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Part 2―How Digital Transformation Helped Save the Day

Episode 2

Published: January 6, 2022

Digital transformation is the process of using information technology to streamline, systematize and scale-up manual business processes. Pre-pandemic, many businesses had placed digital transformation on their back burners, but the times turned it into a top priority overnight. This was especially true for organizations that were still cutting paper checks, using hand-signed contracts or relying on other manual processes.

Leaning More Into Technology

The study found that top technology adoptions had shifted to center on people connecting with people as employees and customers adapted to working remotely in greater numbers than ever before.

The top technology upgrade reported by survey respondents was video communications technology—adopted or upgraded by the majority of survey respondents (58%). Internal communications tech (cited by 40%) and customer relationship management (CRM) platforms (29%) came in second and third.

To support these findings, 71% of respondents said they have adopted new techniques for reaching and communicating with target audiences. And respondents who adopted human resources technology reported the biggest workforce management gains due to tech upgrades.

Video communication was the most popular investment but small businesses also adopted internal communications and customer relationship management software:

40% invested in video communication platforms
29% invested in internal communication platforms
27% invested in customer relations management (CRM) software

Spurring many of these upgrade efforts was an increased willingness to purchase business products and services online, as was reported by 35% of respondents.

We've seen a huge acceleration of digital transformation among small business decision-makers, said Davis Trice, Director, Client Services at Morning Consult. They've become very accelerated in changing to a more tech-focused company and more innovative."

Short-term or Long-term Fix?

Among those business that adopted new technology, a majority reported that technology has positively impacted “processes we will implement permanently” and “how we manage our workforce” among other objectives.

Across all categories of tech products and services, a majority said they will continue using them long-term. The greatest example is video communications platforms in which 89% of respondents said they will adopt it for permanent use.

Most businesses, anecdotally speaking, were far better off if they had done even just a little bit of digital transformation. If they had done some, maybe a little bit of adoption, they were able to use that as a foundation, said Harry Bradford, Editorial Director, Brand Innovation at T Brand. He went on to say, I think that might be also somewhat explaining the discrepancy between that notion of temporary versus permanent. I think you have that original shock where you're like, oh, we're really far behind. But actually, maybe we have things and we can kind of get up to speed more quickly than we thought."

AI: Not Just for Big Business

Many businesses have considered artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in the technology they’ve adopted. About half of small business decision makers said they have considered AI and automation in their decision-making regarding new technologies to adopt, purchase or upgrade. A quarter (24%) said they had not thought about it at all.

I think this shows that even for small businesses, there's a lot that can be learned from these types of technologies said Trice. Small business decision-makers maybe just haven't considered that this isn't just for the big people, this is for us as well."

Adopting New Ways to Reach Your Audience

Digital transformation has brought new ways of reaching a business’s target audience and the survey found it was having a strong impact. A total of 71% agreed that they were adopting new ways to reach audiences and 72% were changing their approach to marketing and advertising.

With new ways to use audience data, businesses were getting more creative in how they reached their audiences through new social media channels. “It’s not just Twitter anymore, not just Facebook advertising, but TikTok and Instagram and other things are becoming a means of reaching new audiences,” said Trice. “If you have a new technology to reach a new audience, it's really helping your business grow.”

In fact, a total of 87% of those who have adopted new ways to reach target audiences said the new methods have had a “very” or “somewhat positive” impact on their company’s growth. Since technology is only as good as the people using it, business leaders acknowledged worries about their ability to address employee needs going forward.

A big topic of this survey was digital transformation. How has the last 18 months forced companies to look at how they're using technology to keep their businesses going and thrive even in this environment? We found that they feel really optimistic about the digital transformations' impact on their companies."

—Davis Trice, Director, Client Services at Morning Consult

Coming Up

Look for more highlights in upcoming articles of this series as we take a deeper dive into other aspects of the study including:

Remote work and its impact on workplace culture
What this all means for the future of business