

However, some are more significant to customers than others. Let me repeat that: Every touch point is important.

Differentiate on Touch Point IntensityĮvery touch point is important. Often in journey maps, offstage actions are drawn differently or placed below a “line of visibility.” No matter how you denote them, it is helpful to distinguish offstage actions from those that are customer-facing, so you can separate the customer’s actual experience from the operations that support it. Make sure you understand how offstage actions, like internal communication, impact the onstage experience. Running the credit check for financing would usually occur offstage. For instance, in the car buying example, talking to the salesperson would be an action that occurs onstage. When evaluating a touch point, it is important to look at the touch point through the lens of onstage (what is visible to the customer) and offstage (what goes on behind the scenes). Now, we have to entertain three different scenarios that occur after the jam: 1) the customer walks away without dealing with it, 2) the customer gets a refund from the cashier, or 3) the customer’s kid really wants a gumball, so the manager has to come open the machine. It’s a simple process, until the machine jams. Look at the simple graphic below, which shows the purchase of a gumball from a gumball machine. Questions like these can complicate customer journey maps extremely quickly. Did the customer enter the purchase process through the website or toll-free number? Did organic search or your display ad campaign bring the customer to the toll-free number? Once the customer was on the phone, were they routed to the technical support or billing departments? Often, a specific touch point has multiple paths of entry. Any distinct point where the customer interacts with the organization should be mapped. You want your map to cover the entire journey from marketing to post-sale follow up surveys. Minor touch points might be when the customer walks around the lot prior to being greeted by a salesperson or when the customer is delivered their car after the sale is complete. In the car buying process, for instance, major touch points might be taking a test drive or sitting down at the salesperson’s desk to negotiate the final deal. Look for both major and minor touch points. The most foundational step in customer journey mapping is identifying the touch points where your customer interacts with your organization. Let’s jump right in with seven tips to help you get started with customer journey mapping. The more you explore journey mapping, the more you will learn its mechanics, and the better you will understand what your customer is experiencing with your organization. Used in the right circumstances, either method can be effective. Some disciplines (like heart surgery) should not be attempted without formal training, but customer journey mapping is more like entrepreneurship: While you can get a formal business coach to assist you, you can also dive in and learn by doing. However, journey mapping is a useful activity, even when it is not perfect or sophisticated. If you are familiar with customer journey mapping, then you know that it can be incredibly complex. Journey mapping is a holistic approach to understanding the flow of experiences a customer has with an organization it uses pictures to represent a process that cannot be adequately captured with words. Customer journey mapping is the act of graphically portraying your customer’s experiences with your organization across major and minor touch points (times when your customer interacts with your organization or product).
