When You See the Value, But Have Yet to Act

Senior business leaders recognize the need to overcome challenges including poor product traceability and counterfeiting, but largely have yet to embrace product digitization efforts that can help solve those problems, new research reveals.

According to a survey sponsored by Digimarc, nearly 7 in 10 business leaders (69%) believe their digital transformation efforts are ‘advanced,’ with most businesses digitizing processes and documents. But less than half of those surveyed (45%) say digitizing products, characterized by adding digital identities or serialization, is part of those efforts.

Meanwhile, these same executives – more than 500 were surveyed in the United States and United Kingdom in August 2022 – acknowledged that the inability to trace product origin or location, and a lack of visibility into the product lifecycle are among the leading limitations of their current digital transformation efforts.

Traceability and product insights are among the issues that can be successfully addressed by adding a unique digital identity to any product and connecting to a cloud-based, digital record of its journey and interactions.

While just 1 in 6 respondents (16%) identified digitizing products as their company’s top digital transformation priority, suggesting that digitizing processes or documents remains more urgent, respondents recognize the importance and value of product digitization.

In fact, 60 percent of business decision makers acknowledge digitizing products is ‘very important’ to their company, especially in certain sectors. For example, nearly 4 in 5 (77%) in retail, catering and leisure markets say digitizing products is ‘very important.’

And the significant business benefits of digitizing products are apparent to those surveyed.

• Accessing primary customer data and consumer insights was cited as most beneficial, especially in the U.S. where most decision makers (52%) identified digital access to customer data as the leading benefit.
• Gaining a direct, interactive communications channel with customers is another top benefit, according to 43% of those surveyed.
• Additionally, leaders in larger organizations – up to 500 employees – identified the ability to confirm product authenticity as an important benefit, with U.S.-based respondents (41%) citing it twice as often as European executives (19%).
• Looking ahead, respondents expect that their organization will benefit from product digitization by improving operational efficiency (54%), reducing costs (50%), and increasing revenue (49%).

Although they understand the value of digitized products, a large portion of business leaders surveyed (39%) believe their company’s IT infrastructure poses a technical obstacle to digitizing products. And a third (33%) believe their staff lack necessary product digitization skills. But these perceived limitations are easily overcome – and may not even be shortcomings at all.

Finally, while opinions about priorities vary, the survey shows that business leaders are aligned in their view of technology vendors as an authority on product digitization as cited by 33% of respondents, exceeding management consultants (21%) and industry research analysts (21%) by a significant margin.

Digimarc is the global leader in product digitization that can help complete your digital transformation. Don’t let a lack of actionable product intelligence be a blind spot for your brand.

For questions about product digitization or to understand how easy it is to get started, please contact us to schedule a demonstration. Download a free infographic featuring more findings from the recent survey and learn why savvy brands should digitize products now.