Unlocking Digital Growth: Why Startups Needs To Personalise CX

India’s digitalisation progress is rising to remarkable heights, with the Indian technology sector at the forefront of innovation. The sector is driving the digital transformation agenda for organisations across the globe by leveraging cutting-edge technologies. The country’s growing knowledge capital, favourable demographics, vibrant startup ecosystem, and vast pool of talented digital natives have all contributed to this success.

India has climbed to the 40th rank in the Global Innovation Index 2022 due to its technological advancements, and investment towards building a digital infrastructure. 

On a bare-bones level, given India’s growing technology-savvy population, as well as initiatives such as the Digital India Program along with fast-track adoption of technologies like cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI) across sectors have not just transformed but led the global market in digital transformations.

Putting technology at the core of operations, from public to private sectors, India’s economy has been remarkably resilient despite global macroeconomic headwinds. 

India’s young demographic, with a median age of 28.4 years, provides the country with strategic advantages. The country’s adoption of digital payment technology such as Neobanks, DigiLocker, and identity authentication with Aadhaar, among others, has helped it unlock the digital consumption potential of this population.

As digital adoption permeates almost everything we do, customer experience (CX) is key. CX is constantly being redefined, especially with the fast-track adoption of emerging technologies such as machine learning, big data, in-memory computing, and hyper-connectivity, to name just a few. 

Create A Competitive Advantage By Delivering Experiences 

The customer journey for consumers of all ages now begins with a search on the internet, transforming the way we work, shop, travel, bank, learn and socialise. 

With access to a plethora of digital channels, consumers have multiple touchpoints to engage with businesses, which increases the pressure on organisations to raise their game. The focus on the adoption of digital tools and how to use them efficiently is no longer enough to create measurable impact; digital transformation has to be driven at the customer level. 

Businesses need to curate various economic, behavioural, and attitudinal data, which requires predicting customers’ future behaviour, optimising marketing efforts, and unifying the experience across all the touch points. It is no longer about price positioning or adding another intuition-based feature to one’s product, but about delivering a holistic experience.

Seamlessly Deliver A Humanoid Experience With New Business Models 

Consumers are no longer confined to a particular choice in this borderless and boundless digital landscape. They juggle between options, hover, and compare, particularly with high smartphone penetration and connected micro-moments. 

While understanding a customer journey can be complex, it is imperative for businesses to deliver an omnichannel experience, especially with the advent of technologies such as AI and chatbots gaining traction.

Whether it’s an AI lead automation of product up- or cross-selling technique or robotic process automation (RPA), or connectivity becoming omnipresent, the goals from pre- to post-purchase are being re-imagined in response to shifting consumer behaviour.

As customers are growing accustomed to tailored experiences and easy user interfaces, the adoption of business models like the below in ecommerce provides a flexible customer checkout experience. 

• Buy online, pick up in-store (BOPIS)
• Buy online, pickup anywhere (BOPA)
• Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL)
• Buy Online Ship to Store (BOSS)

Similarly, as technologies mature from being intriguing to becoming essential, consumers today increasingly try to resolve their needs through self-service before connecting with customer service or an inside sales team. And these experiences necessitate the adoption of technology. 

Striking The Right CX Balance With Technology 

The Amazon effect dramatically changed the way shopping is done. It introduced an efficient and frictionless shopping process with immediate results, raising customer expectations for a customer-centric journey. 

In similar disruption within banking and services industries, Neobanks are shaping up the future of the banking industry. Revolutionising the way consumers access their finances with AI, neobanks are completely focused on delivering integrated, frictionless, and personalised banking customer experiences.

On the same note, emerging technologies are not just changing what’s being made or how fast it’s developed; they’re changing the experience. The virtual setup of businesses in the metaverse (built on the convergence of AR, VR, and web3 technologies) not only helps in delivering an immersive experience but also enables organisations to connect with customers on a whole new level. 

As products become interface-less, such as Google Home, consumers no longer need to click on the weather app to know the weather or press the button to take a screenshot. They can simply ask a question and get the answers. 

As digital capabilities improve and connectivity becomes more ubiquitous, India’s digital transformation journey has been impressive, with the potential to transform the country’s economy and society. 

Customer behaviour has changed dramatically in the last few years, and this paradigm shift is nowhere near complete. Customer actions are becoming more and more digital, flexible, and global. Hence, it’s imperative for organisations to quickly adapt to this new reality and align their business models to service their customers’ needs. 

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