July 27, 2020

168 | Transformation Turnaround: Doing Digital Transformation Right – with Rob Tedesco

You’re about to hear about the challenge of getting calorie counts into digital menus.

Joining us is Rob Tedesco, a digital strategist who spearheaded the digital transformation of Subway, the world’s largest restaurant chain. We discuss how a franchise business went on to prioritize its digital transformation, getting leadership buy-in, and all the unforeseen challenges that are involved with taking an existing franchise and adapting it to a digital platform.

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS

Why should businesses be focused on a digital strategy when their current one is working well, and how do you ensure that it’s successful?

  • When a brand has been around for a long time, there comes a point when you need to look at recruiting a new generation of customers and fans.
  • As other brands have started to pave the way for digital, they are becoming the new standard of customer expectations.
  • Be patient with the results. You will not see a massive change immediately.
  • You need complete leadership buy-in to lead your digital transformation, otherwise, it will not be successful. It requires so much cross-function collaboration that you need the person at the top to push this to the top of the priority list.
  • You have to think of this as a digital transformation and not a digital augmentation.

How COVID-19 has become a game-changing moment.

  • Every brand, big or small, has had to adapt rapidly to survive: curbside pick-up, delivery, contactless payment, and more.
  • COVID has been an accelerant for a very long, very slow march towards ecommerce.
  • Everyone is focused on how to sell online or set up 3rd party delivery, but selling directly is incredibly powerful because you get the customer data. This is going to give businesses even more of an opportunity to know their customers and follow up with them.

Resources:

LISTEN TO THE EPISODE

About The Innovation Engine

Since 2014, 3Pillar has published The Innovation Engine, a podcast that sees a wide range of innovation experts come on to discuss topics that include technology, leadership, and company culture. You can download and subscribe to The Innovation Engine on Apple Podcasts. You can also tune in via the podcast’s home on Spotify to listen online, via Android or iOS, or on any device supporting a mobile browser.