What is a Customer Journey Map?
A customer journey map is a top-down view of the customer life cycle.
Today’s customer journeys are complex — multiple touchpoints span multiple devices across time. This complexity makes it difficult to understand, account for, and optimize the customer experience.
Customer journey maps simplify things.
They give customer care professionals a means of understanding and visualizing the customer experience. This allows for a systematic approach to understanding and improving that experience.
Customer journey maps have a few key features:
- Maps are built around customer personas or profiles
- The journey is built in stages — or “moments” — of the customer lifecycle, from pre- to post-purchase
- Each stage includes touchpoints
Some add other features to each stage, such as point-of-view testimonials, fears, desires, and so forth. This approach makes it easier for the map’s user to see things from the customer’s perspective.
In other words, maps are customer-centric, making the customer story the prime focus.
There are a number of benefits that arise from this approach:
- Staff can easily visualize the customer experience and better understand the customer mindset
- A better understanding of customer needs improves empathy and customer service
- Customer journey maps can help identify strengths, weaknesses, and metrics for ongoing customer experience optimization
Many successful businesses make the customer experience their top priority.
Customer journey maps help ensure that businesses deliver better experiences, maintain great customer relationships, and stay more profitable.
