Most companies and entrepreneurs were forced back to their drawing boards after COVID 19 forced them to come up with suitable strategies to navigate through this unforeseen circumstance.
The pandemic brought life to a grinding halt, and things we once took for granted - like eating out and shopping in malls - were suddenly sorely missed when the lockdown began.
This meant that entrepreneurs had to adapt to these sudden changes or be swept away by the tide. The most logical thing to do for most businesses was to move their operations online.
The announcement by Zomato about the tremendous growth of its revenue generated during FY 20 is a testament to this fact.
There has been a spurt of cloud kitchens across the country because of the increased presence of food-app players and the growing growth of supporting digital technological solutions.
A report by RedSeer Management Consulting predicts that the D 2 C restaurant business in India could be $2 billion industry, a significant jump from the 200 million that the sector was valued at back in 2019.
The shift to digitalisation was more involving for bigger companies. With the need to keep the show on the road and keep operations going, most brands switched to the Work From Home WFH model.
This model allowed employees to connect to their colleagues and bosses via internet and from their homes. This was not possible in industries like manufacturing where the physical presence of workers is critical and industries were forced to shut down completely or limp along with a skeletal number of staff.
WFH has proven to be successful in a wide variety of roles thanks to the internet. Most of the meetings are held online, except for the critical ones that need to be conducted physically.
This has helped them reduce their costs in terms of rent, utilities, employee conveyance and other administrative expenses.
This major shift from physical to digital in the workplace also required the creation and subsequent implementation of processes to keep track of the progress of the work being carried out.
Location meant to be everything, with some businesses like restaurants, showrooms, boutiques, and the like. The access to these brands is no longer restricted by geography with the advent of digitalisation.
German luxury carmaker Audi has invested heavily in digitalisation. The brand believes that this strategy is a must because it predicts an increase in the use of digital solutions within the purchase process of its customers.
The showroom experience is brought to customers by the use of artificial and virtual reality technologies.
It is not completely negating the need for physical touchpoints for customers and employees, as a result of the push towards digitalisation.
Audi has implicitly stated that its physical showrooms will continue to be the backbone of the brand because they provide the elements that no digital solution can.
The marque has begun to establish a string of brick and mortar centres where customers can experience its products, as it was building its fortunes through the e-commerce route.
This omnipresent strategy, straddling both digital and physical, is the need of the hour. How this balance is calibrated and implemented within the business will be the difference between a successful entrepreneur and one that isn't.
These processes must keep changing to keep pace with the performance of employees to maintain efficiency within the organisation and keep track of the preferences of customers to spot and cash in on emerging trends.