Even though Norwegian companies constantly work hard to meet customer expectations and keep up with the technological evolution, they are not utilizing the full potential within the digital dimensions analyzed in this report.
To be able to meet competition from new and global players, most Norwegian companies need to make significant efforts within most digital areas.
The impact of digitalization is continuing to accelerate and is rapidly influencing and changing the competitive landscape in all industries. Established organizations are continuously being challenged by new players, and consumer behaviors and habits are changing. As the world is becoming more consumer-driven, a key success factor is understanding how to make better use of digital assets to improve loyalty, accelerate e-commerce, develop sustainable growth and create disruptive business models. A disruptive digital customer experience represents an opportunity for new entrants and a challenge for incumbents. Successful companies have a deep understanding of consumers' needs and preferences. They are able to satisfy consumers' expectations for continuous improvement and innovation, meaningful and contextualized experiences, simplicity and speed. They know both how to create a compelling digital experience and how to disrupt their own business models, sales force, operations and CRM to prevent customer preemption by other aggregators.
The purpose of this report is to present how mature Norwegian and Nordic companies are when it comes to using digital technologies to improve their businesses and create competitive advantages. The report measures digital maturity within six dimensions for 10 industries, and detailed analyses are presented for each dimension and industry. In total, we have analyzed 70 companies within 256 criteria. The evaluation is made as an outside-in observation, where the digital dimensions are analyzed from a customer point of view.
This is the second time that BearingPoint Norway makes this report; last year, one of the key findings was that Norwegian companies were less digitally mature overall than their Nordic counterparts. This year, we see that trend has continued, and most Norwegian companies are still ranked behind their Nordic peers.
The detailed findings per industry and dimension can be found in the relevant sections of the report, but a couple of observations are worth mentioning here. First of all, very few organizations score well in all dimensions. One exception is FINN.no, the overall winner, which scores well in all dimensions. Based on the low score many companies achieve within the areas analyzed, we see that there is a lot of unused potential when it comes to utilizing digital technology to improve different areas of the business. The second key finding is that the dimensions where Norwegian companies score best are in digital product experience and mobile. Furthermore, telecom is the industry winner by a clear margin both in Norway and in the Nordics overall. Lastly, an interesting trend seems to be that mobile websites are improving more than the companies’ mobile applications. This trend has been expected and we now we see it happening, as several retail players only interact with their customers through mobile websites, not through apps.
The main conclusion in the report is that there is a lot of unused potential within the digital dimensions analyzed. Companies should use digital channels to get a more personalized and involved relationship with their customers. Utilizing big data, advanced analytics and artificial intelligence will be crucial to create competitive advantages in this area. As new opportunities arise together with new technology, customers’ expectations will rise as well. Customers will demand flexible, simple and fast solutions with a very high degree of customer service.
To be future winners in their industries, companies need to take a more strategic approach toward digital transformation. They should make detailed analyses of how digitalization impacts all areas of their business and how their business model can be improved to create competitive advantage.
