How to Elevate CX using Customer Journey Maps

Step 1: Review your goals

It is important to review your goals and set clear objectives for creating a customer journey map. Ask yourself-

• Why are you making the customer journey map?
• What experience is it based upon?
• What do you want to achieve with the map?

Once you have the answers to these questions and have established the purpose of creating a customer journey map, the next steps become easier. 

Step 2: Gather customer data

The next step is to gather feedback from your customers or prospects. To do so, you can use questionnaires or create short surveys and send them to people who’ve interacted with your brand before or plan to do so. 

Here are some questions that you can add to your survey:

• How did you hear about us?
• What problems are you trying to solve?
• Have you ever purchased with us? If so, what was your deciding factor?
• On a scale of 1 to 10, how easy can you navigate our website?
• Is there any way that we can further support you to make your process easier?

Step 3: Create buyer personas

Based on the results derived with step 2, i.e., customer data, narrow your customers into different buyer personas. 

It is important to create buyer personas and group your customers under different buyer personas to chart a specific customer journey map focused on your goal. Avoid grouping too many personas into one journey, or your map won’t accurately reflect your customers’ experience.

Step 4: Make a list of all the touchpoints

All the points of interaction that a customer goes through in his journey are touchpoints. Based on the data you gather, generate a list of customer touchpoints and the channels on which those touchpoints occur. For example, the touchpoint could be paying a bill, and the channels associated could be “pay online,” “pay via mail,” or “pay in person.”

While listing touchpoints, remember to include information that addresses elements of action, emotion, and potential challenges. Touchpoints vary depending on the type of business you have. 

For instance, the touchpoints for a coffee shop will be different than those for an eCommerce company. Even if that is the case, the most common touchpoints found in customer journey maps are:

• Social channels
• Paid ads
• Email marketing
• Third-party review sites or mentions

Step 5: Assess the current customer experience

Look at all your touchpoints and assess the current state of your customer’s experience. Take a note of- 

• How long does it take for a website visitor to find what they’re looking for?
• How many people are closing before making a purchase? 
• Which touchpoint has the most point of conflict?

These are some of the questions you should be able to answer with your finished map. Assessing the current state of your customers’ experience will show you where the customers’ needs aren’t being met. 

Step 6: Initiate corrective actions

Assessing the current state of experience will help you to identify gaps in customer experience or spot the red flags such as poor transitions between stages and significant pain points or obstacles for customers. 

In other words, you’ll get a clear picture of where you’re lacking and what actions need to be initiated to fill those gaps and improve the customer’s experience.