Discover innovative opportunities with Customer Journey Map

Table of Contents

• Customer Journey Map – definition. What is a customer journey?
• Why mapping a customer journey is so important?
• Customer Journey Map creation step by step
• Customer Journey Map – what’s next?

The key to success of such great brands as Uber, IKEA or Starbucks lies not only in the quality of their products and services. Famous companies plan their customer’s every step and they make sure that each stage of his journey meets his needs. Customer Journey Map is necessary to achieve such an effect – but how to create it and use it so it would really be beneficial?

Customer Journey Map – definition. What is a customer journey?

Customer Journey Map is a visual or written representation of the process a customer has to go through to acquire a product or a service. While creating a customer journey, all the actions completed by the client are thoroughly analyzed. It allows us to spot the issues and problems that may have a negative impact on users’ experiences and, indirectly, affect sales and conversions. Thanks to that, a bank may eliminate problems such as:

• Long time to service.
• Complicated processes.
• Abandoned purchase processes.

Customer Journey Map is also beneficial in terms of competitive advantage, especially in the banking industry. Defining customer journey allow banks to improve customer service and adjust the products to fit the requirements of target audiences, even under very dynamic circumstances. If those are the challenges your bank has to face, designing Customer Journey Map is a simple and effective solution.

Why mapping a customer journey is so important?

Customer Journey Map becomes more and more powerful each and every day. That is because the journey is the key to the discovery of weaknesses in service processes and eliminating them in order to convince customers to complete the remote purchase. It has a significant influence on their satisfaction rate – according to the latest research conducted by McKinsey, after the Customer Journey Map was introduced to a company, satisfaction rate grows by up to 20%. It can also have a positive impact on:

1. Cost optimization and planning. It is confirmed by companies’ experience – organizations that regularly improve their Customer Journey Maps can observe a 10 to 15 percent rise in their revenues.
2. Gaining a competitive edge – especially in the industries in which it is hard to stay ahead of others. Thanks to seemingly small improvements in sales process, one could convince customer to continue transactions or begin other ones, increasing his loyalty.

What is more, regular implementation of minor changes in a long-term perspective can cause measurable benefits. Customer Journey Map is a part of kaizen approach based on constant improvement – including the ones introduced to benefit the company.

Customer Journey Map creation step by step

Step 1. Where to start?

To begin a creation of Customer Journey Map, one should start with defining its two base elements. Those include:

1. Actors. Who would use the Customer Journey Map in the end? Create a persona representing the point of view of your target audience and evaluate the process form its perspective. Thanks to that solution, you will avoid a number of mistakes caused by looking at the process from employee’s point of view.
2. Scenarios and goals. Describe the current state of the process and circumstances in which your persona operates and add some context to it. Choose your goals and expectations that will interest your target audience during the process.

Step 2. Choose the stages of Customer Journey Map

After describing the basic data about the process, we can move on to defining its particular stages. The easiest way to take into account all the actions in Customer Journey Map is to point out the first and the last step in each scenario and fill the gaps with sufficient actions in the end. It should not be a time-consuming process – consecutive stages should be of importance for the process and should have an impact on its development.

Step 3. Create a list of necessary actions

We already know what obstacles one has to overcome to fulfill his goal. In this part of Customer Journey Map creation, one should add all the necessary actions to the predefined steps that customers have to complete in order to end the process. In this case going into too much detail is also not advisable – basic information should do perfectly well at this stage.

Step 4. Add thoughts, emotions and impressions to a Customer Journey Map

At this stage of customer journey creation, you should look at the process from his point of view. Add thoughts, feelings and general impressions each stage of the journey is to trigger in the target audience. In this part of Customer Journey Map, you should focus on all the negative emotions that may be caused by different interactions and discourage customers from completing the process.

Step 5. Identify the problems on customers’ way to purchase

Use the information you have prepared in the previous steps to mark the stages that negatively affect the customer journey. Do not expand your map with additional pages – use colors, frames and dots to emphasize the most important finds.

Step 6. Improve your solutions

Based on the Customer Journey Map you have created, you can easily point out the disadvantages of your process and suggest solutions. Add them to your map using an effort-cost principle (include all the tasks and funds necessary to complete the suggestion). Remember that you don’t have to implement drastic changes at once! Start with introducing minor improvements and let them accumulate over time, resulting in a spectacular effect.

Customer Journey Map – what’s next?

The work with Customer Journey Map does not end when the document is closed. The map should be a tool that is regularly refreshed over time. While new work is being done and while new problems occur, Customer Journey Map can be expanded and commented on. The results of implemented improvements should be constantly monitored with success meters, as they can be a base for further modifications. Thanks to that, the journey can become a living map that allows for ongoing improvement of standards instead of one-time revolution.

What is more, Customer Journey shouldn’t – and mustn’t – be available for a limited number of people. It should be a priority for each and every employee and manager and it should act as a key to introduction of further improvements and decision-making processes. This is the only case in which the adjustments implemented thanks to the Customer Journey Map will have a chance to become a base for further development in the future.

The creation of the Customer Journey Map is a complex long-term process that requires professional support. Would you like to know how would it look like in your case? Do you wish to know what to improve and how to solve the issues troubling your customers in the banking industry?

Contact us, schedule a meeting and gain the access to knowledge and experience that will help you improve processes in your company.

Ailleron

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