Your external tech stack matters as much as internal

Extend your strategy to create a digital presence that caters to your customers

There are two sides to a company’s digital presence. On one side, there’s the internal, company-facing tech — including your CRM or EMS systems, cloud-based infrastructures, and in-house servers — that keeps your business moving smoothly.

Because these systems literally drive your day-to-day operations, they’re justifiably top-of-mind when building any digital tech stack. But they represent only half of the story.

Your external tech stack — the consumer-facing portion of your digital presence — deserves equal attention.

Digital drives business

Recent research suggests 57% of consumers won’t recommend a business that has a poorly designed mobile website. In addition, 40% of revenue in leading B2B organizations now comes from digital sales channels.

In this climate, building client-facing digital platforms that prioritize a positive customer experience is a can’t-miss way to boost business. 

Consider the possibilities. With a more customer-friendly mobile and web presence, your business might:

• Convert a higher percentage of online visitors into active customers.
• Increase total sales or service bookings.
• Save money in customer support costs by digitally anticipating and addressing customer needs.
• Reach new customer demographics.
• Boost your standing as an industry leader.

Prioritize customer usability

Strong external tech stacks deliver web and mobile sites that treat the customer experience as a priority, not simply an afterthought. They include innovative features that make interacting with sites easier, faster and more enjoyable.

Recently, for example, many mobile sites have moved away from cumbersome log-in forms in favor of a two-step authentication process that sends a simple log-in code to a verified phone number or email address. The step is more convenient for users to navigate, saving valuable seconds with every log-in.

Sites and apps that score highest in user satisfaction tend to be ones that have clearly questioned the status quo and asked, “How can we make this even better for our customers?”

Often, during these brainstorming sessions, the site’s ease of use is the first metric considered.

Highly ranked web sites and mobile apps are generally ones that seem both sleek and simple to use, from the customer’s perspective.

But achieving simplicity for the end user isn’t simple from a tech standpoint. It actually takes quite a bit of coordinated, intentional planning — planning that’s best done during the website or app design and development phases, rather than as an end-stage add-on.

In digital design, prioritizing the customer experience from the get-go matters.

That’s why custom-designed tech stacks, which are engineered to truly anticipate and respond to each company’s unique customer needs, typically out-perform ones built on generalized templates, which too often shoehorn in the customer experience only after internal tech development is complete.

Approach the process with a new Lens

When it comes to identifying a web or mobile site’s key indicators of success, it can feel difficult or even uncomfortable at first to shift from a solely company-focused, or internal, perspective to also include a customer-focused, external lens.

But the effort is worth it.

When you redesign a web or mobile site with the customer’s experience in mind, you find yourself asking questions such as:

• What do we need to change in order to convert at least 90% of visitors on our site to active customers?
• How can we reduce the average log-in or registration process for our services to less than 30 seconds?
• What current problems do our customers come to us looking to solve, and how can we better define or describe our available solutions?

Yes, customized tech stack development requires an outlay of both time and capital. But it’s one that pays off. 

Customers respond — and gravitate — to mobile and web sites that anticipate and best serve their needs. When firms redesign their external-facing digital platforms to center the customer experience, their business tends to expand in measurable ways, from total sales volume and overall profitability to customer retention and brand satisfaction.

Investing in a well-designed, high-performing web and mobile presence simply makes smart business sense, both for long-term customer loyalty and your firm’s bottom line.

How Wipfli can help

Our teams help businesses with every stage of both internal- and external-facing tech stack development, from initial brainstorming and planning through design, development and implementation. To learn how we can help optimize your company’s web and mobile presence, see our digital strategy services webpage.