Recently I’ve been working with a few brands to improve the maturity and scalability of their digital ecosystems. I’m not talking about scaling to be able to serve more users at a server level. I’m talking about scaling to serve more users from a content and strategy perspective.

Towards the end of last month, I launched a project for the American Cleaning Institute. Yes, it included a redesign and cleanup of content on their main digital property, but in reality, it was really aimed at providing admins a more flexible, modern system. A system where they can create meaningful experiences. Where they can scale the amount of content they create. A system where they can be nimble when needed.

I’m encouraged by the number of conversations I’ve had recently with current clients and potential clients around digital maturity, what it means and the roadmap to get there.

I think my brand’s pretty mature.

There’s a lot of infographics and articles by different organizations that discuss digital maturity or customer experience maturity. I found the one from Cognizant and the one from Melt Media interesting for different reasons. I referenced the model from Hero Digital in my post about the value of a digital strategist as well.

Digital maturity is a complex topic, which is part of the reason there are so many different approaches. Yes, every brand is unique, so how can they all fit into the same approach?

I’ve thought a lot about this and ultimately settled on 2 different approaches. These work together with the first providing a high-level categorical breakdown and the second, more of an actual roadmap.

At a high-level, I believe there are 3 categories of digital maturity. Within each of these 3 categories, there are multiple steps that help move a brand forward from category to category. For this post, I’ll focus on the categories as it’s a good place to start the conversation.

1 – Creating

Content’s king and creating great content is extremely valuable.

I’ve said before I don’t believe the sentiment if you build it they will come. I do believe the version, if you don’t build it they won’t come. There’s an important distinction between these statements. Building it means creating content. It means creating experiences and consistency that users can engage with. It means that when users do come they have a reason to keep coming back.

That’s why creation’s the first step. This includes both creating content and pushing it out.

2 – Listening

The digital world provides a great opportunity to collect both hard and soft data, which is how we listen to audiences. Hard data means page views, conversion rates, bounce rates, and everything that we can put a number on. Soft data, on the other hand, refers to sentiment. It often comes in the form of sharing, the tone of references, the answers to surveys, contact form submissions, etc.

Listening through data is the second step in the process. This includes passive listening and converting that data into actionable items allowing the first category to be more efficient and engaging.

Section 3 – Conversing

Another way to think about this is engagement. This should ultimately be the goal of all brands.

Today’s audiences and customers engage with brands. They want to know that their voice is being heard. That their concerns are taken seriously. This means that brands need to show users that they get them. Your brand knows what they’re looking for because they paid attention last time. That their experience is seamless because your brand values their time.

Conversing is the third category. It includes more engagement in various ways. This means there’s more opportunity to collect more data and create more compelling content.

Above I’ve outlined the categories that my digital maturity roadmap flows through. If you want to talk through this in more detail I’m happy to do so — use my contact form and let me know a little more about