How to Future Proof Your Digital Experiences

GUIDE:How to Future Proof Your Digital Experiences

Table of Contents

How to Future Proof Your Digital Experiences 3

Make Your Website the Hub for Your Digital Experience 4

Go Beyond Responsive Web Design for Mobile 5

Progressive web apps

Stand Out in a Noisy Online Space 8

Boost organic traffic through SEO

Share content and engage on social media

Inbound Marketing

Get the inside track with analytics tools

Privacy Policy and GDPR 10

When does gdpr apply for your digital experiences?

Looking Towards the Future: Innovations in Digital Experiences 11

Voice assistant

Chatbots

Machine learning

Personalisation

What Makes the Really Great Digital Experiences Stand Out from the Crowd? 13

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HOW TO FUTURE PROOF YOUR DIGITAL EXPERIENCESFuture proofing your digital experiences is the key to staying on top in a fast moving world.

From optimising your website to maximising your marketing strategy, what you do today

can have a huge effect on your success tomorrow. And it doesn’t have to be difficult.

In this guide, we take you through the best ways to supercharge your customers’ digital

experiences – now and in the future.

Enjoy the reading!

Best regards,

Siw Grinaker

Community Manager

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MAKE YOUR WEBSITE THE HUB FOR YOUR DIGITAL EXPERIENCES

Your website is the virtual equivalent of your office. And just like you might want to

impress clients with pot plants, coffee machines and high tech boardrooms, your site

needs to work hard to offer customers value.

More than just a host for your content, a website should be at the heart of the customer

journey, providing content, services and ongoing support every step of the way.

And all of this doesn’t have to cost the earth. Be

savvy about your website, and you’ll find that

this relatively low cost channel can repay you

in so many ways. Why not reuse content and

services from your website for other solutions,

like a mobile app? Or if you want to start small,

simply let your web presence grow with you.

Agile, efficient and exciting, your website has the potential to become the go-to hub for

your digital experiences.

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GO BEYOND RESPONSIVE WEB DESIGN FOR MOBILE We’ve already established that websites are great. But what turns a great website into a

brilliant one?

Progressive Web AppsYou might have been told that a mobile-friendly design is the key to a supercharged site.

After all, more Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10

countries, including Japan and the U.S. But for a truly future-proofed site, you need more.

Enter Progressive Web Apps.

Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) are web applications that offer “an

app-like experience”. This means they combine features found on

most modern browsers with all the great benefits of native mobile

apps. So you can expect things like super speedy loading, silky

smooth animations and immersive user experience.

What is PWA?

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Why is it better?A PWA has it all. Not only is it smoother, slicker and more streamlined, but it’s easy

to develop and release into the world. All of these benefits translate into impressive

stats. In fact, when using PWA, Twitter experience a 75% increase in tweets sent, while

e-commerce giant Alibaba reported 76% higher conversions across browsers.

Hassle-Free Experience

For users and developers, PWAs

offer an all-round hassle-free

experience. For a start, it cuts

out one of the biggest hurdles

for users – actually finding,

downloading and installing an

app. Instead, your customers can

enjoy a seamless experience from

the comfort of your website.

Universal Compatibility

With today’s web browsers

offering support for the latest

HTML5 features, you’re all set to

get the most out of a PWA. That

means you have the potential to

reach billions of internet users

– far more than the 700 million

people who currently have the

capability of installing an iOS app.

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Avoiding App Store BureaucracyNative apps aren’t just harder to build – they’re more difficult to distribute too. Technical

requirements, community guidelines, complicated forms and tiresome review processes

all mean that it can be a slog to get your app into the world. In comparison, for a PWA all

you need to do is tweak the code, test it, and push it out live. It’s just as easy as updating

your company’s website.

Enjoy the benefits of push notificationsPWAs might not have all the features offered by a native app, but

they do have one of the most important ones: push notifications.

This increasingly common form of mobile communication is a really

useful tool for marketing directly to your audience, helping to keep

them engaged, updated and informed.

STAND OUT IN A NOISY ONLINE SPACE

Boost organic traffic through SEOSearch engine optimisation, or SEO for short, has gained a reputation for being cryptic,

with some old-school marketers attempting to crack the code with keyword stuffing, link

baiting and a whole host of other SEO tricks.

But in actual fact, SEO can be pretty simple. And hugely effective. It starts with offering

value-driven content on an attractive, user-friendly site. When people start returning time

and time again to your site, Google will begin to take note.

Now that you’ve got a functional website, how do you plan on

standing out? Getting recognised online might seem like an art

form in itself, but all it really takes is some hard work and savvy

marketing. Here are some ideas for you to get started.

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Inbound marketing When it comes to getting your business noticed online, inbound

marketing is a must. As well as costing an average 62% less

than outbound marketing, Hubspot studies show that it’s far

more effective at attracting an engaged audience thanks to its

anti-spamming approach and focus on producing meaningful

content.

Share content and engage on social media While most of us excel at using social media in our personal

lives, far fewer embrace it in their professional ones. But

sharing content and connecting through social networks like

Linkedin, Instagram and Facebook can add real value to your

business. Acting as both a point of contact and a vital part of

your brand development, social media actively improves the

digital experiences of your customers.

Get the inside track with analytics tools Analytic tools help you to measure your success, and plan

for the future. Dig deep for data-driven insights that allow

for technological decision-making and drive real-time

experiences tailored to each and every customer.

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PRIVACY POLICY AND GDPR

When does GDPR apply for your digital experiences?If your business is a “controller” or “processor” of personal data, you’ll be subject to

the new GDPR regulations. Personal data includes all sorts of information, like names,

addresses, IP addresses – anything that might be considered sensitive. So if your digital

experiences rely on user’s data, be prepared to explain the what, why and how of the data

you’ve collected. It’s also important that your company gives individuals the opportunity

to control their own datas.

You might have heard the term ‘GDPR’ thrown around a lot in recent

months. That’s because the General Data Protection Regulation,

or GDPR for short, is set to transform the way companies manage

data. GDPR came into force in the UK on 25th May 2018 and allows

people to have easier access to the data businesses hold about

them, as well ensuring organisations always obtain the consent of

the people they collect information from.

Future proof digital experiences aren’t all about slick UX and savvy analytics. It also

involves going above and beyond to build trust by keeping your users’ data safe.

What is it?

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LOOKING TOWARDS THE FUTURE: INNOVATIONS IN DIGITAL EXPERIENCESFrom Alexa to AI, these are the innovations set to revolutionise digital experiences in the

future.

Voice assistantVoice assistants like Alexa and Siri are already a huge part of our homes, and they’re soon

set to become a big part of business too. With 19% of people using Siri at least daily, this

tech offers huge potential when it comes to innovating your digital experience.

ChatbotsMore and more businesses are embracing chatbots as a way of optimising their customer

service. As computer programmes that mimic human-to-human interaction, chatbots

are increasingly becoming able to pull from a company’s collective expertise. That’s a

big improvement on old chatbots that could only work from preprogrammed rules and

scripts.

So how can a chatbot improve your digital experiences?

According to 95% of consumers, the answer lies in

customer service. Studies suggest that customers are

increasingly looking towards chatbots as their go-to mode of

communicating with companies thanks to their promise of

instant answers and 24/7 support.

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Machine Learning Machine learning may be complex from an engineering point of view, but its impact is

simple to understand. Using AI, machine learning gives computers the ability to learn

without being explicitly programmed. This means that it has the potential to simplify,

streamline and increase efficiency in digital experiences.

PersonalisationPersonalisation optimises your digital experiences, helping to streamline the user journey

and add that personal touch that keeps customers coming back for more. AI-enabled

solutions work by analysing the way different functions work, in turn learning about past

behaviours and offering recommendations that offer genuine value to users.

WHAT MAKES THE REALLY GREAT DIGITAL EXPERIENCES STAND OUT FROM THE CROWD?Every digital experience is different, but the best ones have one thing in common: a

future proof CMS (content management system). As a central backbone for your digital

presence, a good CMS will offer scalability, flexibility, and better productivity.

When looking for a CMS that’s guaranteed to last long into the future, remember to look

for:

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SecurityYour CMS needs to be up to the job of handling hacking attempts and other security

issues.

ScalabilityGet the most out of your CMS by ensuring it can grow with your business.

FlexibilityYou don’t know what the future holds, but you can ensure that your CMS is able to

handle the future requirements of your users. Such as support for rolling out new

code changes and features continuously and a high degree of flexibility for web

editors.

InteroperabilityIntegrate your favorite marketing tools and legacy systems for a supercharged CMS.

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Productivity for web editorsDo your digital team a favour and look for a CMS that supports responsive

authoring (big screens to mobile), and keyboard shortcuts for faster management

and less mouse usage. A modern UI and simplified image handling will help boost

productivity too.

Headless supportHeadless support doesn’t necessarily sound like a positive thing, but this can

actually help you get more out of your content. The headless metaphor refers to the

lack of a presentation layer, or a head, meaning you can access your content using

APIs and feed it into other systems like mobile apps, chatbots and ecommerce sites.

AccessibilityMake sure your web content can be accessed by everyone with a CMS that enforces

accessibility for navigation and markup. This is especially important in light of the

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) – guidelines that ensure businesses

make their website accessible to disabled users. Just remember that the CMS can’t

do all the hard work. You’ll also have to ensure all web content is accessible with

transcripts and subtitles for example.

WANT TO LEARN MORE ABOUT DIGITAL EXPERIENCES AND CMS?

Take a look at these blog posts:

• Why Choosing the Right CMS Matters

• 5 Signs that it´s Time to Change Your CMS

• 5 Reasons to Choose Enonic as Your CMS