Where does your company stand with DX? What's missing? Insights from the DX Diagnostic

Dentsu Inc. has launched the "Dentsu Digital Transformation Diagnosis" (DX Diagnosis) service. This service scores a company's digital transformation (DX) challenges, identifies its position within the market and industry, and provides solutions tailored to those challenges.
"Dentsu Digital Transformation Diagnosis"
This diagnostic solution ( release here ) measures DX progress using a deviation score, based on Dentsu Inc.'s proprietary research, by framing customer touchpoint-related areas as "Marketing DX."

This time, we introduce the contents of the DX Diagnostic. We also share insights gained by companies that have actually undergone the diagnostic.

<Table of Contents>
▼Gain clarity on your company's current state of Marketing DX through the diagnostic
▼How is the diagnosis conducted? What specifically does it reveal?
▼ Insights Gained from the Diagnosis
▼Supporting Marketing DX Implementation Based on Diagnosis Results

 

Through the assessment, you can understand your company's current state of marketing DX

Corporate DX is accelerating, partly due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, since DX encompasses a broad scope, determining where to focus efforts is key to efficient implementation.

Leveraging its accumulated expertise in people-centric marketing, Dentsu Inc. defines the areas surrounding clients' customer touchpoints as "Marketing DX" and provides focused support.

For future companies and brands, the source of competitiveness lies in "unique, consistent experiences provided to customers." To deliver these customer experiences, a system is needed to track customer reactions to products and services through data and execute corresponding initiatives. Furthermore, we believe it requires personnel capable of translating tracked data into actionable initiatives, along with the organizational and operational design to execute those initiatives.

This requires the following four transformations:
① Customer Experience Transformation: Designing a consistent customer experience (value proposition)
② System Transformation: Acquisition and management of reaction data derived from "experience"
③ Data and Talent Transformation: Understanding customer situations and needs from reaction data
④ Organizational/Operational Transformation: Rapid feedback execution and iterative validation for customer experience

To enhance competitiveness through "unique, consistent experiential offerings provided to customers," and to advance these four transformations in a balanced manner, it is essential to first understand your company's current state of Marketing DX. The DX Diagnosis is a valuable tool for this purpose.

How is it diagnosed? What specifically does it reveal?

The DX diagnosis evaluates the following areas:

① Customer Experience Transformation
・Are we providing new experiential value that aligns with customers' lives?
・Have you built a relationship of trust where customers voluntarily provide data?

② System Transformation
• Do you have mechanisms to capture data generated within customers' daily lives?
• Do we have a system to measure customer satisfaction with the consistent experience we deliver?

③ Data and Talent Transformation
・Do we have the mechanisms and personnel to detect customer situations and understand needs from data?
• Is a culture established where decisions are made based on insights derived from data?

④ Organizational and Operational Transformation
・Is there a business process in place to convert insights into actionable measures and rapidly iterate through execution and verification?
• Is feedback effectively disseminated across the broad organizational span of the company's value chain?

The diagnostic is questionnaire-based, comprising 32 questions in total. It includes the diagnostic items listed above plus questions to gather an overall overview. Respondents will answer multiple-choice questions about their company's current state.

Partial list of diagnostic items. To analyze the client's DX from multiple angles, we prepared questions comprising a total of 32 items across three perspectives and four domains. We quantify and diagnose DX challenges based on the client's responses.

Responding requires an overview perspective of the company, so we ask corporate executives and managers to complete the survey.

Then, based on Dentsu Inc. original logic and proprietary database, we assess how far along or behind the responding company is in transformation compared to the market and industry.
・Vision Perspective
・Customer Orientation
・DX Progress
We categorize companies based on these three perspectives. This process derives the company's DX diagnostic type and provides diagnostic results as shown in the diagram below.

The diagnostic report presents deviation scores for Vision Orientation, Customer Focus, and DX Progress, as well as for System Transformation, Talent Transformation, and Business Process Transformation. This diagnostic result not only reveals the company's level of progress in marketing DX relative to the market and industry but also allows for an immediate understanding of where the company is relatively advanced and where it lags behind among the four transformations: Customer Focus, Systems, Talent, and Business Processes ().

Key Insights from the Assessment

Many companies have already utilized the DX diagnostic. Let's briefly share some insights gained through the diagnostic.

Case 1: "We gained clarity on our current position"
This is the most common case. By undergoing the diagnosis, companies gained clarity on:
- Where are we now?
• Where are we making progress, and where are we falling behind?
were clarified.

One financial company stated: "We suspected our customer focus was lacking, but visualizing it confirmed our belief." Another noted: "We thought we were pursuing DX, but the scores made us realize our efforts hadn't yet yielded tangible results."

Case 2: "We identified gaps between departments"
One company underwent diagnostics across multiple departments. They reported that the diagnostics revealed gaps between departments.

At a food manufacturer, board members including the CEO and CMO underwent the diagnosis. Feedback included: "While the management department had issued the DX directive and believed it was being executed, the business departments hadn't reached that level of awareness," and "The advertising department was not effectively driving DX."

Case 3: "We realized our DX strategy needed course correction"
Some companies adjusted their marketing DX initiatives based on the diagnostic results.

A sporting goods manufacturer reflected on the diagnostic results, realizing they had been pushing initiatives while neglecting the customer experience. They decided to work with us to rethink the entire strategy layer for that domain, including those initiatives.

Case 4: "We learned concrete steps for course correction"
We can also propose Dentsu Group service lines and solutions to companies that undergo the diagnosis.

An education company struggling with customer retention underwent a DX diagnosis. This revealed challenges in the customer experience transformation domain, indicating room for improvement in delivering appropriate customer experiences and managing loyalty. After introducing Dentsu Inc.'s CRM capabilities, the company requested, "Please propose next year's DX promotion activities." This led to us developing a concrete proposal.

Supporting Marketing DX Execution Based on Diagnostic Results

Once you understand your company's current state of marketing DX through the diagnosis, it's crucial to take the next steps regarding areas needing improvement and focus. The ideas, execution, and network cultivated by the Dentsu Group address every challenge in the marketing domain.

・One-stop production from planning and development to operation
・Designing CX (Customer Experience) and proposing new ways to engage customers
・Integrated online and offline marketing solutions and advertising optimization
・Developing software essential for DX transformation
・Structurally designing and acquiring KPIs from business KGI, followed by analysis execution
・Design and develop IoT products and service models utilizing technologies like AI
・Provide management support within organizations

Based on diagnostic results, we provide concrete proposals on how to advance marketing DX moving forward and support companies in their efforts.