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Conventional wisdom has been that digital transformation is a three-to-five year process. It's an initiative with a defined beginning and end, designed to meet specific goals in a specific amount of time. And at the end of that initiative, transformation is complete. High fives and fist bumps, a little champagne maybe, and then back to business.
Sounds reasonable enough, except for the fact that it isn't true.
In reality, transformation has no end point. There are milestones along the way, but there is no final state. Businesses, markets, technologies, customers are constantly evolving, so looking at digital transformation as a "thing" rather than as a way of being is outdated and limiting. Companies should think of transformation as an investment in evolution - the continuous modernization of their business and the customer experience through technology.
Seen through this lens, digital transformation is a constant. There's always a better way to sell or buy or engage or create efficiencies. There's always room to grow or gain a competitive advantage. Sometimes a company takes big swings, and sometimes they make incremental improvements, but they are always moving forward. This kind of progress is built on questions and hypotheses. How might we improve conversion through wayfinding? If we enabled personalization could we reduce call center volume? Could we reduce attrition by improving site speed?
The answer to those critical questions is experimentation.
This never-ending quest for better - better experiences, better ROI, better performance - is enabled by adopting experimentation as both a practice and an ethos. Approaching digital transformation like a scientist allows an organization to leverage data to cut through opinions and tip sacred cows. Experimentation is more than A/B or multivariant testing, though that is certainly centralto the formula. It's a foundational rethinking of how decision-making happens. Think you need new navigation on your website to improve demand generation? Prove it. Think you can shorten your sales cycle through AI-enabled content recommendations? Prove it.
Adopting a culture of experimentation helps companies stay nimble and be entrepreneurial, and it's also smart money. Fail fast and avoid expensive, slow-moving initiatives that don't deliver. Find quick wins that prove strategy, boost performance, or unlock revenue before committing to larger investments.
Platforms like Optimizely make this approach possible by helping marketers remove guesswork and make smarter decisions faster. Real-time data tied to strategic experimentation accelerates progress, leads to measurable growth and increases ROI of the overall marketing spend. Want to talk about how Optimizely can help your organization improve both the customer journey and your bottom line? Contact Verndale.
