You’ve adopted an accounts receivable solution and are ready for your organisation to start reaping the benefits. There’s just one problem. You’ve got to get your customers on board. Tools like digital invoicing and an online self-service payment portal are only useful if you can get your clients to use them.
According to the Boston Consulting Group, a startling 70% of organisations fall short of their digitisation goals.
That’s where digital optimisation comes into play. A digital optimisation team (DOT) is designed to help get your team up-to-speed with the software, while also easing and facilitating your customers’ transition to the new process.
Clearly Define and Track Your Goals
When implementing digitisation, a failure to clearly define goals and benchmarks can be a frequent cause of failure. The Forbes Technology Council cited a failure to set clear end-user experience goals, miscommunication of project goals, and a failure to align goals as three of the leading reasons that organisations are unsuccessful in their digital transformation projects.
“Not having clear goals to achieve in terms of end-user experience and accurate ways to measure it is often the reason the target is missed.” – Forbes Technology Council
But whether your goal is to start small by increasing digital payments by as little as 25%, or to fully transition your entire customer base to digital payments, a DOT can work with you to craft a personalised strategy that will help you achieve the benchmarks that you’ve set.
A DOT will also work with you to create tailored reports that will help you track your progress toward those goals in real-time.
Crafting a Communication Strategy
In their study, Forbes also found that a poor onboarding process can be a major source of failure when it comes to digital transformation. Getting your customers to buy into the transition is an essential part of this, ensuring that they not only know what is different, but also recognise the benefits of the change.
That’s a challenge that CallRevu faced when they adopted our AR automation solution.
“Our business works directly with automotive companies, and many are reluctant to adopt new technologies. They like to maintain a paper trail for each transaction and want to ensure that they’re secure.” – Chuck Connor, AR Manager, CallRevu
Our digital optimisation specialist worked with CallRevu to onboard their customers. Automated communications containing invitations to switch to digital payments were sent out each time a customer submitted a payment via paper check. In addition, our DOT worked with CallRevu’s AR team to develop comprehensive talking points so that they could effectively explain the benefits of digital payments to customers and how to use Quadient AR’s self-service payment portal. Finally, a “pay now” button was added to all invoices, so that customers could submit payments through the online portal via the touch of a button.
“They helped us send messages to customers informing them of the speed and security benefits. This has enabled us to lower DSO and improve customer experience.” - Chuck Connor, AR Manager, CallRevu
Beyond simply explaining why digital payments were more convenient, CallRevu was able to provide information about PCI-DSS compliance, assuring customers that their payment data was protected. Quadient AR meets the 12 broad requirements and 200 line-item requirements stated on the PCI Security Standards website, while only 27% of businesses can say the same! That means customers can make digital payments, safe in the knowledge that the data they share is maintained in a secure environment.
The results were dramatic. Not only did paper check payments decrease by 50%, but customers began making payments faster. Days sales outstanding (DSO) decreased by nine days, even though their customer base doubled during the transition.
Find the Difference Between Success and Failure
According to the Boston Consulting Group, 80% of organisations plan to accelerate their digital transformations. Unfortunately, the majority will fall short of their goals. Working with a digital optimisation team can be the key difference between achieving transformation and falling back into “business as usual.”
To learn more about how Quadient Accounts Receivable can assist your digital optimisation process, download our case study, CallRevu reduces paper checks by 50% with Digital Optimisation.
