Breadcrumb

Why digital transformation is important for businesses

Written by

The GoCardless content team comprises a group of subject-matter experts in multiple fields from across GoCardless. The authors and reviewers work in the sales, marketing, legal, and finance departments. All have in-depth knowledge and experience in various aspects of payment scheme technology and the operating rules applicable to each. The team holds expertise in the well-established payment schemes such as UK Direct Debit, the European SEPA scheme, and the US ACH scheme, as well as in schemes operating in Scandinavia, Australia, and New Zealand. See full bio

Last editedMar 20232 min read

Why is digital transformation important? It’s a significant question. After all, the concept of digital transformation has been around for awhile, and amidst all the excited chatter about machine learning, AI, virtual reality, and cloud-first solutions, it’s sometimes easy to forget what all of this new and transformative technology is actually in service of. We’ve put together a simple guide to why digital transformation is important, giving you the information you need to understand why the era of digital transformation is here to stay, and why that’s unequivocally a good thing.

What is digital transformation?

Firstly, what is digital transformation? In its simplest form, digital transformation means leveraging transformative digital technology to improve your business. The four main areas of digital transformation are business model transformation, process transformation, domain transformation, and organization transformation. That is to say, digital transformation is an ongoing process affecting every aspect of your business. Essentially, when we refer to digital transformation solutions, we’re talking about an ongoing effort to take advantage of the opportunities afforded by the development of technology.

How digital transformation helps business

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering, “Why do we need digital transformation anyway?”, wonder no more. Here’s our rundown of the practical benefits of digital transformation solutions:

1. Break down siloed departments and encourage collaboration

The use of digital transformation technologies like cloud-based software can help to develop a sense of unity and erode silos between departments, making employees feel more engaged and encouraging people from all around your business to collaborate and step outside of their predetermined team roles. This is only going to affect your company in a positive way, leading to happier, more flexible, more productive employees.

2. Generate meaningful, data-driven business insights

Businesses have never had access to as much data as they do today, and with the right use of business intelligence and analytics tools, you can convert this data into impactful, relevant insights into your company and its customer base. From dashboards and data visualizations to reporting and online analytical processing, there are a wide range of tools you can use to inform fast-paced decision-making, and the more deeply you embed these tools into your company’s business operations, the better insights you can expect to receive.

3. Reduce time-to-market

Digital transformation solutions may also enable your business to reduce the amount of time it takes to bring your products from development to market. Streamlining operational and deployment deficiencies through digital transformation strategies (for example, automating the development process, implementing agile project management techniques, setting up data-driven KPIs and metrics, and so on) can help to minimize your costs and build out products in a faster and more efficient manner, accelerating your cycle times and shortening time-to-market.

4. Deliver an enhanced customer experience

Finally, the delivery of an improved customer experience is one of the key reasons why digital transformation is important for business. By providing a more personalized experience and digitizing the customer journey, businesses can keep customers engaged and boost their overall satisfaction. Whether it’s the use of conversational chatbots or the provision of omnichannel/mobile commerce, digital transformation solutions are effective ways to enhance customer experience and build trust in your brand.

How can GoCardless support digital transformation?

When thinking about how digital transformation helps businesses, it’s important not to forget about how impactful a streamlined payments process can be on your business’s cash flow. Powered by the winning combination of bank debit and open banking technology, GoCardless is an ACH debit solution that allows businesses to collect payments directly from customers’ accounts. This eliminates the risk of late payments and helps you to maximize customer lifetime value, all in one single solution.

We can help

GoCardless is a global payments solution that helps you automate payment collection, cutting down on the amount of financial admin your team needs to deal with. Find out how GoCardless can help you with one-off or recurring payments.