“We are excited to have Brandi join our leadership team,” said David Roberts, CEO of Alchemer. “She has the customer-experience history to help our customers achieve maximum value from the Alchemer platform.”     

The Alchemer platform provides survey, workflow, audience, communication, and analysis tools to allow any size organization to collect, integrate, and act on the voice of their customer. Alchemer also delivers industry-first solutions, such as Activated NPS, that further personalize the engagement businesses have with their customers to drive actionable feedback.  

“Building products that help customers achieve their missions is my passion,” said Brandi. “I love creating teams that are relentless in addressing customer needs, and that makes Alchemer a great fit for me.”  

About Alchemer 

Alchemer (formerly SurveyGizmo) transforms customer feedback into operational gold to create customer-centric organizations. Alchemer provides a customer-experience platform and pre-packaged solutions that enable businesses to collect and act on feedback to find, get, and keep more customers and employees. Only Alchemer puts customers at the center of everything a company does by integrating feedback directly into the systems and applications that power the organization today. Alchemer serves more than 15,000 global customers and 30% of the Fortune 500. 

The post Alchemer Adds Former KPA CTO to Leadership Team appeared first on Alchemer.

Companies, including healthcare facilities of all shapes and sizes, are competing more and more on the experience they offer. In fact, by 2020, Gartner has forecasted that 88 percent of companies will be competing on the basis of experience.  

Highlights: 

In order to be successful in the healthcare industry shift from volume to value, healthcare facilities need to focus on crafting and sustaining an experience in addition to their products and services that match the needs of their patient population. 

To start crafting a winning experience, the first step is to develop a set of patient personas. 

The insights provided by patient personas help determine what is needed to create an experience that will resonate with the needs of your specific patient population. 

Download the patient persona template bundle

What is a patient persona? 

If you’re reading this and wondering what exactly a “persona” is and why you need to develop one, keep reading — it’s not nearly as intimidating as it may sound.  

Most commonly used by marketers, personas are mini-profiles of a company’s ideal customer or range of ideal customers. 

Individual persona profiles typically include information that helps shape how to market toward them (e.g., what language style or tone to use) and in what ways that message is delivered to the persona (e.g., social media or email). 

In healthcare, the objective and purpose of a patient persona are entirely the same. The only difference is the use of the word “patient” before “persona.”  

Related: Why patient experience matters

How do I Build a patient persona? 

You can get the data needed to develop patient personas a few different ways. When foraging for data sources, it’s always best to use as many collection methods as possible. The more data the patient persona has, the more prescriptive you can be with your outreach. 

Collect data and insights from: 

• Patient feedback surveys 
• Engagements on social media 
• Run a market research study on your patient population
• Patient verbatims
• Healthcare provider review sites 

What is included in a patient persona? 

Since the sole purpose of having patient personas is to have insights into a company’s target customer, there is specific information that is considered best practice to include in the persona profile:

• A fictional name 
• A fictional picture 
• Demographics: age, gender, family, location, occupation, education level  
• Goals and challenges: average health status, common conditions, common health goals, how your facility helps this person achieve their goals and solve their challenges 
• Values and fears: what the person values, common reasons why this person objects to purchase your service or product
• Your marketing messaging: (varies based on persona)
• The main value proposition: what drives this person to choose your facility to solve their challenges

Example of a patient persona

Personas are often packaged as a PDF format or a view-only document and stored in a commonly accessed location organization-wide. 

You can cater the information to gather as it relates to your specific healthcare facility, it’s offerings, etc. This example includes the basics. 

Build your own patient personas

By going through this process for each of your personas, you will better understand who your patients are, what they’re seeking, and what challenges they face. This is vital information that can be used to create that initial connection and develop it over time.

You also may discover that there are things you don’t yet know about your audience, which could trigger a persona-specific research quest. 

Once you’ve completed all of your personas — again, typically three to five is suffice to represent most of your audience — you begin to piece together their values, beliefs, and motivations. 

Knowing this will determine the position you take with your marketing from how it is written to how it is distributed and when.

One important thing to know about when you are creating your set of patient personas is that they will evolve. The process of building personas should be expected to take place once every few years or when you experience changes with your patient’s preferences. 

People’s needs change over time, and your personas should reflect any evolution that the market and the active consumers undergo.  

By developing your patient persona set, you’re one step closer to crafting an experience that is beneficial for both your facility and your patients. 

The post How and why to build patient personas appeared first on Alchemer.

Highlights: 

• The healthcare industry has shifted from a volume-based industry to a value-based industry.
• As healthcare costs skyrocket and health outcomes plummet, the industry has made a concerted effort to cut costs and improve the delivery and quality of care provided. 
• Study after study consistently shows a direct correlation between experience and the bottom line. 

Experts warn that if hospitals neglect to adjust their revenue cycle to align with the expectations of the patient population they serve, the business will see a rise in debt and their patients will look for care at another facility. 

An estimated $4 million of annual income per hospital is tied to the patient perception of care, the Hospital Advisory Board estimates. 

Of the $1.5 billion reimbursed in 2016, $450 million was linked to patient experience and care perception, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Studies found.

Yet, challenges still persist around improving the patient experience. In this article, we review some of the top challenges that are slowing healthcare facilities down from adopting a 100 percent patient-centric care delivery model. 

Healthcare is now operating in a competitive market for the first time

The healthcare industry has never really had to sell itself like other businesses to get consumers to buy from them. 

Today’s consumers, however, are more prone to ditch their healthcare provider for another if the service of the other is less expensive,  more convenient, and digitally enabled. 

This new competitive era requires the industry to market to their target audience, prove to this audience that the service provided is better than the other healthcare organizations, and consistently deliver a rich experience every single time a patient interacts with the facility. 

This can be done by combining a marketing strategy with patient data and forming the health facility’s value proposition around it. 

Understanding the needs of your target audience is critical when determining how to frame the contribution you provide as the solution.

Providing care to a patient without knowing their needs and expectations of care is like driving a car blind. It’s only so long before you crash. 

Meeting a patient’s expectations is a moving target

Getting people’s attention is hard, and only gets harder every day. Between dwindling attention spans, new technology coming to market, and constantly shifting expectations, cutting through the noise is a challenge with which even the best advertisers struggle.

Yet, as consumers, we expect businesses to adjust to meet our needs and demands regardless. For example, as consumers become more accustomed to free two-day shipping from Amazon Prime, they expect other companies to follow suit with fast, free shipping for online orders.

Adjusting to consumer expectations is equally important in healthcare, and collecting patient feedback on a consistent basis is one of the best ways to stay up to date on their expectations and needs.

Lack of standardized definition of value

In order to consistently deliver value, health facilities need to determine what value means to them and communicate this relentlessly to their patients. Otherwise, what a patient determines as the value may not align with what the facility deems as value. 

Without a standardized and shared definition between patient and provider, providing value is derived from two different benchmarks — ultimately, missing the mark altogether. 

Relationship building requires different skills and takes time

Traditionally, a doctor interacts with a patient on an as-needed basis, which boils down to just a few minutes together. The doctor usually asks questions, reviews the patient’s chart, shares a diagnosis, administers care, and leaves. 

This idea of an engaging and ongoing patient-doctor relationship was never a variable. As it turns out, human beings want a lasting and consistent connection with their healthcare providers. It’s a proven approach that has shown the closer the relationship, the more proactive the patient is with managing their health in their day-to-day life. 

To meet this consumer need, many healthcare professionals must brush up on soft skills, such as interpersonal communication, social intelligence, and a flexible attitude, in order to engage with the patient throughout their time at the facility and not just on an as-needed, transactional basis.  

As with any strong and trusting two-way relationship, it takes time to develop and mature. The more interactions you have, the closer you become. 

With a little marketing communication between visits and social media engagement, building a connection with your patients — while a new approach for the industry — is easier to accomplish today than perhaps 20 years ago thanks to technology.  

This is one area in which the shift from volume to value puts a stop to doctor’s looking to just meet a quota.  

How to become a marketing organization 

Health facilities should be actively looking into redefining what their current (if any) marketing looks like and refocusing it on evolving into being a modern marketing organization.

While the main objective of marketing is to generate revenue by getting people to buy your product or service over another, effective and longer-lasting marketing is the main driver in creating lasting creating lasting patient-provider relationships, sharing helpful resources, and establishing trust with your patients. 

By using insights collected from your patients either through patient feedback surveys or a market research study on the specific patient population you serve, you will be able to:  

• Deepen your understanding of your audience needs, wants, and pain points.
• Develop patient personas using the collected insights.
  • A persona is often used as a representation of your target customers and what traits they possess, such as motivations, pain points, and demographic information.
  • Typically, a company has three to five personas that represent their audience.
  • Using patient personas in your marketing strategy is the missing link needed to make the full shift toward a consumer-centric environment.
  • Patient personas help to shape an intimate, personalized experience.
• Conduct keyword research to find out what your audience is researching as it relates to healthcare, and use keyword research insights to develop your messaging. 
• Build an outreach campaign that positions your products and services as the solution to your audience’s main pain points.
• Gauge competitive insight to find opportunities for improvement.

Experience is a competitive advantage, revenue generator, and contributor to healthier patients  

Honing and crafting a rich experience for your patients using data and collected insights is not only a way to continue making money as a business but also the best way to retain patients, foster an experience-driven reputation, and improve the care provided to each patient. 

While it’s not an overnight fix to some of the industry’s largest problems, reshaping and rethinking the overall approach to the experience delivered by healthcare providers is the first step. 

The post Why patient experience matters appeared first on Alchemer.

Protecting personal data has become more important now than ever before. 

With massively destructive data breaches hitting companies and even governments on a seemingly regular basis, sophisticated uses of personal data, and our on-demand data-driven way of life — the ability to process data and keep it private is critical.  

This article shares our initial work toward achieving GDPR compliance as of today. 

Many of the features within Alchemer can be used to help ensure your own GDPR compliance — a few of which are highlighted below. 

If you ever have any concerns or questions in regard to our use of your data, please don’t hesitate to contact Alchemer at: [email protected]

GDPR: What Alchemer is Doing to Prepare   

Here at Alchemer, privacy is and will remain a top priority company-wide. 

We have been working closely with each department and the executive team to ensure we are not only going to be ready for the May 25 deadline but that we exceed GDPR compliance expectations for years to come. 

There are a variety of fundamental GDPR efforts currently taking place here at Alchemer to build the GDPR framework. Below we go into detail about what these efforts entail.

A standard Data Processing Addendum will be available.  

To ensure Alchemer is responsibly processing data, our customers will have 24/7/365 access to a standard Data Processing Addendum (DPA) as it becomes available. It can be accessed through our main website, www.alchemer.com.  

A DPA is a contractual agreement between you and Alchemer — the subprocessor — to ensure we are handling and processing your data as directed by you at all times. 

All Employees will receive GDPR training. 

Company-wide GDPR training will take place before the May 25 deadline, ensuring all Gizmos are familiar with the regulation and our ongoing commitment to protecting data.

A GDPR resource webpage will be available. 

We will host a permanent webpage on our main website, www.alchemer.com, that will be packed to the brim with current GDPR happenings here at Alchemer, free resources to help you achieve and maintain GDPR compliance, and more. 

Product updates, GDPR specific policies and procedures, and any changes to our Privacy Policy will also be reflected on this page. 

Alchemer will have a local GDPR representative. 

According to GDPR, companies are required to have local representation within the EU. Our local representative will soon be named and will register with the UK ICO.  

Our EU Data Center is in Germany. 

Our data center in Germany signifies our invested partnership with our European-based clients, and allows us to keep EU data within the EU, eliminating many risks associated with transcontinental data transfers.

Personal data is treated differently by different countries. Having an EU Data Center in Germany ensures that customers who use our www.alchemer.eu server will not have their respondent data transferred to the U.S. without their approval. 

When we decided to implement an EU location for Alchemer, we wanted a location that took data privacy as seriously as we do. And with some of the strictest data privacy laws in all of the EU, Germany was quickly decided to be the home of our EU Data Center.  

We do not reuse, sell, or otherwise share respondent data.  

All information collected in surveys belongs solely to the customer, not Alchemer. Under no circumstances do we reuse, sell, or otherwise share respondent data. 

Alchemer Product Features that can be Used for GDPR Compliance 

Customers can use our platform to help them comply with GDPR requirements. 

Thanks to our advanced privacy notice and opt-in consent process, account administrators can easily include all necessary consents within the surveys.  

In the event that a customer of Alchemer needs to retrieve the respondents’ consent, this is easily done via the platform through the account administrator.  

Survey Consent Opt-In

Response Settings

Permanently delete responses.

Only Account Administrators have the ability to permanently delete data.

Permanently Deleting individual responses is a multi-step process. Before you proceed, it is important to note the differences between Deletion and Permanent Deletion.

• Deletion. When a response is deleted, it is placed in a Deleted view (similar to your computer’s trash bin). At this point, the response is not permanently deleted and can be restored.
• Permanent Deletion. Once a response has been deleted, it is placed in the Deleted view. From the Deleted view, the response can then be permanently deleted. Once permanently deleted, a response cannot be recovered – this process is irreversible.

Deleting responses permanently will:

• Delete the supplied responses
• Delete files associated with these responses
• Delete all other data associated with these responses

Important! There is NO recovery method. Once permanently deleted, Alchemer Support will NOT be able to help you restore these responses or associated data.

We recommend that you contact the survey creator or owner of the survey before doing this.

In order to confirm the permanent deletion, you will be asked to enter your Alchemer password (the same password that you log in with).

Permanently delete surveys.

Deleting a survey is a multi-step process. When initially deleted, surveys are placed in the trash (similar to your computer’s trash/recycle bin). The surveys can then be permanently deleted from within the trash.

Permanently deleting a survey will permanently delete the following associated items:

• The survey itself
• All responses collected on the survey
• All reports that have been created for the survey (any scheduled reports will no longer be sent)
• All associated files
• All other data associated with the survey

Important! There is NO recovery method. The Alchemer Support team will NOT be able to help you restore the survey or data.

We recommend that you contact the survey creator or owner of the survey before doing this.

Visit the Permanently Delete Surveys documentation for Individual Response permanent deletion steps.

Track respondent email unsubscribe requests. 

You can track respondent email unsubscribe requests and import them into other systems to help ensure you’re in compliance with the various applicable regulations. 

An unsubscribed contact will not receive further invites from any campaign or surveys in the account. This is true regardless of how the contact was added to a given campaign (e.g. uploaded to the campaign itself versus imported from email lists.) 

To unsubscribe a contact within Alchemer, go to the Contacts page of your email campaign, search for contact’s email address and click to edit. On the Contact Info tab change the Subscription status. 

Customers can exercise all or any of their individual rights under GDPR. 

As a Alchemer customer, you can request any or all of their GDPR individual rights on your data through multiple systems and processes — via phone, email, or through our main website. 

Survey responses can be anonymized.  

Survey responses can be anonymized to ensure that submitted information is not connected to a natural person. 

To set up a survey with anonymous responses: 

1. Go to Tools > Response Settings.
2. Check the Anonymous Response Options.

Note: The Anonymous Responses setting is locked once your survey records at least one response. This means that if you set your survey to be anonymous and collect any data, you will not be able to disable the anonymous setting. 

GDPR Terminology Definitions

For more information on any of these terms or any other official documentation regarding GDPR, visit the website of the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO): https://ico.org.uk.

The terms provided below are as defined by the ICO. 

Consent 

Under GDPR, consent means offering individuals real choice and control that must be freely given; this means giving people genuine, ongoing choice and control over how businesses use individual’s data. 

Genuine consent should put individuals in charge and build trust and engagement. This requires a positive opt-in, prohibiting the use of pre-ticked boxes and any other method of default consent.   

Individual Rights 

Under GDPR, individuals are granted the following rights: 

The right to be informed. Individuals have the right to be informed about the collection and use of their personal data. This is a key transparency requirement under GDPR.  

• The right of access. Individuals have the right to access their personal data and supplementary information. The right of access allows individuals to be aware of and verify the lawfulness of the processing.
• The right to rectification. Individuals have the right to have inaccurate personal data rectified, or completed if it is incomplete. An individual can make a request for rectification verbally or in writing. Organizations have one calendar month to respond to a request.
• The right to erasure. Individuals have the right to have personal data erased. This right is also known as “the right to be forgotten.” Individuals can make a request for erasure verbally or in writing. Organizations have one calendar month to respond to a request. This right is not absolute and only applies in certain circumstances.
• The right to restrict processing. Individuals have the right to request the restriction or suppression of their personal data. When processing is restricted, organizations are permitting to store the personal data, but not use it. Organizations have one calendar month to respond to a request. This right is not absolute and only applies in certain circumstances.
• The right to data portability. Individuals can obtain and reuse their personal data for their own purposes across different services. This right allows individuals to move, copy or transfer personal data easily from one IT environment to another in a safe and secure way, without hindrance to usability. This right enables consumers to take advantage of applications and services which can use this data to find them a better deal or help them understand their spending habits.
• The right to object. Individuals have the right to object to: (1) Data processing based on legitimate interested or the performance of a task in the public interest/exercise of official authority (including profiling); (2) Direct marketing (including profiling);and (3) Data processing for purpose of scientific/historical research and statistics.
• Rights in relation to automated decision and profiling. This right protects individuals if organizations are carrying out solely automated decision-making that has legal or similarly significant effects on them. 

Personal data 

Personal data is any information relating to an identifiable person who can be directly or indirectly identified in particular by reference to an identifier. 

Automated individual decision-making

Automated individual decision-making is making a decision solely by automated means without any human involvement. 

Profiling 

Profiling is the automated processing of personal data to evaluate certain things about an individual. 

Data Controller   

A data controller is a person who (either alone or jointly or in common with other persons) determine the purposes for which and the manner in which any personal data are, or are to be processed.

Data Processor 

In relation to personal data, a data processor is any person (other than an employee of the data controller) who processes the data on behalf of the data controller. 

Subprocessor 

A subprocessor can be engaged by the processor. A subprocessor can process personal data on behalf of the data exporter and is often a third-party. 

Processing 

Processing, in relation to information or data, means obtaining, recording or holding the information or data or carrying out any operation or set of operations on the information or data, including: 

• Organization, adaptation or alteration of the information or data,
• Retrieval, consultation or use of the information or data,
• Disclosure of the information or data by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, or Alignment, combination, blocking, erasure or destruction of the information or data.  

View our current Privacy Policy  

• EU 
• US

View our current Website Terms of Use 

• EU
• US

The post The Alchemer Commitment to GDPR appeared first on Alchemer.

In less than one year, Gartner predicts that 90 percent of large global companies will have a Chief Data Officer (CDO) on their executive team.

A study run by NewVantage Partners on the impact of big data, which surveyed 60 Fortune 1000 companies, confirms that this upward trajectory of the CDO is happening. Leading corporations in the financial services, insurance, pharmaceuticals, and medical industries have recently added a CDO to their c-suite portfolio. 

The role has been seeing healthy growth over the last five years. The same study from NewVantage found that just 12 percent of firms had a CDO in 2012. Today, nearly two-thirds, or 63.4 percent, of firms have a CDO. 

Looking at the year-over-year trend from just 2017 to 2018, the percentage of titled CDOs who responded to the NewVantage survey has spiked significantly from 32.3 percent to 55.6 percent respectively. 

“One of the approaches that firms have established to deal with data-driven disruption and change is to establish new management roles,” writes Thomas Davenport and Randy Bean, managing partners at NewVantage. 

The survey data suggest that the role of a CDO is on its way to becoming table stakes for any company looking to compete in the digital landscape and innovate not only a company’s offerings but also their revenue model using data. 

But what exactly is this role and why is it on the fast-track to the top?

What is a Chief Data Officer?

While the role has established a foothold in executive leadership, it remains ambiguous and unclear to many. 

For most organizations, pulling up a seat for the CDO at the head table is the first step of many that will go into shaping it. The role itself, research from Forrester tells us, varies significantly across organizations in both hierarchy and responsibilities. Dependencies on the differences include data legacy and current organizational needs and goals. 

Despite the differences, CDOs have three main areas of responsibility: 

• Data management including quality and regulation, 
• Using data for operational improvements, and; 
• Having data play a large role in driving revenue.  

Other responsibilities, according to the third annual Gartner Chief Data officer survey, released late last year, include: 

• Defining a data and analytics strategy 
• Leveraging data science methodologies 
• Steward of data ethics 
• Profit and Loss (P&L) ownership  

Industry, market and organizational maturity strongly impact the individual responsibilities of the CDO, according to a recent Deloitte report. 

The IBM Institute for Business Value defines the role of the CDO as: 

The Chief Data Officer is a business leader who creates an executes data and analytics strategies to drive business value. The role is responsible for defining, developing and implementing the strategy and methods by which the organization acquires, manages, analyzes and governs data. It also carries the strategic responsibility to drive the identification of new business opportunities through more effective and creative use of data. 

Why are companies hiring Chief Data Officers?  

Data is a critical business asset that is highly vulnerable.  

It’s becoming increasingly more difficult for businesses to continue to operate with so much data at their disposal and not find themselves in the crossfires of a ruptured or compromised data security strategy thanks to malicious attackers and threats.  

In the last few days alone, data has again been bringing in headlines for landing in the wrong hands at the expense of the company, its customers, and other key stakeholders.

Breach events hitting Under Armour’s MyFitnessPal app and retailers Saks Fifth Avenue and Lord & Taylor prove, yet again, the universal lack of immunity around the very real dangers of working with and sharing data.

It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when a data breach or attack will occur. Companies are quickly finding out that their luck of operating without the oversight of a CDO is going to run out sooner rather than later. 

The role of the CDO is being framed as a company’s cross-functional leader alongside data risk management to ensure a responsible use of data. And it’s because of this, that the role is becoming more attractive for companies to adopt. 

It’s easier today to name five recent data breaches at large companies than it is to name the latest medical breakthrough or the latest Nobel Prize winner — proving the level of importance and impact data has had not just on running a business but on how we live our everyday life. 

Couple these threats with the increasing pressure to mine value from business data, CDOs are the horsepower companies need to strategically move ahead of the competition, generate revenue in the digital landscape, and meet the demands and reliance on data initiatives such as improving the customer experience — all tasking the CDO with high-impact business outcomes.  

Data regulations like the GDPR require CDOs  

With regulations like the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) hammering down on the protection of personal data, having a c-level executive overseeing data or what the EU calls a Data Protection Officer (DPO), on staff is required for businesses and retailers based on the EU. Failure to appoint one welcomes steep fines. 

Under GDPR, the DPO is seen as the ultimate authority to manage, monitor, and assess an organization’s data processing and management as it aligns with the regulation.  

With or without the legal impetus to have executive oversight of a company’s data, organizations around the world should feel the pressures to break down operational silos and invest in good data management. 

GDPR and other data regulations are evidence of how serious companies should be with protecting data. If not required to comply with GDPR, investing in data protection by appointing a CDO is quickly becoming standard practice for companies. 

Not only does it send the message that data is being protected to the utmost degree, but customers will feel more inclined to do business with a company that goes above and beyond to ensure that personal data is safeguarded. And it’s that level of trust that will be a major competitive advantage throughout and beyond the digital transformation. 

Data-driven businesses are the most valuable 

According to the S&P Capital IQ, six of the top 10 companies with the highest market capitalization worldwide are data-driven.  

1. Apple
2. Alphabet (Google’s parent company) 
3. Microsoft 
4. Amazon 
5. Facebook
6. Alibaba 

“Data-driven enterprises are businesses that have a cultural mindset to use data analytics to make fact-based business decisions,” says the CEO and founder of Platfora. “More than that, they have the ability to quickly gather the right data from the right parts of the business to make those decisions. The CDO is central to making that happen.”  

These companies are experiencing 20 to 30 percent gains in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) in large part due to their use of data to drive sales, marketing, supply chain efficiency, manufacturing, and R&D, according to leading analysts at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG). 

It’s then no surprise that with the widespread use of data across the business requires a dedicated leader responsible for the strategic use and management of data as it relates to the organization. 

Chief Data Officers build the links between data analytics, business processes, and outcomes. 

The use of data in business has matured past the point of simply using it respond to situations in the retroactive sense — only calling for data after the fact to put out fires or to remedy a sour situation. However, to be truly data-driven the approach needs to shift to be more proactive and predictive. 

This shift swings the revenue pendulum into the realm of the CDO, who can then build various monetization strategies with data at the core. 

This is a notable difference that comes with having a CDO. Traditionally, data oversight roles are more of a guardian in a way — someone who keeps a close eye on the data and ensures it’s protected, maintained and used properly in operational processes. 

With the dedicated focus that comes with a CDO knowing a company’s data inside and out, they can uncover ways to leverage the data by extracting insights that often are hidden inside existing processes and functions. The insights derived can then be used to open new revenue streams in a variety of ways. 

Leveraging data to drive business value means different things for every organization, industry, and geography. However, one of the core objectives of the CDO — of linking data, business processes, and outcomes — may range, according to the IBM Institute for Business.  

Extracting value using data could mean the CDO defines the best way to leverage existing internal data. It could mean the CDO finds and exploits new data sources from existing or new business partners. Or the CDO could draw from big data sources such as social media or artificial intelligence and machine learning data.  

Put simply, the role of the CDO calls for excellent tech savviness and change management skills, but also creative problem solving and a high level of sophisticated craftiness. 

Biggest Roadblock for CDOs: Data Literacy

Data literacy, or the lack of by data knowledge and understanding across the company, is a major concern for incoming CDOs. To learn more about this challenge, we asked Donald Farmer, Principal at TreeHive Strategy on how to improve data literacy in organizations.

Expert Spotlight: Donald Farmer, TreeHive Strategy 

Data literacy often presents a dilemma for the CDO. Where business users lack data skills, the IT team struggles to provision all the insights needed by the organization. They are constantly running to catch up with users’ demands. Yet, with technically savvy business users the CDO may face another problem: users can access, analyze or share data in ungoverned ways, beyond IT’s original expectations. 

How should the CDO square this circle?

Firstly, let’s recognize that data literacy is a good thing: the ability to collaborate on decisions with a sound understanding of data improves organizations in quite measurable ways. We should encourage greater data literacy through training in tools and techniques. 

Today, numerous online courses cover subjects ranging from the basics of spreadsheets to advanced machine learning and data science. A CDO can put together a virtual curriculum appropriate to their own business users and needs.

Training, however, is only the start for a data literate organization. Learning to be literate takes practice. We know that successful kids in the real-world are surrounded by stimulating books and comics. 

In the same way, the CDO should work to ensure that their organization lives with data every day.

• Are strategies and plans communicated with a good and clear analysis of the data behind the decision? 
• Are targets and incentives laid out with data to support them? 
• Do people have the right tools to share data in meetings, and are meetings structured to encourage the use of data in decisions? 

When we live and work with data on a daily basis our literacy improves in a natural way.

But the second strategy of the CDO is equally important. 

We must ensure that we have clear, helpful, policies for the use of data. We need a governance framework and a training program for staff as they ensure they understand their own roles, responsibilities, and risks when it comes to the professional use of data in their work. 

In a sense, just as we encourage data literacy to build a smart organization, we need to develop what we might call “Data Civics”, to ensure we grow into a well-governed organization too.

The cool thing about this approach is that, with the right governance framework and with the right training in place, business users can find themselves with more access to data than before. 

The result is a more data literate, better managed, and more successful team for both business and IT.

How to find the right person to fill the CDO role at your organization

In the United States, there are 357.5K people with the title of Chief Data Officer. The top 10 qualifying skills across CDO job postings regardless of industry or organization maturity include: 

1. Domain experience and deep IT knowledge 
2. Innovation driver 
3. Change manager
4. Highly-collaborative
5. People management and relationships skills 
6. Independent and self-driven 
7. Strategic thinker 
8. Maintain productivity in fast-paced and high-pressure environments 
9. Ability to scale change
10. Leading and motivating cross-functional, interdisciplinary teams  

It’s clear that to be a successful CDO in today’s business landscape it requires skills that are traditionally developed across roles. 

However, with the emphasis on wide-spread collaboration across functions, CDOs need to be multi-faceted across areas and considered the experts not only for the technical skills and qualifications required, but experts in business, communication, and management skills of people and systems, which can be a challenge for both the organization and those looking to become a CDO. 

When a visionary CDO is identified and secured, an organization must continue to empower them by truly understanding the role’s potential for change and the value it can bring to the organization. 

Without this two-way street established from the get-go, the CDO can be only so effective. Set them and the organization up for sustainable long-term success by making a concerted organization-wide effort to improve technology and data management, finding new ways to add business value with data, and fully embracing the CDO as a true c-level executive capable of helping companies go from good to great. 

The post Data Finally Has a Leader: Chief Data Officer appeared first on Alchemer.

Traditionally seen as being a company’s source of truth for all things tech, the role of the CIO is morphing into a more strategic driver developing leadership, communication, and collaboration skills. 

Two studies released just yesterday by Forbes Insights found that over four out of five CIOs believe their role has increased in importance over the last five years. The number one skill that will make CIOs successful in the new business landscape, according to the 400 plus CIOs Forbes surveyed, is their contribution to corporate strategy. 

Change management ranked in the top five of the 13 skills demanded of CIOs to do their jobs effectively — a definite shake-up in the traditionally expected output. 

And while change management and strategic business contributions were always on the skill list of effective CIOs, their rise in priority is opening a path to leadership for the role. 

Related: What is the Digital Economy? 

What is Change Management? 

Change management can be thought of as the process of managing employees and the organization through a transitional period. The process is often best approached using a combination of best practices, tools, and skills. 

The goal of change management is simple: to reduce the impact of the distractions related to change such a shift in priorities or goals while keeping focused on the big picture. 

Given that change is inadvertently chaotic, even if it’s a positive change; reducing the consequential friction is most commonly mitigated by utilizing a change management process catered toward the specific organization and its employees where the change is happening. 

In other words, there are certainly some change management tips that can be universally applied, but the more tailored the process can be to a given organization increases its overall effectiveness as it takes in the nuances of that specific organization that comes with knowing its employees. 

Why the CIO Role is Evolving 

The global digital economy has spurred transformations in consumer needs and purchasing behaviors, the complexity and scale of necessary technology, and operational models. 

To release these pressures and operate at a higher level of digital sophistication and scalability, shifts across the board are happening — some more seismic than others. 

Some experts say the transformation the CIO role is experiencing — mainly due to digitization and reliance on high-tech processes and systems — is one of the most drastic executive-level impacts.

“This new business context is seeing technology finding its way into the heart of the business agenda,’ PwC states in the 2017 report on the changing role of the CIO. “Increasingly, CIOs will hold the key to unlocking competitive advantage, business benefits, and relevant customer engagement, and with this shift comes growing pressure on, and higher expectations of, the IT function.” 

Change drivers include:

• The hyper-fast pace of technology 
• The disruption caused by new technologies  
• Shifts toward customer-centric business models 
• Growing intensity of compliance, security, and privacy governing the use of new tech
• Dramatic shifts in consumer needs and behaviors 
• Saturated and noisy competitive landscape — locally and globally
• Digital alignment of operational models and supply chains  

“Ignoring the rise of digital business now carries the risk of businesses becoming irrelevant,” PwC states. 

From Service Provider to Strategic Enabler 

“The way CIOs used to work is they’d sit down with, say, the head of sales and say, ‘Okay. What do you want?’,” Martha Heller, CEO of specialty recruitment firm for CIOs, CTOs, and VP-level tech leaders, Heller Search Associates told Forbes Insights.

“Today the CIOs are more proactive. They are saying, ‘here is what we could build together. What do you think?’ This means that a CIO is no longer just a service provider to these domains; they also are, and need to be, an integral part of the larger business,” says Heller.

The shift from service provider to strategic enabler is evident in the role’s expansion and influence across the business as well as its relation to the success of individual business functions such as regulatory compliance, R&D/Innovation, distribution, and logistics, the Forbes studies found. 

CIOs are now in the position to foster mutually beneficial two-way relationships with internal and external stakeholders from marketing and sales to customers and suppliers. 

The transformation is compounded further with a new avenue for CIOs to leverage organization-wide collaboration. The CIO is now going to be increasingly relied on by the business to be a strategic thinker and change manager while also being grounded in technology. 

The new facets of the role will require new and unprecedented levels of collaboration across the business — a necessity for this level of wide-spread change to stick. 

Five Ways CIOs Can Develop Change Management Skills 

Again, while facilitating the development of skills like change management has always been in the CIOs wheelhouse, the utilization by the business of the skill is increasing the demand for it be more fine-tuned and polished. 

And despite CIOs generally welcoming this shift in their role and the increased opportunities to display their value to the business that comes with it, at the end of the day, change is challenging and has varying impacts on teams and on individuals. Proactively identifying the potential impacts will set up the CIO and the process for success.  

For CIOs who are assuming the role as the executive champion owning the change management process, here are five tips to consider when the process is being developed and when it is deployed: 

1. Conduct a Self-Assessment 

One of the best ways to learn about yourself and the current state of your skillset is by conducting a self-assessment. 

Examining the strengths and weaknesses of individuals on your team may be easier than looking inward and learning about yourself. Yet, the results are insightful not just for your own knowledge, but for your team to understand how to work with you better and vice versa. 

“A self-assessment, to be effective, must take into account an individual’s work-related values, interests, personality type, and aptitudes,” says Dawn Rosenberg McKay of The Balance. “All of these characteristics make up who you are, so ignoring any of them won’t give you an accurate answer.”  

The information gathered from your self-assessment can help you make more informed decisions on where you can focus your improvement efforts and where you can feel confident.  

McKay suggests to consider the following four main attributes when conducting a self-assessment: 

• Values: the things that are important to you, like an achievement, status, and autonomy. 
• Interests: what you enjoy doing, i.e. playing gold, taking long walks and hanging out with friends.
• Personality: a person’s individual traits, motivational drives, needs, and attitudes. 
• Aptitudes: the activities you are good at, such as information systems or data security. An aptitude may be a natural skill or one you acquired.  

It’s best practice for leaders to consistently run self-assessments and communicate the insights to their employees and even the organization. It’s a great way to gut check where you stand and how you can better work with people and for people to better work with you. 

For times of change, it’s especially important to remain highly self-aware and remain as in control as possible in order to ease the transition. 

While we have suggested the four main attributes that McKay as defined above, the beauty of a self-assessment is that you can design it for different contexts, such as in times of change or when someone joins a team, for example. This helps to get the most out of it and best use the insights from the exercise in the most effective way.

A lot of people claim they love change — I am one of them — but in reality, I don’t actually thrive in times of change and it doesn’t always bring the best out in me due to how change typically aligns with my personality type. 

By letting my teammates know this about me alongside the data from a self-assessment backing up my assumptions, provides a narrative I can then communicate to my team and my manager that when the change occurs, I may need more support than normal. 

Balancing emotions at work and in times of change is tricky — when there are ways in which emotions can be backed by supporting evidence and welcomed in open and constructive discussions, the insights can be incorporated — mitigating the potential of emotions muddying the business objective and alienating employees. 

2. Establish a Clear Vision 

When there is a clearly communicated vision of the change, employees understand it better and the impact it may have on their daily work life and responsibilities. 

A change vision should include the objective of the change so employees’ expectations are set and there is little to no room for speculation.  

And while the change vision may knock it out of the park, how and when it’s communicated can either rally employee support or flatline before it has a chance. 

Drawing on his experience in a constant state of change as a Navy SEAL, Brent Gleeson, now a motivational speaker and founder of change management firm TakingPoint Leadership, suggests keeping these six tips in mind when crafting a vision statement for change: 

• Simplicity. Simplicity is often always the best approach to communication. The change vision should be articulated concisely within five minutes or less with succinct outcomes at the heart of the message.
• Authenticity. Keep the vision authentic by aligning it with the company’s culture and values. Leaders have a bad rep of talking the talk but not walking the walk. Authenticity brings in a high level of trust. When a powerful change vision is communicated and immediate action is followed-through, trust is strengthened — a critical component of change management. 
• Multichannel. Communicate the vision using multiple company channels such as the company newsletter, company-wide meetings, posters throughout the office in common areas, in one-on-one meetings, in internal chat programs such as Slack or Skype.
• Repetition. For the vision to resonate with employees, they need to hear it over and over to the point where you will likely feel annoying. It’s been said that the average person has to hear something at least seven times before it becomes a part of their recall.
• Consistent behavior. Similar to the authenticity element, if a change vision is communicated through multiple channels, simply outlining its objectives in an authentic way, it will fail if the behaviors from the top down deviate away from the new vision. Behaviors must align with the change vision and modeled by leadership. Without maintaining behavioral consistency, the risk of resistance increases exponentially due to a breach in trust.
• Feedback. Welcome all feedback throughout the process and in all forms — this is a theme throughout effective change management processes. Not only is feedback a great way to check-in on the current state of things but is a way to establish an ongoing dialogue. The insights can help keep employee morale high and also improve the process iteratively. 

3. Communicate Honestly and Often 

In general, communication is challenging for companies. During times of change, communication is an element that should be carefully crafted. Employees are often left in the dark when it comes to organizational changes and is expected to adhere to change without knowing why the change is happening in the first place. 

Frequent, honest, and well-distributed communication is critical to the effectiveness of a change management process. 

Communication should include: 

• Why the change is happening, it’s mission and vision as it relates to the business as a whole 
• What the impacts of the change will be in the company (the good, the bad, and the ugly) 
• What the impact of the change will be on each employee (the good, the bad, and the ugly) 
• Only definitive answers that the CIO or other executive sponsors know as true versus assumption or hearsay 

Communication should be: 

• An open door policy for any and all questions 
• Structured as an open conversation about the change 
• A proactive way to relay what’s coming rather than what has happened
• Formal and informal  

4. Empathize

Keeping the human element is also critical in times of change as change often triggers a range of emotions. Effective change managers avoid telling their employees how to feel and encourage them to openly and honestly discuss the emotional impact of the change. 

Rather than sympathizing during this time, it’s more effective to understand and share that feeling by actively listening and empathizing. Sympathy has a reverse impact during high-stress times and makes an employee feel pitied and even small. 

“Empathy — the ability to read and understand one’s emotions, needs, and thoughts — is one of the core competencies of emotional intelligence and a critical leadership skill,” says Marion Barraud of the Harvard Business Review. “It is what allows us to influence, inspire, and help people achieve their dreams and goals. Empathy enables us to connect with others in a real and meaningful way, which in turn makes us happier — and more effective — at work.” 

Managers who lack emotional intelligence often cause good people to leave and teams to lack functionality, engagement, and respect. And while lacking empathy has some detrimental effects, it’s a common personality trait shared among results-driven managers. 

The focus on results for managers makes undoubtedly a great business asset, but when it comes to managing people in a team and leading them, empathy encourages managers to slow down to observe, listen and ask questions of their team. 

When a manager is truly empathetic, team members will feel more comfortable talking about how they feel rather than fearing being dismissed by their manager. The long-term impact and bonds created on the relationship side of management far out weight the growing pains of forming more empathetic skills.  

This people side of management is one of the biggest shifts for CIOs who are deeply rooted in the technology and not so often rooted in people skills. Developing empathy comes with time and patience. Sure, some people are just born with more empathetic tendencies than others, but that doesn’t mean it’s a not a learned skill that can be developed. 

When developing these skills, especially for those who find it to be a learned behavior, ask for more feedback from your employees on how it’s working and where you can improve. While improving the skill, asking for feedback will allow employees to see you’re actively improving and taking their opinions seriously. 

5. Prepare for resistance  

A negative human response to change is a natural instinct and a built-in defense mechanism, for better or for worse. When it comes to workplace change, social psychology tells us that resistance is a natural response and no matter how positive or negative the change is, employees will respond negatively time and again. 

Knowing resistance to change is simply how we are wired as human beings, helps change managers better prepare for the inevitable and help mitigate wide-spread resistance. 

Combining some of the tactics above such as clear, consistent and authentic communication, change managers must show and tell their own enthusiasm for the change. 

With the feedback loops we discussed earlier built-in to the change management process, resistance issues will surface as they occur and are more manageable to address. We all know what happens when we bottle our emotions — they eventually boil over and cause more harm than if they openly discussed in context. 

And since resistance is to be expected, being open about it from the get-go is a great proactive way to take on the challenge head-on. 

The post 5 Ways CIOs Can Develop Change Management Skills appeared first on Alchemer.

Data security to businesses of all sizes is as vital as oxygen is to human life. Operating without a data security strategy, or with an outdated one, is putting your business front and center to detrimental, damaging, and costly risks. 

At the most basic level, data security refers to how sensitive, proprietary, and personal data is protected from being compromised in any way. 

A data security strategy is a combination of procedures, policies, protocols, and sometimes technology, that is implemented and followed company-wide. 

Why Businesses Should Invest in Data Security 

There is more data to protect than ever before. 

It’s difficult to track down a hard number of how much data a business creates, collects, and stores. There are a lot of variables that impact the figure, from industry specifics to business maturity. 

What is certain is that the amount of data is only increasing, and it’s projected to only continue to do so year-over-year for the foreseeable future. 

For some quantifiable context, companies upload an average of 18.5 terabytes of data to cloud applications each month, according to data experts at AT&T. Just one terabyte can store 130,000 digital photos. Long story short: there is no shortage of data. 

The threat landscape is growing in size, complexity, and sophistication.  

The volume of attacks that a company faces per year, along with the craftiness of each attack, only worsens the threat landscape. 

The numbers tell a powerful story: data breaches have spiked by more than 27 percent each year from an average of 102 per company to 130, according to Accenture’s 2017 Cost of Cyber Crime Study. The same study found an uptick in ransomware attacks from 13 percent to 27 percent.   

Another study from AT&T found that 80 percent of organizations reported at least one security incident last year.   

Organizations should move swiftly to up their defense and develop an iron-clad data security strategy. Being lax on data security not only costs an organization financially but reputationally, which has entire other levels of negative consequences.

Many organizations’ data security strategies are outdated. 

In fact, a study conducted by CIO/Computerworld found that 50 percent of organizations surveyed haven’t updated their security strategy in three or more years. With the speed of attacks and the pace of innovation, having a static strategy in place to protect your data is likely doing more harm than good. 

Cyber attacks are financially devastating. 

The average cost of one data breach last year is estimated by the independent data security research firm Ponemon Institute to be around $3.6 million. 

The financial aftermath of a cyber attack includes not just the attack itself, but the cost of recovery efforts from the disruption to both the business and its customers. The aforementioned Accenture study found that information loss is the highest cost for an organization. 

Effective Data Security Strategies Don’t Just Protect Against Cyber Criminals 

When we think about securing data, we think about how to secure it from those looking to cause harm — cybercriminals, hackers, data thieves, etc. And while that is more than reasonable to consider, it’s only one dimension a data security strategy should prepare for. 

Today’s data security protocol, processes, and procedures need to account for the consequences of: 

• Employee behavior 
• Equipment back-up 
• Human error 
• Offsite data centers

Organizations’ top perceived threats   

As reported in the AT&T’s Global State of Cybersecurity survey, organizations’ top perceived threats for 2018 include: 

• Malware, worms, and viruses – 60% 
• Unauthorized access to corporate data – 49% 
• Ransomware – 46%
• Theft of proprietary company information – 39% 
• Compromise of operational systems – 38% 
• Compromise of mobile devices – 35% 
• Advanced theft of high-level corporate executives – 32% 
• Compromise of IoT devices – 32% 
• Denial of service – 30% 
• Compromise of customer-facing systems (e.g., PoS) – 27%
• A hijacking of social media accounts – 24% 
• Website defacement – 22% 
• Physical safety risks – 21% 

How familiar are you with these threats? Can your current data security strategy protect against them? Conducting a data security assessment is a best practice used to gauge where the strategy stands, and how it can be improved. 

Emerging risks to organizational data 

In addition to an organization’s data being comprised thanks to cybercriminals, ransomware, and other malicious kinds of attacks, an organization should also factor in other risks to their data. 

BYOD

Short for bring-your-own-device, BYOD is a common practice at many organizations that allow employees to use their own computers, smartphones, and other devices for work.  

For organizations, BYOD is a cost saving that cuts out having to provide equipment to each employee, or having to staff an IT department or run a helpdesk. 

For employees, BYOD gives them the freedom to use equipment they are most comfortable with and consolidates work and personal life, cutting down having to carry two cell phones or work from two laptops, for example. BYOD also lends itself to a more remote-style work experience for the employee, cutting the tether to having to be in the office. 

Yet, BYOD creates a number of security risks, such as: 

• Less oversight of computer hygiene (i.e. updating software and passwords) 
• Increase use of unsecured Wi-Fi networks 
• Increase exposure to malware or viruses 

Mobile phones

Over half of last year’s data breaches was due to employee mobile devices, AT&T reported in their Global State of Cybersecurity survey. 

More often than not, employees are prone to use their smartphone with or without an established “BYOD policy” in place. When an employee’s smartphone is used in the business context they aren’t necessarily upheld to the same security standards as a company-issued smartphone such as having a passcode on at all times. 

According to the cyber security experts at AT&T, one-third of mobile devices have a medium-to-high risk of data exposure largely due to employee behavior. 

Mobile apps  

Think about it, when you download an app on your phone do you check who developed it? Do you check to see if there is a threat vector — a means for a hacker to gain access — through the application that can easily hop onto the network at the office? 

Intentional risks such as downloading sensitive company data to your personal smartphone or inadvertent risks of an employee’s phone being hacked by an outsider, are risks regardless and should be considered a part of a comprehensive data security strategy.   

To keep a pulse on the level of awareness your employees have when it comes to company data security protocols and policies, regularly distribute a feedback survey. This practice is a critical part of determining the effectiveness of a data security strategy especially when trying to understand how it influences employee behavior. 

An effective data security strategy is one that evolves with innovation rather than being a static end-all-be-all approach. 

Data security should be designed and viewed as a living, breathing, continuously evolving business strategy that protects data in all forms and at all costs. 

As much as businesses thrive on the innovations of data used to drive decisions, improve products and services, and even helping up employee happiness, innovation is equally as attractive to those looking to cause harm. 

And as such, a business’ data security strategy should be held to high standards, the utmost level of sophistication possible, and ready to protect data no matter what or who tries to comprise it.  

Staffing a dedicated cybersecurity department, building new policies, procedures, and training, investing in technology solutions, cyber insurance, and running consistent risk assessments all are critical elements to build into your forward-thinking proactive data security strategy.  

The post Why a Data Security Strategy Matters to Your Business appeared first on Alchemer.

Just as the Industrial Revolution changed manufacturing processes, for example, the digital economy is changing the role and use of data. 

The Industrial Revolution gave life to the use of machines across industries. The telephone, cotton gin, steam engine, and sewing machine all made their debut during this time period. Communication, agriculture, textiles, and transportation changed forever. 

The digital economy is not only changing the relationship between business and the consumer but calls for a standardization of moral responsibilities around the use of personal data, perhaps for the first time on the global scale. 

This article will provide an overview of the digital economy and its risks. The objective of this article is to spark new ideas on how to elevate and communicate with your customers and iterate the importance and role that trust and transparency has.

What is the Digital Economy?

The digital economy is a societal revolution that is a direct byproduct of the mature use of data to make decisions, increase efficiency, and to innovate.  

Our “always on” society, hyperconnectivity between people, business, devices, data, and processes are no longer a nice-to-have, but they have become the standard way of life, and as such, business and industry must keep pace. Enter, the rise of the digital economy. 

The term itself was first used by business strategist and author Don Tapscott in his book, The Digital Economy: Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence. He discussed the ways digital technology such as the internet was changing the way people interacted with one another and with society. 

Tapscott’s 1997 book was used by businesses as a “survival manual” for adjusting their strategies to align with the rise of people going online and gave perspective to the enigma around operating in a globalized economy. 

Companies such as Amazon, Google, Apple, and Facebook are seen as the earliest adopters and successes of this digital economic ecosystem taking shape.  

Put simply, the digital economy is a maturation of society and threads through all aspects of daily life from how we interact with one another to what job skills are needed. 

The full potential of the digital economy, the World Economic Forum estimates, could mean new scientific research and breakthroughs, new job opportunities, and never-before-seen economic growth. 

For business, the ecosystem of the digital economy changes: 

• Traditional infrastructures and models
• Approach to data privacy and security 
• Meeting enhanced consumer demand and expectation 
• The velocity of decisions and growth
• Connection access and availability 

Risks of the Digital Economy 

With more opportunity comes more risks. Being aware of the risks associated with this shift will not be enough. 

Businesses should prepare and proactively structure themselves to these risks as best they can to avoid any detrimental impacts such as losing great employees and loyal customers, becoming irrelevant in the market, and losing their edge on the competition. 

Risks of digitization include: 

• Impact on jobs 
• The use of personal data 
• A backlash against technology  
• Loss of trust 
• More opportunities for attacks on data 

Competing in the Digital Economy Means Adopting New Approaches 

The year-over-year momentum of digitization proves its value to businesses. Yet, a recent McKinsey digital global survey found that only 8 percent of companies believe their business model will remain economically viable through digitization.  

“The reason, we believe, is that digital transformation is uniquely challenging, touching every function and business unit while also demanding the rapid development of new skills and investments that are very different from business as usual,” says McKinsey Partner Paul Willmott and Principles Tunde Olanrewaju and Kate Smaje.  

And with the speed and capabilities of new technologies, staying ahead of the trends new tech creates and the disruption it causes is critical. Business value and relevance is retained by companies who have a strategic approach that is complementary to this shift.  

Experts from MIT Sloan Research have found that companies that are making strides to adapt to the digital economy are 26 percent more profitable than others in their industry who are not. 

As such, those early adopting companies will have long-term market share than those who resist the change. 

“Eventually, what was once radical is normal, and unprepared incumbents run the risk of becoming the next Blockbuster. Others, which have successfully built new capabilities (as Burberry did in retailing), become powerful digital players,” says McKinsey Partners Martin Hirt and Willmott. 

How to be Successful in the Digital Economy 

Develop a Unified Company Definition of “Digital” 

When used in different contexts, the term digital can mean different things to different people, companies, and industries.  

McKinsey researchers echo that having a “fuzzy definition” of what leaders mean by digital is a top pitfall of digital strategies that are developed to align with the digital economy. 

“When we talk with leaders about what they mean by digital, some view it as the upgraded term for what their IT function does. Others focus on digital marketing or sales. But very few have a broad, holistic view of what digital really means,”  says digital strategy experts at McKinsey. 

Without a clear definition of the term digital, connecting a digital strategy to your business will remain a constant struggle. 

Adjust the Market Strategy 

Sometimes accepting the reality of change results in ignoring it all together in hopes that an out-of-sight-out-of-mind approach will stop the change from happening.  

Yet, taking this approach when looking to become a competitive player in the digital economic landscape is a formula that only calculates failure. 

Establishing a digital market strategy will not only help you create the edge you need to push out the competition but will allow you to have a clear direction forward. 

And while developing a traditional market strategy isn’t much different than developing a digital marketing strategy, the pace of change in the digital economy is much faster, relentless, uncertain, and complex. 

Adjusting a brick-and-mortar based market strategy will, of course, be inherently more challenging than adjusting a market strategy that was designed for online-based businesses, but consider who more successful and who will thrive in this new age. 

Top considerations to factor into a digital market strategy include: 

• In the next five years, what direction is your industry projected to take? 
• What role does your company want to play in that future?
• Set your goals around the results of the first two bullets and build out a tactical plan on how to reach those goals.
• How well do you know your customers and target audience? Get to know them and then some. Adjust your strategy to meet and exceed their wants, needs, and expectations as well as how your product/service/company solves their pain points.
• Identify what marketing tools you may need to prove ROI and performance in digital channels such as social media and online advertising.
• Leverage key tactics to help drive awareness, increase customer engagement, improve conversion, and up retention rates: digital advertising, search marketing, content marketing, social media marketing, and email marketing. 

Become and Remain Customer-Centric 

Like with any relationship, the one you develop with your customers will need regular management. In the digital economy, the average customer is smarter, savvier, and more suspicious of being “marketed” to not to mention their digital empowerment. 

Capturing and sustaining their attention is harder than ever, but the rewards of winning them over are more rewarding. 

When a customer is loyal to you, the benefits to the business are worth the cat-and-mouse chase. You’ll see increased retention, referrals, and satisfaction — even better feedback for product enhancements.  

Yet, creating rich experiences time and again is no doubt a challenge and requires a more investment of time, money, and energy. 

From the first point of interaction through to retaining customers, companies must provide an exceptional and holistic customer experience. And doing so is a business-wide effort.

Map out your customer journey and break it down into segments to provide a greater focus and clarity on where the biggest improvements in your customer experience program can be made to provide the greatest benefits to your bottom-line. 

Related: How Vertafore Maintains Customer Experience Excellence 

Create a culture that is data-driven and transparent 

“Companies must rethink their structures and culture to better deal with new market environments and business models,” says Lindsey Anderson and Irving Wladawksy-Berger of the Harvard Business Review. “The hierarchical organization that prevailed in the 20th century’s production-oriented industrial economy will not work in the more global and fast-changing digital economy.” 

Companies who are thriving in this space, such as Amazon and Google share the following culture traits:

• Data-driven
• Transparent 
• Collaborative 
• More action, better words 

Company culture sets the tone for others to follow and should influence the behavior of not only employees but customers. To sustain culture dynamics, companies must consistently reinforce and follow-through with every tenant of its culture. 

Trust, privacy, and security are more important than ever 

Being data-driven comes with some scary consequences. The more data a company leverages, the more opportunity there is for that data to become compromised. Cybersecurity and privacy programs that are built to mitigate data-related risks should go hand-in-hand with becoming data-driven. 

Communicate all security and privacy programs to employees and customers in order to build and keep their trust. Digitization makes so many more opportunities available, but also the risks are more detrimental than ever. Having a solid foundation of trust is critical.  

The post What is the Digital Economy? appeared first on Alchemer.

GDPR is short for the General Data Protection Regulation and it comes into full effect May 25, 2018. In only three short months, businesses across the world that work with the personal data of any EU citizen or resident are required to comply with GDPR. 

While GDPR shares many traits with its predecessor, the EU’s Data Protection Act, GDPR is hands-down the stricter, more hard-hitting younger relative that protects the use of personal data. 

This article will provide a brief overview of GDPR so you can start or continue work on a data protection compliance program at your company.  

The legislation, as it appears in the Official Journal of the European Union, sums up the impetus for GDPR best: 

“Rapid technological developments and globalisation have brought new challenges for the protection of personal data. The scale of the collection and sharing of personal data has increased significantly. Technology allows both private companies and public authorities to make use of personal data on an unprecedented scale in order to pursue their activities.”  

It’s important to note that this article should not be used as sound legal advice. If you are looking for lawful guidance and recommendations in preparing for GDPR, consult a data protection authority. 

GDPR Grants People More Control Over How Their Personal Data is Used. 

In the EU, personal data protection is considered a fundamental human right, and with more and more data breaches only increasing in severity and long-term impact, the need to protect personal data is more pressing than in years past.  

GDPR Overview

The EU has historically taken a more stringent approach to handling data than the U.S. has. GDPR is pushing aside the former data protection initiative, the EU Data Protection Directive, or Directive 95/46/EC, which was adopted over 20 years ago. 

Personal data protection regulation has been in dire need of a transformation, and GDPR offers just that and then some. 

Data protection regulations such as the ones mentioned above, and all of their predecessors, come on the heels of massive leak events.

Illegal government-run surveillance programs such as what Edward Snowden leaked about the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) along with European government entities and large telecom companies in 2013, is feeding the need for regulations like the GDPR.  

The NSA leaks are one example of why a regulation like the GDPR is so needed. Massive data breaches at discount retailer Target Corporation and consumer credit reporting agency Equifax offer even more validation. 

Couple these kinds of events with the incredibly fast pace of how global data-driven companies and organizations operate, vulnerabilities are exposed, data protection and security program show their gaps, and the risks of using personal data for business purpose come to surface.  

GDPR is the most recent attempt at a regulation aiming to set the pace of data protection. While the use of data has taken off rapidly across industries and sectors, the regulation and protection of personal data have comparatively not kept that same pace. 

We see time and again with every data breach that protecting our personal data and the personal data of others is critical. When personal data winds up in the wrong hands, the consequences are irrefutable, expensive, and in some cases, life ruining.  

The EU is Comprised of 28 Member States with a Total Estimated Population of 510 Million People.  

The UK will be adhering to the legal framework of GDPR when it comes to privacy and data protection even after they withdraw from the EU in what has come to be known as Brexit, according to legal experts at Shearman & Sterling, an international law firm that considers the GDPR one of the firm’s key issues.  

For U.S. Organizations, GDPR Does Have an Impact.

It’s easy to hear GDPR and think that since it’s an EU-led regulation that businesses in the U.S. can forgo having to comply. 

Yet, for any U.S. organizations — no matter the size — that conduct business with any EU market and process the personal data of anyone living in the EU, they must comply with GDPR. 

Consequences of being out of compliance with GDPR are some hard and fast fines amounting to whatever calculates to be the greater sum: €20,000,000 or 4 percent of annual worldwide turnover.  

Large data-driven companies such as Google and Amazon started preparing for the regulation when it was first passed in 2016. The foundation of these businesses, and ones like them, is centered around handling data. Preparing for GDPR at large scale data-driven companies requires a longer process of preparation. 

However, for small businesses who don’t have a table stake in working with too much personal data and primarily handle only a small amount are also expected to take any necessary steps to be in compliance with GDPR.  

GDPR compliance is not to be approached as a check-the-box, one-and-done compliance process. Rather, it is poised to be best practice moving forward when it comes to protecting personal data, required to be maintained at all times, not just when May 25, 2018, comes around. 

When assessing your data protection program to prepare for GDPR, consider the following:   

• Under GDPR, there are a handful of new rights that people are given. Get as familiar with them as possible to ensure you’re prepared to adhere to each right whenever they are exercised. These rights are paraphrased from the legislation later in this article. 
• Every new organizational process or system implementation you may have on the horizon is expected to follow suit with GDPR. You can ensure compliance by conducting a Data Protection Impact Assessment. 
• Start chipping away at developing an action plan that can be used during a data breach. GDPR requires breach notifications to be sent within 72 hours of a breach becoming known. By having a plan and a draft notification at the ready, it’s one less thing to stress over during an inherently high-stress event.
• It’s very clear from the get-go that focal point of GDPR is around accountability and transparency. Because of this, organizations need to prove they are GDPR compliant at any given time if requested by the governing authorities. Keeping a well-documented and easily accessible paper trail at times is a great fail-safe to have when the regulators come knocking.

What is Considered “Personal Data” Under the GDPR?  

Think about the amount of information you enter for an everyday purchase on Amazon — credit card number, home address, email address. Not to mention the information the site itself collects using cookies such as your computer’s IP address. Everything you’ve entered is considered “personal data.” 

If you then think of other instances online in which you enter information, say if you’re checking your credit score or applying for a home loan or car shopping, “personal data” is everywhere, which means, the risk of it being illegally used, is high. 

Under GDPR, “personal data” officially includes:

• Your full legal name — how your name appears on your birth certificate and other vital legal documents like a social security card.
• Age, date of birth, social security number, passport number, and driver’s license number. 
• Home and email addresses.
• Credit card information and banking account information.  
• Any logins to websites and their passwords.  

It’s easiest to think of “personal data” as any information that can be used to identify you in any way. This includes any information about your racial or ethnic origin, political opinions or party affiliation, religious beliefs, physical or mental health condition, criminal history, and even your sexual orientation and history. 

GDPR does distinguish between “personal” data (anything in the bulleted list above) and “sensitive data” (anything in the above paragraph), but regardless of the distinction, GDPR protects the use of both personal and sensitive data. 

Rights That Each Individual Has Under GDPR

The right to be informed

Businesses are required to inform individuals on how they are using their personal data by them sending privacy notices. 

The right of access

Individuals have the right to access their personal data at any time to confirm its accuracy. Under this right, people can deny a business use of their personal data if it is indeed inaccurate in any way and have the chance to correct it.

The right to rectification

If someone finds out that their personal data is missing information, is incorrect, or not true, the person can require the business to correct it.  

The right to erasure

This right is perhaps the most intriguing in the sense that it feels like you can never truly delete anything about yourself that appears on the internet. When you do “delete” an unused retail account, you can’t help but think that it could still be active, living in the digital alleyways and anyone with even a slight knowledge of computer hacking and malicious intent can find it if they really wanted to.  

This right allows people to tell companies to delete their personal data completely without reason. 

Subjectively speaking, GDPR allows people to go off the grid, so to speak, which seems unattainable these days despite the best of efforts to be digitally forgotten. 

The right to restrict processing

If someone finds an error or anything false in their personal data, they not only have the right to make corrections but they also can tell a business that while they are making the corrections, the business is not allowed to use or process their data until it’s fully corrected.   

The right to data portability

If someone wants to take their personal data from a business, not only can they have access but they have the right to reuse their data for their own intentions. The business is required to provide the person their data safely and securely and in a readable file format such as a .CSV. 

The right to object

It’s likely that you’ve searched something on Google, say “fuel efficient cars” for example, read a few articles, and suddenly started to see ads for the Toyota Prius or the latest hybrid SUV. 

While many of us have become immune to personalized marketing, and maybe even prefer it, opting out of this use of your data is easier under GDPR. 

If a person isn’t OK with how a company uses their personal data to target them in their marketing or advertising, or any other public use of their data, they have the right to say no more and formally object.

Rights in relation to automated decision making 

Making things more efficient is the name of the technology game, not to mention the explosion of automated decision making technologies. But sometimes the way personal data is automatically used to make a decision via algorithms and data mapping remove too much of the human element. 

When decisions are made only using a computerized process, like with any piece of technology, errors or discrepancies can happen. While this kind of technology is a major time saver for industries like banking for example when running a person’s credit, a real live human being should be at the ready to review and confirm the decision made by the computer. 

Under GDPR, if a person feels that an automated decision has “significant effects” on them, they have the right to object the decision and ensure the final say is determined by a human. 

What is Different With GDPR Compared to Other Data Protection Regulations? 

In addition to the high fines for GDPR non-compliance and expanded rights to individuals, the main difference between this regulation and past data protection initiatives in the EU is the level of accountability.

GDPR compliance is expected to be followed-through and maintained by those who directly work with personal data. 

This high level of accountability of the GDPR is an effort to create a balance and clear obligation between those requesting to use personal data and those who offer the service to do so. The EU distinguishes these roles as  “data controllers” and “data processors”.  

GDPR and General Data Protection Resources to Bookmark.

Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK’s independent authority  

The ICO frequently publishes helpful resources for organizations such as checklists, readiness assessment templates, and posts all relevant updates related to GDPR. The ICO has clearly listed out the GDPR obligations required by each sector or industry that you can review and follow as it relates to your organization or business. 

EUR-Lex, access to the European Union Law  

Access and read GDPR’s official text. 

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) 

The U.S. FTC shares tips for businesses when it comes to protecting personal information. 

Alchemer Resource Center 

Keep the Alchemer Resource Center saved as we will be covering GDPR and offering insights on how to best collect and track the necessary information you need to become GDPR compliant. 

Again, we are not GDPR experts nor do we claim to be a voice of authority in data protection legislation, but we are experts in data collection, building effective assessments — among many other data insight and analysis areas. 

While we can’t offer you lawful GDPR guidance, we can provide you with best practices for collecting the information you need to prove your data protection program is in compliance with the GDPR. We will be doing so by sharing these best practices in our Resource Center. 

Even if you are not required to be GDPR compliant, proactively adopting its data protection standards is a smart move. 

It’s clear that data protection and the regulations around it for businesses are taking high priority around the world. It’s only natural to do so in our data-driven ways of life. 

Experts in data protection compliance say it’s only a matter of time when a similar regulation is initiated here in the U.S. Having your program aligned with GDPR will give you the leg up on preparing for any new data protection regulation that may become a standard — and required —  business practice in due time.

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Ten years ago, we launched Alchemer as a software tool to help market researchers carry out projects more quickly, and gather insights without the need for inefficient and cumbersome work to build their data collection mechanisms. For a long time we operated as an incredibly robust tool for users that needed a tool to satisfy fairly simple, straightforward needs.

Over the past decade we’ve had clients that have pushed the limits both of our tool, and of our vision for what we previously considered possible as a company. We love all of our customers, but there is a special place in my heart for those users that have “hacked” our product to make it do things we’d never considered before. These users are the people that have opened our eyes to what we are truly capable of here at Alchemer.

We have grown to become far more than just a piece of survey software.

When we came to the realization that businesses were consistently using Alchemer to build customized data applications tailored to their own specific needs, we identified a whole new world of potential for ourselves as an organization. There is truly no reason why Alchemer shouldn’t be functioning as the central data collection and insights platform across entire enterprises looking to streamline their efforts.

With the inclusion of Alchemer in the G2 Crowd Enterprise Feedback Management Grid Report, we’ve been recognized by our users as a truly comprehensive enterprise-level feedback management platform. We’ve always known that we’ve had these capabilities, but we’re humbled and honored that our beloved users and the respective market have validated this perspective by recognizing our performance in this space.

“Alchemer has been identified as a High Performer in our Fall 2017 Enterprise Feedback Management Grid Report, based on their high levels of satisfaction,” said Mitch Lieberman, Director of Research for G2 Crowd.

I especially love this quote because it validates, for me, that when we put our minds towards a goal such as expanding our offerings to better suit our clients, and dedicate the appropriate resources to achieving that goal, our users take notice, implement new solutions, and love us for it. And we love them back.

I’d like to take this opportunity to express my extreme gratitude. Thank you so much to all of our users and customers that have continued to push us to be the best company we can be. We vow to continue to improve and enhance our product to provide optimal service to all of our users.

With your help, data can truly make a difference.

Sincerely,

Christian Vanek, CEO

G2 Crowd Grid^® for Enterprise Feedback Management Software

G2 Crowd Recognizes Alchemer As A High Performer In Enterprise Feedback Management [Press Release]

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The post Alchemer CEO Reacts to Being Named a High Performer in Enterprise Feedback Management by G2 Crowd appeared first on Alchemer.