Just because you say that you want to "delight your customers" doesn't mean that you actually do. Very often, we don't even know where we're failing to meet the expectations of our customers. This 7-steps exercise helped us visualize our customers’ experience and prioritize what we’ll work on based on data and not assumptions. The process has worked for me ever since. Original article: https://medium.com/omneechannel/7-steps-guide-to-building-a-customer-journey-map-d2c3b00cfffd Content: 1. Why you need to map out your customer experience 2. Don't get intimidated by the complexity 3. 7 steps to create your Customer Journey Map - Collect data from your customers and prospects - Define your personas and goals - Define stages of your customer journey - Add your customer actions, thoughts, and emotions - Define key highlights and pain points - Write down what you can do to improve - Prioritize and execute changes Special thanks to Kristjan Pecanac from Hekovnik startup school who helped me better understand these concepts when I just started my career in the tech industry.

1. 2018 7-Step Guide to Build
a Customer Journey Map
in 1 Week
Nasti Susnjara
Europe
15 Nov 2018

2. "Delight your customers”
What does that even mean?
This idea that has become so entrenched that many business
managers stopped examining it in detail. It has become something
everybody says they do, but in reality, we're all witnesses of too many
bad or even awful experiences every day.
95% of customers share bad experiences and only 87% share
good experiences with others.

3. Customer experience — both good or bad —
has an impact on your revenue.
Omneechannel, 2018

4. It is crucial to understand your customer journey and possible
friction points which you can improve.
Because there are so many different channels and touchpoints
where customers can interact with you and your company nowadays,
it has become very confusing and impossible to keep the whole
overview in your mind.

5. This is why we use Customer Journey Map, a tool that helps
you visualize your customers' experience.

6. Consumers today are well connected, they have access to all information they need and most
importantly, they have a choice, so companies need to look at customers' priorities and put the
user in front and center of their thinking.
A customer journey map helps us to understand the user's context throughout their
experience with our company, our services, and our products.
It helps us understand their motivation, goals, feelings, and thinking which all change as the
customer moves throughout the journey.
Having a customer journey map helps us prioritize what we'll work on based on data and not
assumptions (or even worse - wishes!) of a senior management.
Stop thinking about what YOU want

7. There are always many things you and your
team want to work on, but you need to
understand where your business is failing the
expectations of your customers so you can
focus your efforts where it matters the most.
Omneechannel, 2018

8. Don’t get intimidated by the complexity
The main reason for concern is thinking that a customer journey map has
to be a 100% accurate representation of every single moment of the
customer experience. Which is almost impossible and the sooner you are
okay with it, the easier it will be for you to start.
Because the customer journey can no longer be represented in a linear journey from A
to B - buyers often take a back and forth, cyclical, multi-channel journey - the mapping
can be hard to visualize. — Hubspot

9. There are many ways of representing the journey from post-it notes
on a boardroom wall to Excel Spreadsheets, to infographics.
The most important thing is that your map makes sense to people
who'll be using it.
Do it in a way that fits best to your needs

10. A small part of my
first real customer
journey map from
December 2016.

11. 1. Collect data from your customers and prospects
2. Define your personas and their goals
3. Define stages of your customer journey
4. Add your customer actions, thinking, and emotions
5. Define key highlights and pain points
6. Write down what you can do to improve
7. Prioritize and execute changes
7 Steps to Create Your Customer Journey Map
Omneechannel, 2018

12. Collect data from your customers and prospects
1
Talk to your customers.
The important thing is to only reach out to actual customers or
prospects. You want the feedback of people who are actually
interested in purchasing your products and services and who
have interacted with your company before or plan to do so.

13. Collect data from your customers and prospects
1
Gather the numbers.
Check your website analytics to understand your visitors, and social media to see if there are
any mentions of your name and if they are positive or negative, deep dive in demographics of
your audience, see which content is the most popular among each customer segment etc.
Surveys — still a very valuable tool to get insights into your customers’ thinking.
Gather your usage metrics. How frequently your product or services are used? How people
use your product or services? Which features or certain services are the most popular?

14. Mapping your customer journey is a team
effort. Therefore, the best way to start is to
host a workshop or a series of workshops with
realistic goals and attended by people who
understand the customer journey and those
who do not but are influencers in the
organization, i.e. senior management.
Omneechannel, 2018

15. Define your personas and their goals
2
Define who your target audience really is and who are their typical
representatives. It doesn’t matter whether you’re in B2C or B2B space, there
is always a person on the other side buying from you. If you have multiple
target groups, focus for a start only on those that are most important for
your business (e.g. bring you the most value over their lifetime).

16. Define stages of your customer journey
3
During the workshop, your goal is not
to map out all the details but rather to
put together an overview of the
journey your customers experience
when they engage with your brand,
your product or your service.
BASIC
1. Discovery
2. Research
3. Purchase
4. Delivery
5. After sales
COMPLEX
1. Awareness
2. Knowledge
3. Consideration
4. Selection
5. Purchase
6. Set up
7. Use
8. Troubleshoot
9. Retention/Loyalty
10. Advocacy/Referral

17. Add your customer actions, thoughts, and emotions
4
We call all these “user stories” — their thinking and feelings when they are
doing a specific action. Write user stories for each stage. Each user story is
one touchpoint with your brand.
Touchpoints — How does the customer interact with us at this point?
Goals— What is the customer trying to achieve at this stage?
Questions — What does the customer want to know at this stage?
Emotions — What is the customer feeling at this stage in the process?

18. Stages, user stories, and touchpoints are a part of the customer journey grid
you create for your specific case.

19. Define key highlights and pain points
5
For each stage think about what you’re really good at and where you
really suck.
Many of your highlights and weaknesses you probably already know
intuitively but this step will not be possible without proper data and
insights for each stage.
Relying only on numerical data is dangerous and might lead to wrong
interpretation. Therefore it is crucial to combine numbers with actual
anecdotes of your customers.

20. Write down what you can do to improve
6
Define for each stage and each touchpoint what are the specific things you
can do to improve your customer experience.
If there are things that you know have a negative impact on customer
experience, but unfortunately you are not able to change them, suggestions
for improvements can be a different expectations management.

21. Prioritize and execute changes
7
In this step, you have to understand where your biggest issues are
and focus only on fixing that touchpoint. When you fix it and eliminate
frictions, you can move to the second worst performing touchpoint.
You should always avoid fixing multiple touchpoints from multiple
stages at the same time.

22. Mapping out customer journey is something
that takes time but is definitely worth it. Once
you have, it will not only align your team but
will also give you clarity of where you should
focus your efforts first and how to do it to
really move the needle.
Omneechannel, 2018

23. Read the full article on Omneechannel.
Want to get in touch?
nasti.susnjara@gmail.com
/in/nastisusnjara
@nastisusnjara