Transwap CEO & Co-Founder Benjamin Wong shares how businesses can tap on technology to digitalise and transform business processes

This article was originally published on E27.

While the benefits of digitalisation have been well established, many businesses have been slow to embrace it for themselves.  However, with COVID-19 disrupting business-as-usual, companies were forced to adapt to new technologies for business continuity and survival.

Adopting digital marketing strategies and developing e-commerce capabilities became necessities that few businesses could ignore. Yet, even during these economically turbulent times, there are success stories.

Businesses that have successfully digitalised their processes are now reaping the benefits of their technology investment and many have changed their perception towards digitalisation.

If you’re looking for new ways to transform and digitalise your business processes, here’s are some practical ways you can do so.

Payments

Maintaining a healthy cash flow is the lifeblood of any business. Delays in payments can be just as deadly as a stoppage in a person’s bloodstream for a business.

Financial automation through digital processes helps provide support on accounts payable/receivables. Businesses can tap on APIs to enjoy seamless, convenient, and fully automated B2B payments that ensure that you never miss a payment and have accurate and up-to-date reports on your business’ financial health.

At the same time, businesses can tap on global borderless virtual accounts for sending and collecting money easily around the world. These add a great deal of value to corporations and SMEs who are exporting and selling products from Singapore and need to find a way of collecting funds from overseas.

Additionally, managing cash flows and maximising a competitive edge in local markets for cross-border transactions is made simpler with transparency in fees and foreign exchange rate conversions.

At TranSwap, our Global Borderless Virtual Accounts allow businesses to hold 34 different currencies and easily make international payments with competitive foreign exchange rates.

Global supply chain

In this increasingly globalised world, speed and reliability is king. Suboptimal operational processes, regulatory or legal hoops, and unexpected delays can slow down your supply chain.

Every bump in the road can cause cascading delays, and with all these different factors, it can really add up. And that’s just considering supply chains within a single country.

Global delays on masks shipping during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic underscores the importance of having strong supply chain processing.

If you look into it, it was the most efficient companies and countries in terms of their ability to cut through red tape and establish smooth operations throughout their logistical pipeline that managed to get masks shipped. Invariably, those companies and countries had strong digitalisation.

Businesses can tap on e-platforms to reduce data duplication, improved data flow, access to up-to-date goods movement.

For example, Global eTrade Services (GeTS) enables the orchestration of physical logistics, compliance, and financial requirements of trade and supply chain seamlessly, smartly, and securely.

This means that businesses can make their global trade easier by using this trading platform. We have also partnered GeTS to digitalise and facilitate payments to more than 180 countries in over 120 currencies, for quick cargo clearance and shipment fulfillment.

What this means is that trade businesses can ensure smooth and seamless trade processing that can be easily managed all from their computers. At the same time, it also paves the way for future partnerships and makes it easier for sourcing and procurement in different countries.

Leverage on cloud-based collaboration tools

With remote working becoming a norm, it has been more difficult to create a collaborative environment for efficient work. Without clear visibility on timelines or progress updates, people are unable to plan workflows or set priorities.

The need for effective communication with a transparency of information has never been more urgent. Using cloud-based collaboration tools or productivity suites are available that are easy to use and cost-effective, such as Google’s G Suite, Slack, and Monday.com

How to successfully implement these processes

To reap the full benefits of these improvements, it is essential to follow these steps to ensure that the new processes are implemented correctly and effectively.

• Do it incrementally – It is crucial to add on new processes incrementally. By breaking down tasks into smaller pieces and ensuring that each team learns each process in-depth, you can isolate and address problems without severely compromising your operations as a whole. For example, incrementally integrate collaborative tools into one business unit first before incorporating it into the next.
• Communication is key –These process changes must involve your team at all levels. Getting their understanding, buy-in and support is equally as important for the process change to be successful as having the best technology or latest digitalisation tools
• Tailor-make a solution that fits your needs- Work closely with your partners to customise a solution that meets your specifics needs. For example, we developed a payment solution with API integration into the client’s payments system for seamless transfer from collection to settlement. The solution allows small transfers in large volumes to be credited directly to beneficiaries’ wallets and bank accounts in realtime
• Understand your objective –The process improvements should contribute to your overall service/product quality. It is essential to have a clear understanding of where you are bringing value to your clients or partners. With that firmly in mind, you can be assured that process improvements do not detract or dilute the value that your business is offering.

These are just some ways to get the process going. I hope it brings about some improvements in your business processes and increases efficiency for you.

Image via E27