Go to your favorite search engine, type in “customer journeys,” and click the “Images” tab.
You'll see hundreds of customer journey maps, each one different: curves, bar charts, twists and turns, arrows, circles, tables, and more.
With so much information out there on the many different ways of visually representing the customer journey, it's easy to get lost.
To help us find our way, here are the five steps to creating a “good” customer journey map.
1. Think Like a Customer
Too often, the customer journey is only discussed internally at companies. A workshop or two, a bit of design thinking, lots of sticky notes, and voilà! You've got your new customer journey!
But if you only talk to company employees, the results will be biased. You run the risk of completely sidestepping the customer's point of view, which should be your main concern.
That's why the information you use to map the customer journey should come directly from customers, even if that means disrupting common preconceptions that might be held within the company.
2. Avoid Mapping Your Internal Processes
Following from the previous point, it's important to keep in mind that there's a natural tendency to view the customer journey as a by-product of the company's internal processes.
For example: when a telecom provider receives a customer termination request, it's viewed as a series of actions and processes that must be carried out. But that's not how the customer sees it—they simply want to cancel their contract.
3. Pinpoint Your Customer Touchpoints
If your company's customer journey only has five to seven steps, throw it away.
That's right—toss it! It's clearly not detailed enough. 😉
Creating a customer journey map is a pointless exercise if it glosses over the customer experience. You have to be extremely precise when identifying your various customer touchpoints.
Detailed descriptions of your touchpoints are essential because you can translate them into an action plan.
Imagine you work in the car industry, for example. If you see “greeting customers in the dealership” as the only step in your customer journey, how will you know where to make changes to improve customer experience if this particular touchpoint is identified as being ineffective? The point is that it would be difficult, since that one overarching step is made up of many other smaller ones.
With highly specific touchpoints, you'll be able to find out which of these steps provides the best customer experience:
"Offer coffee"
"Welcome the customer by getting up from the desk and walking over to greet them"
"Have everyone at the dealership say hello to the customer"
"Have reception staff greet the customer by name"
... and so on
And make sure you always keep the customer's perspective in mind! 🙂
By pinpointing these touchpoints in detail, you can determine more specifically what actions should be taken, and ensure that those actions actually work!
4. Use Quantitative Data
If you want your customer journey map to be useful and functional for your company, it should rely on quantitative data, not on your subjective impressions and assumptions.
The aim is to evaluate the importance of each touchpoint in relation to the others, based on objective, quantifiable data.
So, make sure that your analysis of the customer journey is based on measurable indicators, such as customer satisfaction feedback and website traffic. You can then use this data to help you determine what corrective measures should be taken.
Besides, without quantitative data, how will you measure the impact of your strategy? It's important to be able to demonstrate the impact of your actions!
5. Identify Priority Actions
You're not creating this customer journey map merely to admire its beauty. You're doing it to find out which levers to pull to make your customers happy, build loyalty, reduce customer attrition, or even improve your brand image.
A good customer journey should make it easy to clearly (and again, measurably) identify which touchpoints need to be addressed as a priority.
Moreover, the customer experience is a universal issue within a company. It affects every department and every level. That means it impacts every executive as well. Unless everyone is clear on what actions need to be taken and their level of priority, it will be difficult to get executives involved in making decisions.
Just as there are as many potential customer journeys as there are customers, there are also myriad ways of mapping out your customer journey.
Create Your Customer Journey Map
A customer journey map is a visual representation of all the interactions (or touchpoints) between a customer and a business.
It can also take the form of a diagram or chart.
It helps you create more richly detailed buyer personas by better understanding customer behaviors and motivations.
The customer journey map is divided into different stages that describe the overall journey, from the stage in which the customer discovers that your brand and its products exist to the stage in which they recommend you to their friends and family.
The main stages of the customer journey are:
Awareness: the prospective customer learns about your company, brand or product for the first time.
Consideration: the prospective customer does research that leads them to a specific page of your company's website or e-commerce site.
Decision: the prospective customer goes to your store or website to make a purchase.
Service: the customer interacts with after-sales support, whether to make a complaint or to get user support.
Loyalty: the customer follows the brand via social media and/or newsletters and receives offers and promotions tailored to their customer profile.
At any stage, don't hesitate to seek advice from employees and colleagues in other departments of the company.
Surveys, customer reviews, and tools like Google Analytics can also provide you with precious information.
Case Study: Home Made
You'll be creating your own customer journey map for Home Made. To help you, I suggest following the five steps listed in this document.
And you can find a customer journey template (.pptx format) to fill in here.
Let's Recap!
The customer experience is predicted to be the most important growth driver over the coming years, because it helps companies build customer loyalty and stay competitive in the market.
A good customer journey map should:
reflect the customer's point of view.
list touchpoints between the customer and the company, but it shouldn't be a map of internal processes.
identify touchpoints in as much detail as possible.
rely on quantitative data.
help identify what actions should be taken as a priority.
You now have the keys to mapping your customer journey. Now, let's see how to get your employees engaged to improve your customer experience—and the employee experience.
