The key to optimizing your customer’s journey is data. Long gone are the days of one-size-fits-all mass emails. Today's consumers expect personalized user experiences across many channels: email, mobile, social, advertising, and the web. But you have to collect and track the right information in order to deliver that.
To optimize your customer journey, it’s best to start with a map that reflects your specific business model. A customer journey map is a diagram showing each typical point of interaction during the six stages of customer engagement. To get maximum benefit, your map should be based on what actually happens, not what should happen.
Depending on your industry, you may need several customer journey maps to visualize the different scenarios and paths that customers take when engaging with your brand. That’s OK. Start with one, but then expand from there. The more different buyer personas you encompass, the better you will be able to curate experiences that engage and delight your customers.
Customer journey maps aren’t just pretty diagrams; they are communication and collaboration tools. Every internal department will have its own perspective on the six phases of the customer journey, based on their relationship to the brand’s products or services. They will also each have unique information and insights to add. Your map can help you unify fragmented efforts, identify points of friction, and highlight opportunities for improvement. Each team should list its priorities when contributing to the map(s).
- Which customer-oriented data points are vital to monitor?
- What is already being tracked?
- What other information would be beneficial?
- What are the critical indicators of success?
- Which signals should be cause for concern?
- What are our goals — both high-level and granular?
Mapping your customers’ journeys helps to focus stakeholders on the big picture and remind them how their efforts affect each other. It can also help teams deliver consistent customer experiences throughout the journey. For example, if different departments support customers using different interfaces, it can be jarring for consumers.
Be sure to give the map-making step proper attention. An incomplete customer journey map or one with insufficient data can steer you in the wrong direction. Not using a customer journey map at all can lead to data being stored in silos, missed opportunities, and disconnects between internal teams.
Maps ultimately allow you to build logic into consumer interactions and automatically move customers down different paths based on their profiles, buying histories, locations, expressed preferences, or other indicators. Paths or branches on the map can show different experiences that might be triggered based on customer behavior.
Customer journey maps should evolve over time. Journey analytics will show you what is and isn’t working so you can continually improve interactions and design a better user experience. The result will be satisfied customers who spend more money, are more willing to recommend the brand, and are less likely to drift away.