The scaling of digital propositions and capabilities is at the top of many brands’ agendas, with 25% of CEOs agreeing that advancing digitization business-wide is a top priority between now and 2025.

But the challenges of achieving the desired ROI from digital expansion have been heighted by the rising costs of the ecommerce landscape. Plus, such perceived costs may be deterring more brand owners from putting digitalization at the top of their agenda.

So, how can brands achieve strategic scalability – the ability to grow and expand operations without being hindered by available resources or operational models - within such an environment?

From setting a strategic vision to laying the right technological foundations, these are the fundamentals of strategic scalability for digital brands today.

Setting your strategic vision and objectives

A clear strategic vision is the foundation of scalability for a business and provides the blueprint against which you can identify the necessary changes you need to make within your operational and go-to-market approach to maximize growth potential.

Aligning to your brand values, goals and mission, your strategic vision should be set using the following steps:

• Understanding your target audience: Knowing the nuances of your target market and consumers can help you tailor your products or services to meet their needs and preferences and can be achieved through research or by leveraging existing first-party data obtained through owned channels. 
• Assessing your competition: Knowing your competition in both existing and target markets will provide fundamental insights to identify your own differentiating factors enabling you to develop a unique value proposition. Consider what products and services are currently available to consumers and how your offering can attract and secure buyers against this competition.
• Defining your unique selling proposition (USP): Knowledge of your consumers and competition will enable your USP to be defined and leveraged. This could be anything from the distinctive features of your product, to the community of buyers of your brand, to the price point you offer. The key is to align your USP with the demands of your target consumer to maximize revenue potential. 
• Setting both viable and aspirational goals: Define clear, measurable goals that align with your vision and growth ambitions. Consider not only goals based on your current technological, operational and digital capabilities, but also targets that could be achieved should you make changes to the infrastructure your brand operates on that will enable long-term success and durable scalability.

Enabling your strategic vision: Choosing the right operational model and infrastructure

The desirability of your brand and product must also be matched by your ability to effectively and cost-efficiently deliver your proposition in your chosen market.

After setting your strategic vision and growth goals, the best operations model should be selected for your brand; these include: 

• In-house – a brand owner takes full responsibility to run all operations, technology and digital services internally.
• Outsourced – a brand owner gives control to multiple third-party providers to run the brand.
• Hybrid – a brand collaborates with third-party providers to leverage the strongest offerings whilst keeping some aspects of the business in-house. This can involve multiple vendors or simply choosing a single provider that offers multiple ecommerce services you require, such as THG Ingenuity, to help minimize complexities of multiple vendors and reduce costs.

Whether operating on an in-house model or partnering with a specialist provider, intrinsic to executing your digital strategy is the technology on which your brand operates.

If your current ecommerce platform cannot cater for the sales functions required to maximize revenue opportunities and enhance customer experience, it could be a sign it’s time to switch ecommerce platforms.

Equally, brands should consider whether their existing fulfillment and marketing service capabilities are sufficient to match evolving consumer demands in order to review whether existing solutions will enable you to achieve your strategic scalability goals.

Securing scalable growth and ongoing performance

Once you’ve laid the foundations that will maximize your opportunities for success, it’s vital design a route to growth which provides ongoing performance and optimization.

Some top tips to achieving this include: 

• Test and optimize: Adopting a test and learn approach can enable an ongoing cycle of optimization and is a mindset that should be adopted across all teams within your business, for example in your marketing campaigns, new product development, trading tactics and customer service processes. 
• Use data to drive decisions: Leverage data wherever possible to make informed strategic decisions. Market trends are valuable to gain a big picture perspective, but first-party data can empower you to tailor decision making specifically to your brand and carve out its unique place in the market. 
• Continue to invest in technology: As your business continues to expand and evolve, ensure your technology evolves in tandem to enable and cater for growth, selecting the right partners for long-term success and strategic scalability.  

Laying the foundations for strategic scalability can help maximize a brand’s opportunity for long-term success and durability. Ingenuity has the experience as a brand owner to recognize how important scalability is for long term brand growth.

In response, THG Ingenuity has built a complete digital commerce solution that enables ambitious brands to reach their growth potential through one single service provider.

By bringing everything under one roof, customers are able to reduce costs, eradicate complexities and accelerate speed to-market supporting a sustainable approach to brand growth.

THG Ingenuity is the trusted digital commerce partner of brands such as Coca-Cola, Homebase, ELEMIS and more.

To find out how THG Ingenuity can help your brand achieve strategic scalability and long-term, cost-efficient success, get in touch today.