Transforming your business for the digital age. It means more than just putting up a website. Here to tell us more is Vinnie Schoenfelder. He is a principal and chief technology officer for cap Tech Ventures. He's based in Richmond, Virginia, but he joins me here in our New York studio. Vinnie, thank you very much for being here, Thanks for having me. Tell people what is cap tech Ventures. We are a national I T management consulting firm about six and fifty
people across eleven locations. Think of it as um most of our clients being fortune of the Fortune fifty. We partner with them to create custom solutions for their business initiatives and challenges. And it could be everything from a
digital marketing campaign to a financial secure financial payment system. Sure, I mean think of mobile devices, iPhones, androids, tablets, mobile banking, taking a photo of your check and having it being deposited, or in the case of retail UH finding locations of shop shopping online loyalty rewards program amps, those types of things.
What are some of the biggest challenges you face when you talk to non technology people inside of these corporations is that that they get it, but they don't know what the first steps are, or maybe just explain that there's a transformation that's going on. So it's not about writing an iPhone app or an Android app. It's about thinking about how your customer engages with you across a range of experiences and devices. UM common mistake in the past would be to try to match web to print
or match mobile to web. Now we're saying, if we understand you have a work computer or computer at home, a tablet, an iPhone, your spouse's phone. So how do we give you just what you need at the moment you need it with some of the unique capabilities of that device, whether it be location awareness or um, you know, GPS with beacon locations for indoor, that type of thing. What would be an example. I know you did some work for utility companies, have also worked for government. Maybe
give us an example of some of the things you've learned. Sure, I think at its core it's it's there's an interesting psychology around this. People have a more personal relationship with their mobile device than they have with any other piece of technology. I read something recently where the human brain reacts most quickly to a baby crying. Number two is their phone, and it took you know, a long time for us to get tuned into the first in a
very short time to the second. So there's a genuine and authenticity that an organization has to bring to to these designs. UH. Users will sniff out very quickly if the features and functionality are there to benefit the company or if they're genuine to benefiting them. So business value has to be uh the side effect what you mentioned. For example, I know in one of your reports that digital marketing in order to be successful it needs to be authentic. What does that mean, Well, let's look about
information sharing. So big data and data analytics is huge and and refining the features and functionality and use ability and apps, and people will share that information if they believe honestly that you're giving them the best experience for that as opposed to just using it for your own benefit. So some examples, UM, let's say you're in a retail location.
About of e commerce transactions fall out of the shopping cart area, so it's a huge amount of people to get all the way to the shopping cart and don't
check out. So if you're walking through a mall, or you're walking through and you know, um, any kind of retail location and that store sees your phone through bluetooth low energy technology, it can remind you of those items, let you know that they're in stock, in your color, in your size, and as you're coming in, the store manager can be informed of that and have those items waiting for you. You mentioned that part of the issue is that people just copy what they see, let's say,
on their iPhone. They see these little, uh, sort of designed elements and they look appealing, and they think that's really what they have to focus on. Can you give us an example of a of a company or a case study where that was what they thought at the beginning, but then you kind of moved them along to show them how they had to think rethink the way their business was being done. Sure. Um, we'll start with a
sort of theme park example, if you will. The important thing here was to compete with you know, larger, more nationally known theme parks and not jump to e commerce, not jump to vacation planning. So one of the things that's different about mobile technologies is there's an expectation that's been set that you start small with something really really good, and you put it out quickly and you add to
it quickly. So a lot of times companies will focus on a commerce aspect or a loyalty rewards aspect, something that's big, uh and difficult to solve, which we can do. Um, but even that should be done incrementally. Financial services and the banking industry know that cap tech does a lot of work there. Um. Is there a convergence that you can describe between this sort of multi channel world, as you said, writing checks, mobile phone, desktop, also the regular phone. Yeah.
What's interesting, especially in financial services and retail and healthcare for that matter, is the business functions have been well thought out for a long period of time, So it's hard to be creative in a banking app or savings app two do something completely innovative. Part of that can be solved with gamification, and that doesn't mean create a game. It means take the aspects of a game and put
it into the app. For instance, saving for a goal can earn you badges that can be then shared socially on Facebook or Twitter to encourage positive behavior. I want to thank you very much for coming in and spending time with us of any show and Felder is principal and chief technology officer for a cap tech ventures. He's based in Richmond, Virginia. This is taking stock. I'm pim Fox. This is Bloomberg.