The company Moxo has released data on the digital-first nature of businesses. The report’s findings reveal the digital-first nature of today’s world, especially for client-facing businesses.
With the survey, to understand how businesses are addressing these challenges and the opportunities for improvement, Moxo surveyed 1,500 clients and 1,500 internal- and external-facing employees across three high-touch industries: finance, real estate and legal.
The findings are balanced between employee and client expectations. For example, the report finds that 90 percent of clients agree their preferred method of communication when asking questions about business transactions is digitally, rather than scheduling an in-person appointment or phone call.
The company ran a similar survey last year which produced a similar percentage (89 percent) in favour of digital forms of communication.
However, digital is not synonymous with simplicity. This is borne out by over two-thirds of employees (67 percent) and 72 percent of clients believe their company uses so many different digital tools and technologies that it makes certain tasks more complex.
This challenge has worsened during the avalanche of technology implemented during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. In comparison, as 63 percent of employees and 64 percent of clients felt the same last year.
One area missing from the digital arsenal is with applications. Less than half of employees (45 percent) said their organizations offer a mobile app. Another lagging area is automation for only 36 percent of respondents say their organization offers automation tools or workflow software. This is called out in the report as surprising, considering more than half of employees (60 percent) say their organizations have accelerated their technology investments over the past 12 months.
Outsourcing is a perennial area of interest for business. More recently there has been an interest on diversification as a means of managing risk and here 85 percent of clients would consider using a service provider outside their geographic area. To add to this, 90 percent of employees believe it would be beneficial to engage with clients outside their region.
Despite the desire for a wider spread of providers, 74 percent of service providers note that their clients are all located in their regional vicinity.
