2024 IN RETAIL – WHAT KEY INVESTMENTS ARE BEING MADE?
As part of our recently-launched Mid-Market IT Priorities Report 2024, we spoke to over 500 IT decision makers across four sectors to get their thoughts on several key issues shaping the Mid-Market. This included gathering data on topics such as:
- How prepared organisations feel in the face of increased cyber threats
- Why IT decision-makers see ESG as an immediate way to stimulate growth
- What key motivators are the driving force behind digital transformation
Retail has plenty to gain from technology, but what are decision-makers prioritising when it comes to spending their budgets, what are the biggest threats to maintaining security and how vital to their strategy is the implementation of AI?
Find out more below or download the full report to discover the key IT priorities for retailers in 2024.
1. DO RETAIL ORGANISATIONS FEEL CONFIDENT IN PREVENTING CYBER ATTACKS?
Across the entire mid-market, we’re seeing a more mature and proactive cyber security posture emerging within organisations, which could be due to a higher priority being placed on improving threat intelligence and battling AI-related threats.
When it comes to confidence surrounding cyber security, surprisingly, out of the four sectors we spoke to (private healthcare, finance & insurance, retail and transport), retail organisations were the least confident in their ability to prevent and respond to cyber attacks, with only 77% of respondents saying they were either somewhat confident or very confident – this is in comparison to 89% of private healthcare organisations, the highest ranking sector. However, retail IT decision-makers state that their top cyber security priority for 2024 is strengthening cyber security and reducing breaches (38%), demonstrating they are keen to improve their posture and enhance their ability to cope with any potential threats.
With the retail sector’s reduced confidence levels, we might have expected them to have slightly lower cyber security adoption levels in comparison to more confident sectors, implementing only the most basic cyber threat strategies, however, this doesn’t appear to necessarily be the case. Of those retail organisations surveyed, it was found that:
- 44% have incident response offerings
- 42% have cyber insurance
- 38% have ransomware negotiation
- 31% have dark web intelligence
And importantly, every single one of the organisations interviewed had at least some security offerings in place. This indicates that a lot of retail organisations are equipped with the necessary cyber security prevention and response measures, but maybe the lower confidence levels indicate more, or better, measures may be needed.
FIND OUT HOW WE’RE EMPOWERING RETAIL THROUGH TRANSFORMATIVE TECHNOLOGY
2. WHAT ARE RETAIL’S MAIN DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION DRIVERS?
When speaking to IT decision-makers in the retail sector, they stated that increasing employee engagement and productivity is the top factor motivating their digital transformation efforts. This could relate to the disparate workforces we often see in the mid-market, caused by cost-cutting-led outsourcing and other cost-saving initiatives. It could be said that these initiatives have resulted in disengaged and less productive workforces – so it’s interesting to see the eagerness to improve this and see employees happier and more productive.
When it comes to driving digital transformation, retail organisations are also putting their focus on responding to industry disruption (29%) and entering new markets or business models (28%), which could correlate with higher public cloud usage levels (40%) helping organisations implement more advanced and transformative services.
3. THE CONCERNS AROUND USING AI
It’s important for mid-market organisations to consider the adoption of artificial intelligence. With AI-powered technology entering the market at a rapid pace and offering a variety of transformative opportunities, ensuring they’re at the forefront is key to gaining a competitive edge. This corresponds with the responses from IT decision-makers across the sectors we spoke to, who believe they’re well-placed to reap its benefits, with:
- 66% rating their understanding of AI use in a business setting as good-to-excellent
- 72% rating their understanding of AI use by their organisation as good-to-excellent
- 64% rating their understanding of how AI is used in their sectors as good-to-excellent
Despite this, just 18% of the organisations we spoke to are prioritising AI implementation as a key part of their IT strategy for 2024. Why is this, and what’s stopping retail organisations from adopting AI to assist and enhance daily operations?
Retail IT decision-makers revealed their top AI-related concern to be exposure to new cyber security risks – which ties in with the slightly lower security confidence levels mentioned above.
FIND OUT MORE IN OUR MID-MARKET REPORT
Discover why retail organisations are hesitant to utilise AI, what their IT priorities are for the coming year and more – download our Mid-Market IT Priorities Report for 2024 for free.