Introduction
As interactions between brands and consumers of goods and services increasingly happen online, collecting, protecting, and managing customer information have become more crucial yet challenging.
In response, digitally native businesses are pivoting towards customer-centric models marked by swift digital evolution. As per McKinsey, only 0.5% of DNBs have crossed the $100 million mark over the past two decades. Besides, it says that more than 90% of businesses that started as eCommerce earn less than $1 million as annual revenue.
DNBs need to be more present and catch up in the race for digital transformation. Beyond delivering products or services, the emphasis is crafting a seamless, omnichannel experience that spans personalized customer applications and mobile engagements.
Simultaneously, the challenge lies in protecting customer privacy across various digital touchpoints while focusing on secure, frictionless, and on-demand interactions. These imperative circumstances lead us to the robust CIAM framework.
In this blog, we will explore the role of CIAM in digital strategy in achieving successful transformation for DNBs!
Digital Transformation for Digital Native Businesses
COVID-19 has accelerated the digital-first world, from utilizing health services to opening up bank accounts, and now people don’t want to go back to the conventional lifestyle. Digital native businesses are dynamic businesses that have roots in modern infrastructure. Compared with traditional or legacy organizations, these businesses have better workflows to understand their customers and deliver new products.
However, the DNBs compete in an extremely challenging market, where customers can switch to a competitor with a button tap. DNBs need to understand the groundwork laid by the companies undergoing digital transformation to survive the competition.
The journey to digital transformation begins with a streamlined digital experience that will build brand loyalty and meaningful relationships with customers. To do this, businesses should focus on revamping their existing experience to eliminate unnecessary friction and release new experiences and products. From easy and swift logins to transparency in using data privacy, consumers are pulling the strings.
Is it possible to balance experience, security, and privacy with customers while meeting their demands? Here’s when establishing robust CIAM solutions comes into the picture! An effective CIAM solution will help connect various systems that move your business towards a 360-degree view of the customer, a key prerequisite for successful digital transformation.
What is CIAM, and why should it be an important part of a digital transformation strategy?
Customer Identity and Access Management is a comprehensive framework comprising business processes, policies, and technologies to manage customer identities, authentication, and authorization. A robust CIAM solution encompasses features including self-service registration, profile generation and management, authentication, and consent management IoT applications. Customers expect a brand with seamless, consistent user experience combined with robust online security and privacy protections.
According to a PwC report, 32% of customers leave their favorite brand after a poor experience. Moreover, customers tend to abandon a brand after a privacy breach activity, and some customers stop the entire interaction.
Customers will likely engage with a brand that ensures the highest data privacy and security standards. It is where CIAM comes as it is an all-in-one solution that provides a seamless and secure login and access experience.
Five Pillars of Customer Identity Access Management
CIAM enables companies to scale and ensure a seamless digital experience for their customers while collecting and purposefully managing their data. Here, let us explain the five pillars of CIAM, the core technology required to drive the growth of your digital native business:
1. Multi-Factor and Adaptive Authentication
Proper security should underpin every CIAM initiative and needs better protection of customer information. Hence, businesses must protect their customers' data and deliver sophisticated user experiences. To achieve this, MFA and adaptive access become vital elements.
With CIAM solution, MFA is employed broadly in every business, including financial services, as consumers increasingly conduct sensitive transactions digitally. It confirms the user’s identity and ensures only the right person can access it. MFA involves wide factors, including asking security questions, conforming biometric data, one-time passwords, and more.
2. Scalability and High Availability
A CIAM solution can handle millions of users across web and mobile channels to accommodate large volumes of users and spikes in registrations and access requests without affecting the high level of performance.
3. Privacy and Compliance
Privacy and compliance are the foundational elements of customer identity and access management solutions. Privacy standards and security measures continue to evolve in terms of both formal regulations and consumer demands. Hence, the strategy should address the growing number of consumer protection laws and regulations. An organization must specify the reason for data collection and the purpose of data usage. CIAM frameworks should provide self-service portals to manage their data and consent.
4. APIs
The digital transformation of businesses happens due to the integrating of many apps and services. A CIAM framework is not an all-in-one solution but can operate in a larger ecosystem where you share information with various systems. The powerful feature is made possible through APIs, which allow their-party apps to perform identity analytics, marketing analytics, security integration, auditing, and more.
5. Analytics
One of the key objectives of the CIAM solution is to increase revenue growth by leveraging user data to acquire and retain them. DNBs can make informed decisions and perform better marketing campaigns by transforming the collected data into valuable information. These analytics can be built based on the entered data silos and unified user profiles.
Why is Investing in a Robust CIAM Solution Better Than Building In-House?
While integrating the CIAM strategies could be a perfect solution, businesses often need clarification about whether to outsource the function or have a team on their own.
By outsourcing the CIAM solution, businesses can reap all the benefits of data protection and security compliance without spending big to keep it in-house. Here are some top reasons why buying CIAM solutions is better than building an in-house team.
1. Cost and Time Savings
Investing in a CIAM from a vendor like LoginRadius will reduce the cost and workload for your internal IT departments. The internally managed solution will add another layer of security to your businesses, navigating your landscape away from various intrusion, phishing, and other hacking efforts.
2. Prioritize productivity
By delegating non-core tasks like administration and governance, your in-house IT team can now focus more on strategic business activities that will directly contribute to the growth of your bottom line.
3. Adapt to changing market and customer expectations
The growth in CIAM tools and technologies has been adapted across varied business arenas. From using FaceID to one-click sign-on websites, a CIAM vendor will help you adjust to the changing market landscape and meet every customer's expectations.
4. Reducing risk
When you outsource the CIAM services from a leading vendor, they will distribute the risk, escaping in security, compliance, and disaster recovery. They will have the responsibility and expertise to manage the risks in your business.
5. Operational continuity
Managing an in-house team will be challenging if your project demands 24/7 support or maintenance. However, outsourcing the CIAM solutions will give you access to multiple locations worldwide, ensuring continuous operations without overburdening your local team.
The Bottom Line
Today, CIAM has become more than just an identity gateway for customers. It has become an essential game-changer that will protect your business and give you a competitive edge. The concept is about making your customer happy, keeping their data secure, and getting valuable insight into their behavior while staying flexible.
At LoginRadius, we offer constructive CIAM solutions and add the factor of the outcome – a better performing, more scalable, flexible, and secure system that will scale your business to billions of customers. As a trustworthy CIAM provider, we help you earn their trust and set you up for long-term success in the digital age.
