What makes a strategy “digital?”
Years ago, I worked at a global agency that primarily produced TV and print advertising. One day, a senior executive told me about an office initiative to become more “digital.”
They had an idea: They were going to “put TV screens everywhere,” he said. “Could you help?,” he asked.
Shaking my head on the inside, I nodded, trying to keep a positive outlook. But for all of the enthusiasm and good intent, they just didn’t get what it meant to be digital.
It’s a common misstep, thinking that a screen or a channel or a process makes something “digital.” But digital is so much more.
When we speak of digital transformation, changes such as pivoting from print ads to Facebook ads and paper-based documentation to digital-based documentation are important. But digital strategy goes far beyond the substitution of “digital” counterparts.
Digital is ultimately a way of thinking, communicating and interacting with the world. It’s a point of view and a belief system. To use digital well, you have to embrace it.
The foundations of digital and why they matter
The underpinnings of digital can be linked to numerous interwoven philosophies. Let’s take a look at a number of them.
- Cybernetics and Systems Theory: These theories are based in the concept that feedback provides “noise in the system” that promotes change. The concept of feedback is core to digital because digital enables feedback. When just about anyone can publish their thoughts, new ideas enter society at a fast pace.
Question for your organization: How can/does large scale democratic input from customers and non-customers influence your policies, position in the market and offering?
- Post modernism: Postmodernism is all about questioning and deconstructing modernist and pre-modernist norms. Digital is both a promoter and a product of post modernism. Through digital’s enablement of feedback, societal change, from the #metoo movement to Black Lives Matter, has been organized and amplified.
Question for your organization: What beliefs or structures — either internal to your organization or external facing to your clients and customers, has digital disrupted? How can you embrace and learn from these? - Metaphysics: Metaphysics tackles concepts such as knowing, being time and space. On the one hand, digital has deconstructed time and space by connecting people asynchronously on a quickened scale. On the other, knowing has been democratized and detached from authority. Metaphysician Charles Sanders Peirce suggest that what we know is social.
Questions for your organization: What do your customers believe about your brand? Why do they believe that? Is this social belief aligned with your brand vision and values? How can you use digital to amplify or influence these beliefs? - Media ecology: Media ecology suggests that communications technology is the key driver of social change because it impacts the way in which we process the world around us. From a media ecology perspective, there have been three key phases of communications. The first phase (aural/non-linear) was disrupted by the alphabet (visual/linear) and this second phase was disrupted by electronic or digital media, starting with the telegraph through to TikTok. Today we live in a hybrid visual/aural phase and linear/non-linear environment.
Question for your organization: What modes of communication are you using to communicate with your customers? Have you tried social audio or new types of communication technologies?
- Networked individualism: A component of media ecology and postmodernism, networked individualism captures the transition from linear structure to non-linear ones, such as nuclear families to blended families or jobs in a company to careers in a profession. These new structures are more fluid, allowing for both the individual and the community to coincide.
Question for your organization: What structure does your brand support and are these aligned with current belief systems of your customers? (This is a great example of how your brand can deconstruct outdated societal norms.)
These are the foundations of what makes digital, digital. When people don’t understand why or how to use, say, Facebook, it’s because they don’t understand these core tenets. And in the worst cases, they are frightened or threatened by them because they don’t (and often don’t want to) understand.
How to “think digital”
If you, or your team or your boss, is having trouble applying these concepts, try answering the questions above. In addition, try the following:
- Approach digital with an open mind
I’ve seen many people—people I’ve worked with and people I’ve worked for—simply refuse to adopt digital thinking because, well, they don’t want to. But staying stuck in old ways of doing things is not productive. It takes just a seed of willingness to try to understand something new and to set outdated modes behind. These people either give up or create their own barriers because they simply refuse to embrace digital. But digital is not out to get you. Look for the goodness. Set aside your fears. Try out new digital channels, products and experiences and maybe even read a book about digital. - Learn a little
Just a little bit of investigation into digital thinking can go a long way. Here are a few resources to try out: Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky is a great primer on some key concepts of social media. It’s been around for awhile but it’s still relevant. The New Childhood: Raising Kids to Thrive in a Connected World by Jonathan Shapiro, while technically a parenting book, is a must read for anyone working in digital these days because it provides insights into digital thinking with our youngest generation. Also check out strategic thinkers like Jeremiah Owyang. There’s a lot out there, but these should get you started. - Understand your people
Everybody uses digital in some way. For example, nearly everyone uses email and YouTube. And the pandemic essentially forced those holding out to try it. And once those hold-outs did try digital ways of doing things, many say they are not going back. Whether you’re trying to reach your customers, donors or employees through communications, products or operational initiatives, try to understand what they need and how digital thinking can solve it.
It’s only when we embrace digital thinking that we can create authentic approaches for connection. We don’t have to understand every theory, but we must apply the core concepts of feedback and non-linearity. Otherwise, attempts to “digitize” feel forced, kind of like adding a bunch of TV screens to an office to look tech forward.
