ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF A GREAT CUSTOMER JOURNEY MAP

Customer journey maps are a visual representation of the customer experience. They can track the entire user journey from the moment of brand discovery to after-sale service, or they can focus on a specific area of the experience.

These maps have become more important than ever because they force brands to actually look at their customers and how their journey progresses. As technology evolves, so do consumers, which has resulted in a journey that is no longer linear.

Before, customers would discover a brand — usually through an advertisement –, then they would go to a store, make a purchase, and leave.
Nowadays, things are a lot more complex. A customer might find your brand while researching the product. Then, they might visit your website. Maybe they’ll even visit your physical location. While there, they might do further research online, and once they decide to make the purchase, they might leave and buy from your site instead of having to queue up.

The journey is far different than what it used to be, which is why it’s so important for brands to understand it.

In terms of maps, there are a lot of opinions regarding what they should include, but there are five elements that are essential.

Put the Customer Front and Center
When building a customer journey map, you have to use the customer experience as the core of the map. In other words, map what the customer does, instead of what you think they do based on your internal business processes and systems.

An ideal map will focus on a specific customer segment and will rely on research you’ve carried out to uncover everything about the customer experience from their point of view. Your map should be built on real insights into the customer based on collected data and even anecdotal evidence, but it should never contain your assumptions.

Purpose and Actionable Insights
An effective customer journey map has a purpose and contains actionable insights. This means you need to include the positives and the negatives, and correlate those emotions with how customers act and what their goals and expectations are.

This data can then be used to identify not just areas where you can improve the experience, but also which improvements will generate the greatest amount of impact. Furthermore, you can also uncover how well your current experience improvement efforts are doing, and which areas you should invest in more.

Track the Journey Across Multiple Touchpoints
A large number of organizations still take a silo approach to the customer experience as each team is focused on a certain set of touchpoints or channels. However, customers don’t think in terms of the way your touchpoints / channels are broken up based on your teams. They think of their journey as a whole made up of all their interactions with your brand.
This is why all your customer journey maps should cover multiple touchpoints across teams. This way, you will be able to identify possible gaps in the experience, while gaining the insights necessary to create a seamless, delightful experience that will earn you their loyalty.

Performance Indicators
While customer journey maps rely mainly on qualitative research and small sample sizes, quantitative research can be used to provide more confidence in the results. It’s also an excellent opportunity to determine important metrics for particular parts of the journey or for different touchpoints. By incorporating metrics such as the Net Promoter Score, effort metrics, and other customer satisfaction metrics, you can use the map to track the progress and effectiveness of your customer experience improvement efforts.

Visual Representation
Customer journey maps are visual representations by their very definition. To really make them effective, though, ensure they are organized in such a way that people will naturally be drawn to them, but will also allow you to add other relevant information.

In fact, you might want to create multiple versions of the map for different stakeholders. For example, executives might benefit from seeing performance metrics, while others will want to see more details about the processes and systems involved at each stage of the journey.

A good customer journey map is as much art as it is science. However, the most important aspect of any map is ensuring that you do take action on the insights you gain. And as long as you include the aforementioned five elements, you will have a map that will be a useful tool.

Carnellia Ajasin is passionate about innovation strategy, design, technology and creativity. She works with ambitious organizations and businesses on the strategic application of innovation, creativity and emerging technologies to create competitive advantage, transformative impact and growth in business and society.

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