS can add value to the organization’s bottom line. It can complement, supplement, or even replace many in-house training methods, greatly increasing the outcomes of existing training efforts.
• Employee productivity. In many cases, training efforts deliver sub-par results, which can cause employee proficiency levels to stagnate. Organizations can turn to digital adoption solutions in order to improve productivity levels. 
• Increasing software utilization. If employees only use a software application sporadically – or if they only use some of its features – then the organization will only realize part of the value of its software investment. 

These are some of the ways that an enterprise can use a DAS to increase its workforce’s performance.

For more information on digital adoption, digital adoption solutions, as well as digital transformation and the digital workplace, visit our digital adoption blog.

The post How a Digital Adoption Solution (DAS) Can Transform Employee Training appeared first on Digital Adoption.

Short on time? Read our digital adoption platform comparison guide.

Training staff to use new software manually would be inefficient and resource-heavy. Luckily there is an accessible, low-cost answer allowing staff to learn while working; a digital adoption solution (DAS).

But what exactly are they, and what makes digital adoption solutions important? How do you identify the right one for your staff and organization? And what is a digital adoption platform (DAP)? We can discover the answer to all these queries in depth by looking at DASs.

What is Digital Adoption?

Digital adoption integrates new technology into business processes to augment existing or enable new ones. This process involves technology adoption by planning what is needed, researching the right software or other technology, and purchasing it via license for multiple users.

Another issue arises when the technology arrives on the individual staff systems: user adoption. It takes time to learn how to understand and use new software, so any way to make the process more user-friendly saves vast amounts of resources. This stage is where digital adoption solutions come in, allowing multiple applications to be used, guided, and explained on one digital adoption platform, lowering support costs.

Digital Adoption Platforms Vs. Digital Adoption Solutions

The difference between a digital adoption platform and a digital adoption solution comes from preference. Gartner names them digital adoption platforms, while WalkMe and many other organizations refer to them as digital adoption solutions. Both mean the same thing. So let’s get into the details of precisely what a DAS is.

What Is A Digital Adoption Solution?

To define digital adoption solutions, we must first consider the issues they resolve. Today, technology adoption is at the forefront of any organization’s priorities, meaning that staff can feel constantly inundated with the responsibility to learn new software adoption solutions.

Organizations cannot afford to avoid this process, so a solution needs to be devised to support staff deal with these technological changes. But why is there such a need for digital adoption, digital transformation, and the resulting DASs?

Background To Digital Adoption Solutions

There are three key concepts to consider when we think about DASs: digital transformation, digital adoption, and finally, DASs. Digital transformation comes first as this is the need for change, leveraging new technology for market resilience. Secondly, digital adoption represents the act of staff adopting the technology provided as a result of an organization’s digital transformation. DASs are third as they streamline the adoption process to give a smooth and effective transformation.

When Are Digital Adoption Solutions Needed?

The three concepts described above help organizations remain resilient against many other factors. We have split these factors into categories of need for change which all feed into the requirement for DASs:-

Crises – DASs are at the heart of supporting staff dealing with the new technology involved in reacting positively and innovatively to crises such as pandemics. Crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic showed the world which companies can thrive in a crisis and which fall flat. The companies which thrived could change in a methodical, cost-friendly way where needed.

Pressure – Organizations are successful when they have a proactive attitude toward internal and external pressures. Negative PR is one example of external pressure. When the taxi company Uber attracted negative media attention, it tailored its response accordingly, remaining resilient to media pressure. DASs can support staff to alter their use of software when pressures mean organizations have to change.

New technology – Technology is at the heart of every aspect of business today, and user onboarding is a large part of this. Researching and investing in current technologies, such as AI, cloud transformation, and machine learning, is essential for any organization to remain sustainable. 

These technologies are useless if staff cannot use them, so investment in and updated research into the latest DASs is also essential to optimize new technology. Snapchat is an example of a technologically basic app that saw that smartphone camera technology would increase over time, increasing its daily users from 32 million in 2014 to over ten times that figure in 2022.

Mergers and acquisitions – Staff often become anxious during mergers and acquisitions because they are not always successful due to the other three factors leading to collapse. Disney and Pixar held their own vastly different cultures, but strong leadership made their merger successful. AOL and Time Warner split after problems such as under-performance led to losses caused by the merger.

DASs can unify teams during mergers and acquisitions, as all new or existing staff use the same DAS software to navigate the different software they use.

Digital adoption creates the backdrop for why organizations need DASs, so let’s look at this concept in more detail.

Are Companies Spending Enough to Train Their Employees Digitally?

A yearly investment survey conducted by the European Investment Bank across Europe reveals that while firms have increased their investments into new digital products, their expenditure on training employees to use that software has decreased. The survey covers 13,500 firms and has been administered since 2016. 

This survey reveals a troubling trend in many European businesses: while they are investing more heavily in creating new digital products, they are emphasizing less on training their employees to use that technology. Over the past few years, we have seen a steady increase in investments in digital products like software, apps, and websites. However, at the same time, many firms have been decreasing their spending on training employees to use these new tools effectively.

This is concerning for several reasons. It suggests that businesses are not making the most of their investment in digital technology, as they cannot fully utilize these products’ capabilities. It also suggests that they are putting short-term considerations ahead of long-term growth, as they neglect to invest in their employees’ skills development.

If we want European businesses to thrive in the increasingly competitive digital economy, we must find a way to encourage them to invest more in employee training. This could involve providing incentives or subsidies for firms that prioritize skills development or establishing partnerships between businesses and educational institutions to increase access to quality training programs.

According to the survey, the share of firms that introduced new products and processes to their companies increased to 26-27% in 2019-20 from 22% earlier. The percentage of firms that innovated in their products, processes, and services improved from 32-34% to 35-41% post-2019.

However, the share of investment in the training of employees declined from 10.4% to 9.4-9.6% in the corresponding period. At the same time, spending on software data and IT networks increased from 12-13% to over 15%.

So, despite significant improvement in the number of firms that invested in digital products and innovation, the companies in the European Union reduced their share in employee training. This highlights the importance of Digital Adoption Solutions, which provide an accessible, low-cost way to train the staff and equip them for the changing needs.

How Do You Measure The Success Of A Digital Adoption Solution?

Digital adoption can save a company when achieved successfully or break a company if conducted inefficiently. Inefficiency is what digital adoption solutions seek to resolve but can also create massive frustration when carried out ineffectively, leading to far more waste. So how do we make sure DASs solve more problems than they create?

Establish goals

• Before embarking on your digital transformation journey, write down the goals you need the adoption solution to achieve.
• What do you need to achieve by the end of the digital adoption solution strategy?
• Having a clear destination allows for a smooth DAS journey.

Define KPIs

• What journey will this KPI take us on to achieve our overall goals? 
• Zooming in on a few metrics that align with your goals can help you maintain focus on success.
• With each KPI, always note down a reason.

User analytics

• You need the right tools for the job; in this case, you need to ask yourself and your team what data we will analyze to ensure we have achieved our KPIs.
• Will data be experience-based or number-based?
• How often do we need to check analytics?
• A detailed plan is needed of not just how to generate the data but how to analyze it for optimal outcomes.

Forming a plan is essential to getting the most out of any DAS. Without planning, any DAS will result in frustration, wasted resources, and, in worst cases, significant structural weaknesses for your organization.

10 Benefits of Digital Adoption Solutions

There are several benefits to using a DAS. Here are the ten most important DAS advantages:-

1. Automate training solutions – Staff can use in-app guidance to automatically acquire information when needed. Salesforce users can achieve complex workflows by following a series of instructions on a DAS for automated tasks.
2. Improve the user experience – Digital adoption solutions offer guidance to simplify the experience of using complex software without the need for human intervention. Users maintain their focus on tasks while improving employee engagement levels due to the decreased frustration of learning to use new tools. DASs reduce user onboarding time for both customers and staff.
3. Decrease technical support costs – Technical support calls can increase costs, both financial costs to the organization and the cost to the end users. Reducing technical support calls allows users to become more productive and autonomous, boosting engagement, confidence, and motivation.
4. Accelerate onboarding, training, and adoption programs – Faster time-to-competency translates into shorter time-to-ROI. With digital adoption solutions’ in-app guidance, they learn software more quickly, helping organizations reap the rewards of their investment in less time. Staff can achieve the customer onboarding process quicker, improving customer experience. User engagement can boost productivity by engaging with ongoing training goals.
5. Improve employee productivity and motivation – Overall proficiency levels go up, which then boosts productivity levels. Organizations can prevent employee skill levels from stagnating by using digital adoption solutions to promote specific software features. 
6. Increase software utilization – The more capabilities that workers use, the more value is delivered. Full software adoption means maximum effectiveness and efficiency from its use. DAS allows better software implementation improving user adoption rates.
7. Improve the bottom-line ROI of a software platform – Ultimately, digital adoption solutions help businesses extract more value from their software investments and workforce.
8. Knowledge retention – Knowledge is the information specific to a company and the experience of staff, both of which are costly to generate over long periods. DASs increase software adoption and improve experience management for staff, making frustration decline and satisfaction increase. Using a DAS can improve staff retention and avoid lost company knowledge and experience complications.  Staff continues working for a company where they understand and see value in their software.
9. Improve sales enablement – DAS offers significant benefits to sales enablement when sales teams can utilize software tools to the optimal level. DAS can speed up employee performance, resulting in more inbound and outbound leads, improving company profits
10. Optimize customer retention – Customers are more likely to return when they understand a company’s products through excellent DAS implementation.

We can view DAS as the lubrication needed to get the wheels of digital adoption moving toward the destination of digital transformation. Once you see the above features in the features list for a DAS, you will know it will be an effective tool for your organization.

How Are Digital Adoption Solutions Essential For In-app Training Solutions?

Whenever you install a new app, do you notice the information balloons that pop up the first time you use it? These balloons are part of a built-in digital adoption solution for mobile app users, as it is part of the app that shows you how to use it, giving you the most consistent user experience.

For most apps, these balloons only pop up on the first use of specific features. For customer success to translate into company success, an organization needs to transform customers from regular users into power users or advocates. However, product adoption will not occur if customers cannot use a product or service and in-app training is the perfect product adoption solution to achieving customer retention.

Think of it this way. The customer onboarding process is where you add them to a list. But the in-app training is where you take time to get to know them and form a professional relationship, so they understand what your organization offers and what they will get from the relationship. This stage is where organization establishes loyalty between themselves and the customer, achieving customer retention.

Advocate users invest personally in the organization via the app they use to access services or products. Advocates use word of mouth, social media, and positive online reviews to encourage others to convert to their favorite company or service, providing free marketing for organizations. This stage is where in-app training is critical, as it’s an app’s deeper secondary or tertiary functions that turn users into advocates.

Employee onboarding is just as important as customer onboarding, as everyone goes through the process of being convinced that a product or service is valuable. Employees know they have to register for new software adoption. But the a-ha moment will come when they see what a new piece of software is capable of when they learn the deeper features at their own pace.

Organizations can go one step further and have software tailor-made for either staff, customers, or both for any new app. A custom DAS allows detailed, in-depth instructions on how to use the app to increase user efficiency. In turn, in-app training solutions using DAS allow staff and customer success to improve when accessing the services of an organization.

What Are The Best Digital Adoption Solutions For Your Organization?

You have established that it’s essential to invest in a DAS. But which are the best digital adoption solutions for the money and the benefit of your organization? Ask yourself several questions before investing in DAS SaaS or enterprise software.

• For whom is the DAS intended, customer or staff?
• What kind of organization are we?
• What do we want to achieve with the DAS?
• On what type of platform is the DAS likely to be used?

Answering these questions will allow a CEO to decide which DAS is best for their organization. There are several DASs, so ensuring that investment is optimized with the best digital adoption solutions available is important.

Features of an effective digital adoption solution

Despite Gartner only recently recognizing the digital adoption solutions category, the tools have been developing since WalkMe pioneered the first DAP nearly a decade ago.

While there are now many providers of digital adoption solutions, as listed by Gartner, enterprises should take great care in selecting a tool to meet their needs. 

Here are three features your digital adoption solution should include:

1. Intuitive guidance and engagement, powered by machine learning

First and foremost, when you ask yourself, “what is a digital adoption solution,” the answer should be a digital trainer. Your digital adoption solution should simplify online processes by providing step-by-step in-app guidance. 

Your digital adoption solution should guide users through any process, just like a GPS. Users will immediately be able to complete complex tasks without any traditional training whatsoever. They follow the series of interactive guidance balloons. It eliminates the need for additional training in response to system updates or new features.

Digital adoption solutions are the next evolution in training methods, which deliver poor ROI due to the Ebbinghaus forgetting curve.

Your digital adoption solution should use advanced AI and contextual awareness to engage with users at the right time. 

Instead of a user needing to search for help, they are proactively engaged with relevant content based on their location, time, system, predicted behavior, and even based on their interaction with the software.

Another great feature is being able to notify users of relevant news or changes within the application; you can even have messages appear on their computer desktop.

2. Insights Beyond Analytics

What is a digital adoption solution? Well, a great one is a data analyst. A digital adoption solution should help you understand how to drive transformational change by providing powerful adoption insights, not just user analytics.

Senior staff can track every user’s behavior with the flick of a switch. This feature allows them to monitor the adoption of crucial processes over time. You’ll be able to find out where users struggle, what features are underutilized, and where inefficiencies exist.

Powerful AI helps you to discover behaviors that lead to mistakes and wasted time. The leading digital adoption solutions even allow you to watch real user session videos.

3. Advanced Automation And AI Assistance

And finally, what is a digital adoption solution? It’s a robotic assistant. 

Robotic Process Automation, or RPA, is when an automated process operates systems instead of humans. This process is a powerful way of managing a digital adoption solution because it saves resources and allows staff members to learn a system by using it for business processes, increasing output.

Attended RPA is essentially a robot that learns from the user’s actions and can suggest the following steps based on those actions to the user. Your digital adoption solution should simplify the user experience and boost productivity by eliminating tedious and complex tasks for both the front-end employee and the back-office. 

How Automation And AI work

Your digital adoption solution’s insights should discover process inefficiencies; you click record and capture those processes from end-to-end, and there is an automated process in minutes. Imagine a world where employees no longer have to grapple with tedious admin tasks. No more flawed data entry and everyone can use their digital tools confidently and effectively — this is all possible with the right digital adoption solution.

What Is The Future of Digital Adoption Solutions?

The core of digital adoption is to be agile and for organizations to use technology to evolve and adapt to changing consumer needs. So what does the future hold for digital adoption solutions?

Omnichannel Solutions: The 2030 Vision

Since the Covid-19 pandemic, digital adoption of consumers increased steeply in the online retail market as they perceived significant health and safety benefits to shopping online. However, when the pandemic eased, consumers did not return to shops in the same numbers as before the pandemic.

McKinsey suggests that a 2030 vision of an omnichannel approach is best to optimize the experience management for maximum customer success in physical retail outlets. McKinsey user analytics showed that 30-40% of cosmetics in Asia are purchased online, with such statistics helping to understand user behavior further.

The suggestion is that organizations engage in omnichannel solutions by combining physical and technology adoption, such as social media integrated within stores and fewer stores of larger size, with flagship stores being a more common sight.

Sephora is one of the frontrunners for omnichannel experiences, with a beauty app that can not only show what products are in stock online and in physical stores but shows using the smartphone camera what a product would look like on the user. By doing this, Sephora personalizes the experience for the user.

Omnichannel solutions will involve using new technology adoption solutions for staff in organizations requiring new features of DAPs to assist staff in understanding these new technologies.

Why Choose A Digital Adoption Solution?

The question is less about why to choose digital adoption solutions and more about not utilizing them. The need for digital adoption has been developing over several decades in different forms and is now more crucial than ever. Technology adoption is a massive part of an organization’s ability to be agile, competitive, and sustainable, and digital adoption solutions form the core of this concept.

Staff needs to understand and use new technology quickly, and DAPs are a perfect solution to this challenge. DAPs cut to the heart of digital adoption, offering a seamless way for staff to adopt digital solutions without thinking about it. DAPs allow staff members to use multiple applications within one piece of software to guide them on the best ways to optimize their experience and output.

The result of DAPs is that companies continue to increase revenue through technology adoption in a constantly evolving and efficient manner. This reason embodies why digital adoption solutions such as DAPs are essential in today’s rapidly changing market.

The post Digital Adoption Solutions: What They Are And How To Choose One (2022) appeared first on Digital Adoption.

In this article, we’ll look at these concepts in detail, including:

• The difference between these three ideas
• How they are related
• Why they are so important for businesses to understand

First, however, we should have working definitions for each term.

Digital Transformation vs. Change Management vs. Digital Adoption

These terms are related, but certainly different.

Here are some concise definitions of each:

• Digital Transformation – The organizational changes and transformations resulting from digital disruption and transformation. These changes include the adoption of new tools, cultural change, changes to business processes, and more.
• Change Management – The management discipline focuses on managing and implementing organizational changes. This discipline tends to focus driving organizational change by motivating, training, and mobilizing employees.
• Digital Adoption – Organizations that integrate new digital tools into their business environment. True digital adoption is focused not just on software deployment, but on maximizing the value of that software.

Today, many businesses are undergoing all three processes.

Understanding how they work together is essential for businesses that want to earn the most from their digital investments.

Digital Transformation in Detail

Digital transformation is part of today’s digital revolution.

The digital revolution is fueling transformation that deeply affects businesses, the way we work, and our daily lives.

For businesses, this means that they must adapt and transform in order to stay competitive.

Digital transformations can impact:

• The technology used in a business.
• The workforce.
• Business processes and operations.
• The organizational culture.

Among other areas.

Common aims of digital transformation include:

• Increasing business efficiency.
• Exploiting growth opportunities.
• Enhancing customer value.
• Improving business strategy.
• Increasing employee productivity.

In short, digital transformation refers to organizational changes that help companies leverage technology to adapt, stay modern, and stay profitable.

Digital Adoption in Detail

The aim when adopting new technology should be to maximize the value of that investment – not merely install it.

Unless employees are proficient and engaged, they won’t be productive.

This is how digital adoption differs from other terms, such as technology adoption.

Digital adoption aims at:

• Using technology to its fullest extent. Software is only profitable if it is used. When adopting new software, organizations should focus on improving employee proficiency, productivity, and engagement.
• Streamlining the digital workflow. The better an organization can integrate tools into the workplace, the more efficient the workplace will be. A streamlined digital workflow improves productivity, efficiency, as well as the overall workplace experience.
• Maximizing the returns and value of a software platform. With the right adoption approach, employees can become more skilled and more productive. This results in higher returns on the investment in a software platform.

Ultimately, digital adoption is aimed at improving and enhancing the profitability of digital tools.

Digital adoption platforms (DAPs), for instance, are solutions that help streamline the adoption process through improved onboarding and training.

Why Change Management Is So Important

Change management is a profession designed to implement, organize, and optimize organizational change programs.

Today, when digital transformation is the norm, change management has become important.

Effective change management can:

• Coordinate, manage, and streamline change projects. Organizational change projects such as digital transformation must be managed effectively. Change management is tasked with coordinating all involved parties, overseeing change projects, and ensuring they meet their objectives.
• Improve the results of digital transformation and adoption efforts. Digital transformation and other organizational change projects can be difficult for anyone involved. Change managers help streamline the process, improving project outcomes, and getting better results from digital transformation efforts.
• Overcome obstacles. Change managers also address and mitigate obstacles to organizational changes. These obstacles can range from employee resistance to budget constraints to technical barriers. 

To name just a few benefits.

As mentioned, change management is a discipline that drives change from the individual level.

Namely, change managers focus on areas such as:

• Earning employee trust and support. Employee resistance is a common obstacle to change. Change management specifically focuses on engaging employees and earning their support – a necessary step to fueling successful transformation.
• Minimizing employee resistance and friction. Fear and mistrust are common emotions that cause employees to resist change. Change managers employ a variety of tactics, such as effective communication and employee training, to minimize that resistance and boost productivity.
• Providing employees with the training and skills they need to succeed. With digital adoption and transformation, training is a must. The right training solution (such as digital adoption platforms) can streamline change, reduce time-to-competency, and improve employee performance.

Ultimately, the right change management approach can mean the difference between success and failure.

Final Thoughts

Digital transformation vs. change management vs. digital adoption … clearly they are different concepts.

However, as we have seen, they are all closely related.

And for businesses that want to stay modern, relevant, and competitive, they are all important.

Digital transformation refers to changes aimed at improving efficiency, profitability, and business value by leveraging new technology.

Digital adoption and change management – which both focus on maximizing the value of such changes – are crucial to the success of any digital transformation efforts.

The post Digital Transformation vs. Change Management vs. Digital Adoption appeared first on Digital Adoption.

However, you’d be surprised how many enterprises still rely on one-size-fits-all marketing and customer care approaches.

In today’s digital world, accurate and specific customer segments are more important than ever. In a world filled with so much noise, it’s easy for the customer to feel like just another number.

In this article, we’re going to take a look at the connection between segmentation and impeccable customer care. We’ll also share two ways you can use AI to take your customer segmentation to the next level.

Why customer segments are key to customer care

“Market segmentation creates subsets of a market based on demographics, needs, priorities, common interests, and other psychographic or behavioral criteria used to better understand the target audience.”

Qualtrics

In other words, customer segments are groups of customers that share commonalities. Segmenting based on these similarities helps you to understand your customers better — which helps you to serve them better. 

The customer experience has never been more important. It’s well reported that bad emotive customer experiences are causing customers to churn, costing brands billions.

This emotional connection, or personalised experience, that customers crave in exchange for their loyalty has become paramount.

So, as an enterprise, the better you’re able to segment your customers, the more able you’ll be to give them the personalised and positive connection they’re seeking.

Customer segments are key to customer satisfaction and retention.

2 ways to nurture your customer segments with AI

1. Marketing automation tools

Marketing automation tools have developed considerably in recent years. It’s possible to create multiple customer segments according to their preferences and therefore deliver only the marketing that’s relevant to them. 

Marketing Automation for Dummies lists a few basic types of customer segmentation:

• High-level segmentation on engagement: For example, if you want to keep a list of everyone who’s ever attended a specific webinar, a semi-dynamic list is a good choice because your follow-up marketing probably doesn’t depend on whether those people attend another webinar in the future.
• Segmenting on product interest: A list of people who have shown interest in a specific product segment is a good example of a list that does not need the capability to remove people from it.
• Keeping up with lead stages: Many companies break down their marketing cycle into stages. Fully dynamic lists segmented by the marketing cycle stage are always up-to-date with a clear picture of your lead funnel.
• Segmenting for personal touches: Segmentation can be very useful when trying to find your most influential and most vocal fans. Setting up segmentations to find them and keep them together makes identifying people for case studies and testimonials very easy. When looking to set up a segmentation for vocal prospects, consider looking at lead score, social engagement metrics, and overall activity as key identifiers.

Most marketing automation tools today use AI to process customer data at lightning speed and automatically categorize customers based on that data. 

Your marketing team is probably already using these tools. But have they heard of our next AI-based customer segmentation technology? 

2. Digital Adoption Solutions (DAS)

The evolution of Digital Adoption Solutions (DAS) now allows enterprises to engage and nurture different customer segments according to their behavior when using digital tools and platforms. 

A Digital Adoption Solution provides one of the most useful applications of customer segmentation for your organization. Not only does it track customers effective use of your website or whatever digital system you apply it to, it also automatically engages with your customers based on their behavior.

Let’s look at an example. Let’s say you’re a bank and you launch a new app. It’s a sophisticated piece of software that allows customers to achieve new heights with their banking — they can now do things they never could before. It’s groundbreaking.  

The DAS will segment customers based on their workflows. It can anticipate their mistakes and provide solutions. It can recognize if they’re disengaged and likely to churn — and it can provide exactly the information needed to keep this particular customer segment on board.

Your website or app is likely the central point for your customer experience, so it should be welcoming, engaging, and easy to navigate. It should make customers want to keep finding out more. 

Whether customers are browsing and unclear of their goal, or if they know exactly what they are looking for, the DAS is able to satisfy their customer intentions.

Final words of advice

Customer segmentation might be basic marketing, but that doesn’t mean you should still be using basic tools to get the most out of your customer segments. 

Yes, today’s customers crave emotional connection. And AI can actually help you to achieve this due to its capacity to process and understand high volumes of customer data. 

Technology can help each and every one of your customers to feel like a valued human being.

This is the secret to great customer care and retention, so it’s technology worth exploring. 

The post Customer Segments: How AI Is Enabling You To Get Up Close & Personal With Buyers appeared first on Digital Adoption.

But there are several DAS providers in the marketplace. How do you choose? 

This Digital Adoption Solutions checklist includes 7 critical features you should look out for. These are the things that will take your digital adoption strategy to the next level and ensure you achieve your goals. 

Advanced Digital Adoption Solutions

But first, let’s briefly cover where these Digital Adoption Solutions have come from and how they’re used to great effect by enterprises.

It was only recently that Gartner recognized Digital Adoption Solutions as an important technology category. However, the solutions themselves have existed for a while now. 

WalkMe was the first DAS provider. Their Digital Adoption Platform (DAP) was launched in 2011. 

WalkMe pioneered the DAP technology, and digital adoption as a necessary component of digital transformation. In many ways, they are the reason the category of DAS exists today. 

Because of this, a complete Digital Adoption Solutions checklist should be based on WalkMe’s platform.

How to use Digital Adoption Solutions

WalkMe explains what Digital Adoption Solutions are:

“The Digital Adoption Solution is an emerging technological category that is focused on improving the adoption of multiple tools across an entire organization, helping organizations get the most out of their application portfolios with a digital adoption platform. 

Users are guided through business processes across multiple solutions, enabling a clear path toward task completion, reducing both time and costs of training.”

From this explanation, we can identify a few different applications for DAS.

1. Employee training 

As more and more digital tools enter the corporate world, employee training has become more important — and more challenging — than ever.

Every time a new feature or update is launched, training has to happen all over again. Traditional training methods can’t keep up with the pace, they’re expensive and ineffective.

DAS eliminate this conundrum by delivering in-app training. The Digital Adoption Platform acts as a guide to each employee, so every task is performed with assistance. And when a new feature or update rolls out, the DAS adapts and communicates the changes to users. 

2. Customer training 

Similarly, as more digital products and services are offered by businesses, the more important it becomes to provide effective customer training and/or onboarding.

Customer training is a necessary evil. A laborious and expensive process, the quicker customers can get up to speed using a business’ digital tools or systems, the better it is for:

• Customer care and loyalty, because customers will see results quicker.
• The provider’s bottom line, because training is such a huge cost center.

3. Digital transformation

Digital Adoption Solutions are an essential part of an organization’s digital transformation strategy.

Only through rapid and effective digital adoption can enterprises hope to succeed at digital transformation and remain competitive in the digital world. 

Digital Adoption Solutions Checklist

1. Churn Management

First point on the Digital Adoption Solutions checklist is churn management. A good adoption platform should be able to recognize the first signs of impending churn and respond to them with appropriate engagement.

2. Audience Segmentation

One size most certainly does not fit all, and different people are going to use digital tools in different ways. So if your DAS doesn’t have audience segmentation, it’s pretty much redundant.

3. User Onboarding

Onboarding is the most critical time during a digital tool’s lifecycle. If users aren’t onboarded effectively in the beginning, they’re more likely to churn and never return. 

Core aspects of successful onboarding are understanding the benefits of a given tool, and how to use it to achieve that user’s goals. This is something your DAS should be able to do. 

4. Free Trial

Of course, you’re going to want to try before you buy! Most good DAS offer a free trial, so look out for this.

5. Mobile Deployment

The mobile revolution continues at pace. More and more enterprises are seeking mobile solutions for business processes, so your DAS needs mobile deployment in order to be useful in mobile contexts.

6. Analytics

One of the most important features in any Digital Adoption Solutions checklist is analytics. 

But you don’t just want data, you want insights. A great DAS should be able to interpret and learn from user behavior data to make the individual user experience even better.

7. Task Automation

Automation has come a long way and can now be used to great effect in day-to-day business processes. 

Your DAS should be able to automatically complete certain tasks for users. This dramatically speeds up business processes and makes users more productive. 

As a bare minimum, this Digital Adoption Solutions checklist should ensure your search for providers comes up trumps. Good luck with the search! 

The post Digital Adoption Solutions Checklist: 7 Essential Features To Look For appeared first on Digital Adoption.

We will learn:

• What they are
• Why they are becoming so popular
• Their benefits and drawbacks
• How they are used

And much more.

Let’s dive right in…

Digital Adoption Solutions FAQ

Here are some of the top questions asked about digital adoption solutions.

We’ll start with the most basic question:

What are digital adoption solutions?

A digital adoption solution (DAS) is another term for a digital adoption platform (DAP).

This term was coined (or at least popularized) by Gartner. 

In their report on the topic, they identified these platforms as important tools for improving sales productivity.

According to Gartner, digital adoption solutions:

• Improve productivity and adoption
• Save time and money
• Enhance the user experience through analytics 

Among other things. 

Digital adoption platforms, such as WalkMe, do a few things:

• Offer in-app guidance and tutorials to new software users
• Analyze user behavior and engagement
• Automate repetitive tasks

These platforms are already being used by some of the world’s largest companies, from Amazon to PayPal.

What are their benefits?

Benefits of digital adoption solutions include:

• Streamlined user onboarding, customer onboarding, or employee onboarding
• Decreased learning curves for new software programs
• Greater user productivity and engagement
• Decreased technical support calls
• Lower costs for software implementation

To name just a few.

How are they used?

There are a wide number of use cases for these platforms, including:

• Digital transformation. Businesses that are digitizing their business processes, company culture, workflows, and tools.
• Employee training and productivity. Automated employee training that occurs inside software, helping to simplify workflows and technology stacks.
• Customer care. Online self-service that reduces the need for technical support calls, cutting support costs and improving the customer experience.
• Software implementation. Rolling out new software within a business, helping to ease the transition and improve time-to-competency for employees.
• Customer or employee onboarding. Automate and speed up onboarding communications and initial training.

To name just a few.

Who should use them?

Any business that can find value in the solutions mentioned above can generate ROI from a digital adoption platform.

Here are some examples of companies that could consider using these solutions:

• Businesses undergoing digital transformation
• Companies that need to improve their digital skills training 
• Those who want to improve customer onboarding ROI, through decreased costs and improved user experiences
• Organizations that want to improve customer growth rates across the entire customer life cycle, from conversion to retention to expansion

To name just a few.

When should organizations use digital adoption solutions?

A digital adoption solution can be used at any stage of an organization’s growth.

As mentioned, their training and automation features assist with the entire user life cycle:

• Onboarding
• Training
• Feature adoption
• Retention
• Expansion

And, because these solutions can automate tasks, they also benefit organizations look for process automation.

What are the drawbacks?

As with any business investment, there is a risk-reward balance.

Potential concerns include:

• Not fully utilizing the solution – in other words, not maximizing potential returns from the investment
• Investing in the solution when it’s not really needed
• Failing to manage the platform once it’s installed – they can provide massive returns, but they are not “set-and-forget” solutions – they must be actively utilized to gain benefits

If an organization has a real problem that these platforms can solve, then there is no reason why the ROI would be excellent.

What are some best practices?

As mentioned, digital adoption solutions must actually be used in order to benefit from them.

Here are some top techniques and best practices:

• Develop a dedicated digital adoption function – dedicate time and resources to digital adoption efforts, technology adoption, and software implementation
• Assign a digital adoption manager – this person is responsible for working with digital adoption solutions, overseeing new software implementations, and managing digital adoption projects
• Treat digital adoption like any other project – assign goals, set objectives, use metrics, and perform regular evaluations of your progress
• Be proactive – a passive stance towards digital adoption will, as mentioned, produce lackluster results, so it pays to be aggressive

Correct usage of a digital adoption platform is essential to maximizing results.

Where can I find more information?

There are a few places to look:

• Our own digital adoption blog
• The aforementioned Gartner report, linked above
• The websites for major digital adoption platforms, such as WalkMe

It is also important to remember that the digital landscape is constantly changing.

And, as a result, there may be some confusion over terminology.

Major business publications, for instance, may use the following terms interchangeably:

• Software implementation
• Technology adoption
• Employee adoption
• Digital adoption

So you may be able to find some more information about digital adoption on other sites – that use different terms.

To find out our perspective, you view our list of digital adoption terminology.

The post Digital Adoption Solutions FAQ appeared first on Digital Adoption.

Namely, we’ll cover:

• What digital adoption is
• Why it’s a critical step in the digital transformation process
• What digital adoption solutions are
• Why digital adoption solutions are becoming more and more popular

To begin with, let’s look at digital adoption and digital transformation.

Digital Adoption Solutions 101: From Transformation to Adoption

Digital transformation is a common term being circulated today, across every industry and in every work environment.

At every level of the organization, we can already see the impact of digital transformation:

• Businesses are using technology to innovate, propel change, and fuel growth
• Job roles are shifting, requiring upskilling, reskilling, and training
• Workers are changing their attitude to work, embracing the idea of continual learning and career development
• New business models are emerging that are more efficient and cost-effective 
• Organizations are becoming more open to technology and digital change

Every business is undergoing digital transformation, whether they know it or not.

New technology, from email to mobile phones, play a role in every business. 

The more a company can make use of that technology, the more successful it will be.

In the digital age, after all, “digital” is not an option – it is a prerequisite.

Defining our terms will help us better understand the need for digital adoption solutions:

What is digital transformation?

Digital transformation refers to organizational changes spurred by technology.

More specifically:

• New technology inspires and fuels new innovation
• New innovations – in products, services, business processes, and so on – drive marketplace disruption
• That disruption compels widespread change

In other words, to keep up with disruption, companies must adapt.

Digital transformation is not restricted to technological change, however.

It can encompass:

• Technological innovation
• Cultural changes
• Organizational changes
• New business models
• Digital adoption

This last point is a fundamental step in any digital transformation process.

What is digital adoption?

Many companies think in terms of “technology adoption.”

They adopt, test, and deploy a new tool or technology.

However, there is a distinction between technology adoption and true digital adoption.

Digital adoption involves:

• Adopting and implementing a new tool, platform, or technology stack
• Onboarding and training new users
• Optimizing the technology to ensure maximum usage, productivity, and ROI

Implementing a new technology, in other words, is not enough.

If a business installs a new tool, but users are only partially productive, then ROI falls short.

Those lower metrics, in turn, hurt the organization’s bottom line.

Any digital transformation effort that wants to maximize its software ROI needs to:

• Train its users 
• Proactively manage and maximize productivity
• Continually optimize the user experience and user engagement

In recent years, these tasks have become much easier, thanks to a new category of technology: digital adoption solutions.

What digital adoption solutions are – and why they are so valuable

An article in Computer World described WalkMe as “the most obvious tool in the world.”

The author says that “the idea struck me as so obvious that I’ve been a big fan ever since.”

WalkMe calls itself a digital adoption platform (a DAP for short).

In short, a digital adoption platform:

• Integrates with another application, such as a CRM platform
• Provides step-by-step guidance inside the application, teaching users how to perform tasks only when they need it
• Automates tedious, mundane tasks
• Offers analytics and insight into user behavior, identifying sticking points 

WalkMe’s platform has been implemented by some of the world’s largest brands, from PayPal to Amazon.

This type of platform has become critical in today’s digitally transforming economy.

So much so, in fact, that Gartner even recognized a new technology category: digital adoption solutions.

Digital adoption solutions are becoming a critical component in today’s digital workplace, for a few reasons:

• Businesses implement complex technology stacks, even in roles that aren’t traditionally tech-focused
• Learning these technologies takes time, effort, and energy 
• The effectiveness of training directly impacts user engagement, productivity, and performance

In short, digital skills are a must in the digital workplace.

However, in a world driven by continuous learning, old training methods can’t keep up.

To stay productive and maximize software ROI, many businesses are turning to digital adoption solutions.

In the coming years, Gartner expects digital adoption solutions to expand their market penetration even further.

Conclusion

Installing software – and then not using it – is akin to buying a car and letting it sit in the garage.

And then walking to work.

Instead of saving time and driving, you lose time, fail to recoup your investment, and become less productive.

Meanwhile, those around you (your competitors) are driving to work, being more productive, and keeping up with the modern times.

This analogy captures the essential need for digital adoption and digital adoption solutions.

If you don’t keep up with the technology race, you’ll fall behind those that do.

The post Digital Adoption Solutions 101 appeared first on Digital Adoption.

This category, introduced in a recent Gartner report, describes a new software category dubbed, “Digital Adoption Solutions.”

Digital adoption solutions are the very same digital adoption platforms (DAPs) we have described in detail on this site.

These platforms, pioneered by WalkMe, are software solutions that have become indispensable in today’s digital economy.

Let’s explore what these platforms are, why they matter, and how to get started.

Gartner Introduces a New Digital Adoption Solution

Gartner’s recent report, “Increase Sales Productivity With Digital Adoption Solutions,” introduced this software category.

The report was aimed at helping sales teams:

• Save time and money
• Increase usage and improve the user experience
• Incorporate continuous development for tenured sellers

The conclusion of the report: employers must employ digital adoption solutions to drive productivity.

But what exactly is a digital adoption solution?

The Digital Adoption Solutions Category: A Primer

Digital adoption solutions are platforms that help organizations adopt, integrate, and implement digital technology.

Here is how they work:

• The digital adoption solution acts as a layer on top of target software. This overlay remains invisible to users, which means it can track usage behavior, offer insights, and provide analytics.
• The platform walks user through actions, workflows, and processes. In-app training helps users learn as they go, through interactive tip balloons and step-by-step guidance. Critically, tools such as WalkMe can also follow users as they move between applications. 
• Usage statistics are analyzed, offering insights into growth opportunities. AI can monitor key processes, analyze user behavior, and decrease wasted time. Session replays can offer even more insight, demonstrating exactly how users engage with software.

These tools have become critical in today’s complex workplace.

They solve several problems for employers and employees alike:

• Training – In-app guidance and tutorials teach employees how to perform tasks at exactly the right time. This allows workers to immediately apply what they’ve learned, increasing retention and engagement. 
• Onboarding – New user onboarding, whether they are employees or customers, can improve user retention and decrease abandonment. When applied during onboarding, digital adoption solutions decrease the overall cost of acquisition.
• Automation – Automation is another feature offered by platforms such as WalkMe. By automating mundane tasks, employees can spend time on more valuable activities.

However, when examined in detail, the benefits of these features become more and more apparent.

The Benefits of Digital Adoption Solutions

How do digital adoption solutions generate ROI during digital transformation?

Among other things, they:

• Decrease learning curves and time-to-competency. Learning time can be dramatically reduced, because users learn only the most pertinent information – at exactly the right time. 
• Boost productivity. Employees who learn more quickly can achieve their full productivity potential in a shorter time span. 
• Reduce employee frustration. Change can create friction and resistance in employees, whose desks are already overloaded with work. Digital adoption solutions streamline productivity and decrease that friction.
• Cut costs. Shorter learning curves translates into lower overhead for training programs, organizational change projects, and onboarding.
• Create a consistent user experience. WalkMe’s platform creates a unified experience that provides consistency, even when layered across multiple tools and software.

Given these value-added benefits, it’s no surprise that Gartner recognized the necessity of such platforms in the modern organization.

How and When to Apply These Solutions

When should organizations use digital adoption solutions?

Here are some of the most common applications:

• Employee Training – Whether you are training new employees or upskilling existing ones, digital adoption solutions are ideal. They help users focus only on pertinent information, while freeing up your trainers for more important tasks.
• Digital Transformation – Digital transformation often involves digital adoption, software implementation, and organizational change. Digital adoption solutions help you streamline these processes, cut transformation costs, and enhance performance.
• Improving Productivity – Software is only valuable if it is utilized. If employees use only half of its features, then they are generating a fraction of its potential ROI. Digital adoption solutions help users get more out of the target software, improving output, productivity, and ROI.
• User Onboarding – For app users, customers, and employees, onboarding is a critical process. By streamlining the initial introduction and onboarding to a software program, companies can decrease abandonment rate, increase productivity, and improve user satisfaction.

Digital adoption solutions are especially useful for complex software programs, prevalent in the enterprise workplace.

WalkMe’s platform offers integration with many of the most popular platforms, such as:

• Workday
• SuccessFactors
• Salesforce 
• ServiceNow
• Oracle CX Cloud
• NetSuite
• Jira
• cPanel

And much more.

For organizations that utilize such complex software – or pipelines that consist of multiple tools – a solution such as this is ideal.

Final Thoughts

The digital adoption solutions category is growing quickly.

In large part, this growth has been spurred by ongoing, global digital disruptions and transformations.

As digital change continues to transform the business world, we can expect to see more organizations test, adopt, and implement these solutions.

Given their return on investment, it is no surprise that they are scaling so rapidly.

The post The Digital Adoption Solutions Category: A Game-Changer appeared first on Digital Adoption.