One surefire way to remain unaffected by disruptors in your industry sector is to be the disruptor!

Conventional wisdom dictates that this is easier for industry newcomers as they don’t have all the overhead of legacy systems and processes. This makes it easier for them to adopt new technologies and to do things in a different way that is, perhaps, cheaper, more efficient and better-placed to take advantage of new market opportunities.

However, all of the above counts for naught if an established industry-leader already has an effective Integration Strategy in place. I’ve said it before, but I will say it again; Digital Integration is the enabler behind any great business strategy — and it is Digital Integration, that enables industry disruptors, whether they are new startups or well established industry icons.

Fate whispers to the warrior, ‘You cannot withstand the storm.’ The warrior whispers back, ‘I am the storm.’

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Let’s consider the original industry disruptors; the Online Travel Agents (OTAs. These companies changed the buying-habits of an entire industry’s customer base and forced major players in the travel industry to either change the way they did things or to close their doors forever.

By way of example, consider what one hotelier told me. In times gone by, he used to get regular walk-ins. People who were in the area and in need of accommodation for the night would often stop outside his establishment, then walk up to the desk and ask if he had any rooms available.

Since the advent of OTA, that behaviour has changed. Now, people generally walk up to his front desk and announce their arrival, having stopped outside and already checked availability and made their booking via Booking.com. Many a time, they would reach the front desk before the booking actually registered on his internal system. He had become used to this, however, and would simply say, ‘Thank you. Your booking is not on my system yet. Just give it a minute to come through.’ And sure enough, within a minute or less the booking would appear and he would check the customer in.

How did these OTAs achieve this level of disruption? Through integration! They offered hotels and, later, even private holiday-let owners a way to integrate their own booking systems seamlessly with those of the OTAs. They could sync calendars, take payments and liaise with clients using the same systems they always had. Only, in this brave new world, those interactions and communications would immediately wing their way through the ether to one or more online booking engines, all of which could update their systems in real-time.

Of course, it did not stop with accommodation. It expanded to include flights, vehicle hire etc. and turned the customer experience into a one-stop-shop for all their travel needs.

Did these companies have access to some dark secret that no other players in the industry did? Not really. What they had was vision! They recognised the inherent power of Digital Integration. Then they embraced that power and changed the world. 

Any company can achieve this. When we make Integration strategic, new opportunities will present. This is when companies differentiate themselves and begin to change the world.