Most businesses are now considering adopting an IoT strategy. And the time is now. According to BDaily, the research findings are clear: IoT continues to generate value and ROI for adopters and 74% agree their core business strategy has changed for the better as a result of adopting IoT. Almost all (87%) say they have achieved a return on investment and 51% of adopters have seen operating costs decrease by an average of 19%. But the path to IoT success is muddy for most, so here’s what you need to do to have a great IoT launch.
Differentiation and alignment
First, you need to know why you’re making an IoT investment and how it’s going to align with your other business programmes for the year. Include your go-to-market differentiation and alignment goals within your rollout plan and your implementation partner will help keep you focussed on your desired outcome. For businesses, IoT provides valuable insight into how people are using their products, which can transform their design, production, and sales strategies, to better serve their customers and increase revenue. And by applying IoT to their internal operations, they can improve efficiencies in areas like workforce optimization and preventive equipment maintenance, while also increasing the yields and quality from their existing processes. So, scope your clear business outcomes right into the planning documentation from the start for a smoother launch.
Buy or create?
Find an expert partner who has industry expertise developing IoT in your sector and have a detailed conversation about your goals. If you’re going to install a prebuilt solution, find ones that tailor themselves to a limited number of verticals. One size fits all is not your friend when it comes to IoT deployments. If you do buy ‘off the rack’, augment your IoT platform and analytics offering by identifying partnership and M&A opportunities that will deliver an innovative edge. And remember how much more data you’ll be feeding into your infrastructure. You may need to upgrade your IT ecosystem as well to support these deployments and collaborations. If you’re going to build a solution from scratch, hire the right partners to help you craft a bespoke IoT deployment and help you train your team in the operation and maintenance of this kit. Since it will be unique in the marketplace, little aftermarket help will be available, so create all the documentation and troubleshooting support you’ll need in tandem with the production.
Scope the rollout
Don’t land a new IoT build on your global team. Instead, create a geographic strategy that leverages the upside of your primary market, but can expand to business opportunities in other geographies. Bring your solution to bear on each market in order that you can gain valuable insight about how the technology is improving ROI and where you need to make changes to react to the real-world use case. And remember, wherever you implement IoT, you need to make sure your customers are willing to pay for these advancements and your teams are willing to learn new ways of working. You should have identified this in step 1, but by taking a test and learn approach to your rollout, you can account for any unknown variables by territory.
Now good luck with making your IoT dream a reality – no matter how small you start.