Most of us will have heard of the Industrial Revolution. However, some readers may not realise that the Industrial Revolution talked about in school commonly references what is widely considered the “First Industrial Revolution”.
The first Industrial Revolution was signified by the introduction of machines to replace handmade production methods. The 1st was also fueled by steam power and water power. In the west, the era spans colonial America all the way through the ascent of Queen Victoria to the British throne. It most affected western economies, textile and clothing manufacturing, shipping, transportation, mining and metalwork industries, agricultural methods, and societal culture.
Fast forward two hundred and fifty years and we are described as being in the fourth industrial revolution (4IR), or as some term it “Industry 4.0”. In parallel, we can also think of Enterprise 4.0.
Per a Wikipedia definition, this revolution is defined by a number of technological developments in virtual reality and augmented reality facilitated by high-speed data exchanges. In addition, new human-machine interaction modes are more commonplace such as touch interfaces and gesture-based interfaces that use camera and audio technology, robotics and 3D printing.
The core trend in commerce and industry is automation and data exchange across both manufacturing technologies and process technologies. These include the proverbial Internet of Things (IoT), cyber-physical systems (CPS) more commonly understood as Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR), moving workloads to “the cloud” via cloud computing, cognitive computing, and artificial intelligence (AI).
It is more generally acknowledged that computing technologies still struggle to replace the deep domain expertise but computer technologies don’t forget and so, can often be more efficient in performing repetitive functions. When this robust performance of repetitive tasks is combined with machine learning and appropriate computing power, some very complex tasks can be accomplished. We can already see this tremendous potential in the very devices that inhabit our pockets and purses.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution is thus viewed by some as signifying the early beginning of what some consider an “imagination age”, a period beyond the Information Age where creativity and imagination become the primary creators of economic value.
W. Michael Cox and Richard Alm described this at some length in the 2017 Annual Report of the William J. O’Neil Center for Global Markets and Freedom, SMU Cox School of Business. Cox and Alm went so far as to describe it as “America’s Fourth Wave of Economic Progress” with most of the Age’s employment being services related. “Americans won’t be going back to the farms and factories in any significant numbers.”
The implications for customer and consumer data
While we may be a way off from an era where we no longer need to carry the devices we have today. Battery and data-hungry devices like mobile phones help us to stay connected and engage with one another. But, it is conceivable that such a technological shift that supports us regaining our humanity and discarding these devices in their current form is not too many years far away. What this might look like, is already visible in the futuristic ideas of cinema and television.
Kevin Parikh, Chairman and CEO of Avasant in a presentation at OWS21 describes modern-day society as being in a current era of “digital singularity”. He concludes this based on a convergence of ubiquitous personal technologies and the overall human experience. We can likely all attest to this being probably mostly true. We stayed connected with colleagues, friends and family through Zoom, Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger and Facetime during periods of pandemic isolation. We’ve stayed away from the office and continued to interact with colleagues using these same methods.
Working remotely and in some cases becoming what some would call “digital nomads” doesn’t seem particularly exotic today but it was novel and interesting a quarter of a century ago as I promoted it through a teleworker and telecottage association.
Developing an optimal consumer customer experience in this present-day singularity requires a deeper understanding of the consumer, something that can only be reasonably achieved through consumer consent and consumer buy-in to the idea that you might use their information for only good objectives. After all, personal information in the U.S. alone is a multibillion-dollar-a-year industry per Sarah Myers West in her research article Data Capitalism: Redefining the Logics of Surveillance and Privacy.
This is something that we are already seeing as essential as regional interest groups and authorities crack down on the previously unbridled use and abuse of personally identifiable data stitched together often through inferences based on common devices and behavioural patterns accompanied by unique consumer identifiers.
Without critical customer information, the systems that businesses would hope to leverage to unburden consumers from being stuck in the information age and in fact flourishing in the imagination age will never fully materialise. Personalization of interactions and engagement experiences are at the top of the list.
Businesses will need to maximize the network effects that could be achieved through platforms, and control databases that store customer and user data that can in turn drive more control and predictability over the market. Online publisher Tim O’Reilly believes that businesses need to “leverage customer self-service and algorithmic data to reach out to the entire web, to the edges and not just the centre, to the long tail and not just the head”.
A richer more personalized experience starts to become a reality fueled by consumer information. Systems that are able to describe the person will have the advantage. More particularly, systems that make use of ZPD (zero-party data), i.e. data that consumers have willingly and consensually offered up will be the systems that are the most valuable.
Learn how the Pretectum CMDM can help your business keep up with the increased importance of customer MDM with a SaaS software solution designed specifically to address the challenges of Customer Master Data Management.