Why should B2B enterprises understand their digital maturity?

Digital maturity is the ability to compete effectively in an increasingly digital environment through continuous adaptation. It wasn’t long ago that “digital” was synonymous with e-commerce. But today, as Forrester explains in their “Gauge Your B2B e-commerce Digital Maturity” report, digital is synonymous with the entire customer journey.

Companies who understand how digital aides in the entire customer journey - and have the tools in place to support it as it continues to evolve - are the digitally mature.

If enterprises are to compete in today’s rapidly changing business landscape, they need to develop a more advanced level of maturity and adaptability. This will allow them to respond to changing customer demands. And that’s regardless of whether that customer is a retail buyer (B2C) or a business buyer (B2B).

Understand your organization’s level of digital maturity

Enterprises sit on a spectrum of digital maturity - from beginner to advanced. Generally, businesses will move through each of these stages as they build out a more robust focus and dedication to their customers or buyers.

• Beginners: The digital transformation journey is just beginning for enterprises in the beginner stage. Usually, you have limited experience with innovation and sales channels and marketing programs have not been digitized yet.
• Intermediate: These enterprises have some digital initiatives in place. There is commitment to investing in the foundations of a successful digital transformation journey.
• Advanced: Advanced enterprises dedicate themselves to agile development practices, focus on innovation, and embrace the cloud and other modern technologies. These enterprises have robust resources in place to continue growing and evolving digital transformation initiatives.

Advancing your digital maturity will ensure continued success for your organization. But, the first step to advancement is understanding where you’re at on the spectrum today.

Here are some key questions to ask about your organization’s structure and strategic agenda to evaluate your digital maturity level:

1. Is your executive leadership team investing in “getting digital"? Are you doing everything in your power to put your customer at the center of all you do?
2. Have you or do you plan to modernize your technology stack and technology approach? Are you dedicated to taking advantage of modern architecture (APIs, cloud, etc.) as well as modern development practices (agile)?
3. Do you have the right people in place internally (staff) and externally (vendors and partners)? What support do you need to enhance collaboration and progress across the entire organization?
4. Do you have high-level business goals established that all employees can rally around?

[Forrester has a B2B Digital Maturity Assessment tool you can use to evaluate your organization in more detail. Learn more about the tool here.]

Understanding where you’re at today will help you navigate the types of tools and resources you need to get to where you want to be, tomorrow.

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If your organization or team falls more in line with the beginning to intermediate stage of digital maturity, use agencies like those in Sitecore's global partner network to help you navigate today’s digital landscape. In the age of API-first and headless technologies, it’s helpful to have a partner to help create your own suite of best-of-breed technologies that make the most sense for your organization.

Dive in head-first to headless platforms like Sitecore® OrderCloud® if your organization or team are advanced. Documentation, dashboards, and resources are available publicly. These resources give your team everything it needs to use the robust functionality Sitecore OrderCloud® has to offer without worrying about building (and supporting) custom applications from scratch.

Explore the Sitecore OrderCloud® platform and architecture in the Feature Guide.