Blog #5 - Leveraging Digital Technology and Data

The disruptive forces that have a high probability of affecting the strategy of companies for the next few years is discussed in this week’s readings. Two of the key disruptions listed are digital technology and data analytics to improve the services offered to the customer. Let us examine how Disney makes use of these two aspects in their theme parks.

               Visiting a theme park by Disney is often like a mini vacation and this involves a lot of planning and effort by the consumer. This includes managing a hotel stay, not losing the tickets and using a map to determine which attractions to visit. After performing all these steps, consumers may need to spend a lot of time on a line for popular attractions.

               Disney has managed to digitize most of this experience resulting in almost a seamless consumer experience by leveraging the fact that consumers are often willing to spend a little extra to make their experience a lot more comfortable. The Magic Band by Disney is a wearable wristband that makes use of RFID technology. This band can be used to control entry to the park and hotel rooms, premium access to rides and attractions as well as to pay at shops and restaurants in the park.

               The premium access to rides is controlled by an initiative called FastPass that allows consumers to make reservations for a limited number of attractions to avoid the wait time. All of this can be performed on a mobile phone along with planning routes based on your selections digitally. This also provides a customizable experience to the consumer that is more tailored to their needs.

               The Magic Band also provides park usage data to Disney to better allocate resources and make improvements to their attractions. This is also used for dynamic pricing based on the demand throughout the year. All this information provides is being leveraged to continuously tailor and improve the experience provided to the customer.

               If used appropriately, data analytics could be game changer in understanding market and customer needs and even future trends to an extent.

References:

https://medium.com/@randerson112358/how-disney-world-uses-big-data-24de9c1175a5