Today's Guest

Howard Tiersky is CEO and Founder of FROM, The Digital Transformation Agency. For over 20 years, Howard has been helping leaders at companies large and small navigate digital transformation. Howard speaks regularly at major industry conferences and is also on the faculty of the NYU Tisch School of the Arts where he teaches courses on the intersection of the television industry and the Internet. Howard shared his thoughts with us on how small businesses can bridge the digital gap to interact with their customers the way their customers want to interact, and enhance their customers’ experience which will lead to higher revenues and customer loyalty.

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Episode Summary

The number one success indicator for any business is how much value it creates for its customers. The first thing I think about when it comes to digital transformation is not in terms of what businesses are doing but what consumers have adopted over the last 10 to 15 years. The way we shop, date, learn, or almost any other area of our life has been dramatically changed by the invention of the smartphone. The bottom line is customer expectations have changed and for businesses to continue to be successful they have to adapt to customer expectations or risk becoming irrelevant.

When it comes to small businesses, your first thought might be it is unfair how big companies are setting consumer expectations. While that is true in many ways you can cry about it or do something to bridge the gap. The good news for small businesses is there are so many platforms nowadays that you can leverage what they already built to narrow the gap. While it does take some effort and expense to get up and running on these platforms, they are within reach for nearly any size of business. And SMBs have a huge advantage when it comes to adapting quickly to customer needs because they operate at a smaller scale.

In my book Winning Digital Customers, I presented a five-step process I recommend every business walkthrough. The first step is to understand your customer, the second is to map the customer journey, the third is to build the systems that support the journey, the fourth is to optimize the current processes, and the last step is to rally your team around implementing the needed changes in your business. When you’ve done these five steps well, you will bridge the digital gap with your customers and unlock tremendous growth. 

Resources Shared

• FROM, The Digital Transformation Agency
• Winning Digital Customers by Howard Tiersky
• Impactful Online Meetings by Heidi Wisbach and Howard Tiersky
• Winning Digital Customers Podcast
• Thryv
  

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