Six top tips for IoT success
Matt Clarke, Amaze
From cars to kitchen appliances, warehouse management and agriculture to smarter cities, the pervasive opportunities presented by connected devices and the Internet of Things (IoT) to every imaginable industry are infinite. Even though we are still early in the adoption stages of IoT, there is widespread belief that we are teetering on the edge of an explosion that will make previous technology revolutions – such as the rise of social media – seem like small fry. If you think of the web browser as the first dimension of the internet and mobile the second, then IoT is the third, writes Matt Clarke, the chief technology officer at digital marketing, technology and commerce consultancy Amaze.
While the applications and opportunities presented by IoT may be infinite, so too are the associated disruptions and challenges. The all-encompassing vision of IoT is still a distant dream for the majority, with the reality a series of isolated projects.
It is all too easy to get caught up in the excitement of IoT without stopping to consider how to really unlock its true potential. Those who approach it as a gimmick or with a short-term mentality without creating a strategy around how it can really add value will ultimately fail.
Key considerations for IoT success
So, what do organisations embarking on an IoT strategy need to consider? The key considerations are outlined below.
- Take ownership Driving IoT implementation will bring up new challenges, not least in connecting business systems across business boundaries. This needs strong companywide collaboration, championed by leadership. No one person or department can plan and implement an IoT strategy alone – nor should they, as for IoT to live up to its potential organisations need to join the dots between existing silos of information.
As such, whoever ‘owns’ IoT within an organisation also needs to help drive a cultural shift to encourage departments – from marketing and ecommerce to IT and HR – to innovate and work collaboratively towards realising a holistic customer view.
- Innovate, innovate, innovate The average lifespan of a company is now just 15 years according to the S&P index. The main reason for this? Failure to embrace innovation. Kodak is a classic example here. Although it is the company responsible for inventing the digital camera, ironically its failure to embrace it led to the company’s downfall.
All too often boardrooms focus on figures and not the future – but there needs to be a shift in mentality to invest in innovation. It is so hugely important for organisations to carve out time to be innovative and really think through exactly what they want to achieve with IoT, where they want to go with it and how they’re going to get there.
- Embrace changes in product and service design Part of the reason that taking time to innovate is so important is that the advent of IoT is having an enormous impact on both product and service design – and it is these changes that will drive the commercial success of IoT.
As the connected devices that make up the IoT become more prevalent, the lines between software and hardware will continue to blur. Devices that are connected to the internet do not just offer the opportunity to collect data, they can receive it too. For example, a manufacturer could push out an update to make an older model washing machine run as efficiently as the latest model. In effect, products could improve over time rather than vice versa.
- Intelligent use of data to gain a single customer view As business models shift to subscription based approaches, accessing and exploiting customer data will be absolutely key. To encourage customers to sign up to and continue using subscription based services, organisations will need to know them extremely well, in order to repeatedly anticipate their needs and maximise their experience. For this, organisations will need to understand how their customers consume their services, by tracking their behaviours across channels over time.
Customers already increasingly expect a personalised, seamless experience across all digital touch points and the increase of connected devices on the IoT will only compound this expectation. Fortunately, IoT will also provide a goldmine of customer data – for those organisations that can successfully collect and analyse it at least.
- Build on your current investment The technology to enable connected devices and the IoT things for organisations is, generally, all in place. The majority of organisations have a digital estate encompassing mobile, commerce, CMS, web, analytics, bespoke apps etc. This is good news for many organisations, as it means they do not necessarily need to re-invent their digital estate. Indeed, an organisation’s CMS system is often the only single source of truth amongst all digital assets and content within a business.
It is a vital component within a digital ecosystem that can handle scale and load and is the only platform that is capable of managing a business’ brand experience. In addition, it’s agile and is already gathering intelligence– why on earth would you start again? Instead, build on this investment.
- It’s all about the cloud The cloud is absolutely key in terms of enabling IoT, as it can facilitate not only the integration of the aforementioned technologies, but also the exchange of data that is so central to IoT. It is not only a very efficient hosting environment, it is also possibly the only affordable way to realise IoT.
When building on their current assets, organisations need to ensure they invest in cloud-based infrastructure in order to reap the rewards IoT can enable. Think of the cloud as the brains and control system for the new IoT ecosystem – without it, there is no glue to bind all the devices and platforms together.
Final thoughts
IoT is set to be more disruptive and far reaching than many realise. If approached correctly, it can revolutionise customer experience, streamline operations, completely alter product and service design and deliver new business models and revenue streams.
It is vital that organisations claim ownership of the IoT agenda and drive the change needed to join the dots between their digital functions, not just look at IoT as a way to streamline processes or generate cost savings.
Put bluntly, those that do not, will fail to reap the rewards offered by IoT. Businesses are at a clear junction – they can either make changes to improve their market share going forward, or stick to existing models and risk failure.