How to Win Potential Customers with Customer Journey Mapping on Google: 20 Tips
As is explained over at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com, the customer journey is the process by which a customer interacts with a company to achieve a goal. A customer journey map is planning how a person goes from learning about a product or service and converting into a customer. This article will look to list 20 tips on how to win potential customers with customer journey mapping on Google.
Customer journeys are not linear
The first thing to point out is that the customer journey can rarely be represented in a linear journey from point A to point B as buyers often take a back and forth, cyclical, multi-channel journey as per RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com. For this reason, savvy business leaders use a variety of methods to represent the journey.
The importance of collecting data from your customers
When it comes to customer journey mapping, the most important thing is that the map makes sense to those who will be using it. However, before you can dive into creating your customer journey map, you need to first collect data from your customers and prospects.
Set clear objectives for the map
Additionally, before you can dive into creating your customer journey map, you need to ask yourself why you are making one in the first place according to RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com. What goals are you directing this map towards? Who is it specifically about? What experience is it based upon?
Create a buyer persona
Based on the objectives set, you may want to create a buyer persona. This is a fictitious customer with all of their demographics and psychographics who represents your average customer. Having a clear persona helps remind you to direct every aspect of your customer journey map towards them.
Profile your personas and define their goals
After creating a buyer persona, you should conduct research next. Some great ways to get valuable customer feedback are through questionnaires and user testing. 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.
Highlight your target customer personas
Once you have learned about the different customer personas that interact with your business, you will need to narrow your focus to one or two of them as articulated at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com. If you group too many personas into one journey, your map won’t accurately reflect your customers’ experience.
Pick your most common customer persona if you are creating your first map
If you are creating your first map, it is best to pick your most common customer persona and consider the route they would typically take when engaging with your business for the first time. You can use a marketing dashboard to compare each one and determine which would be the best fit for your journey map.
List out all of the touchpoints
As captured at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com, touchpoints are all the places on your website where your customers can interact with you. Based on your research, you should list all of the touchpoints your customers and prospects are currently using, as well as the ones you believe they should be using if there is no overlap.
This doesn’t just mean your website
When it comes to your touchpoints, this doesn’t just mean your website. You need to look at all the ways in which your customer might come across you online, including social channels, paid ads, email marketing, and third-party review sites or mentions.
Touchpoints to consider
As you create your journey map, there are several touchpoints to consider, including customer actions. List out all of the actions your customers perform throughout their interaction with your brand. Others to consider are customer emotions and motivations, as well as customer obstacles and pain points.
Determine the resources you have and the ones you will need
Given that your customer journey map is going to touch on nearly every part of your business, as covered at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com, it is important to take inventory of the resources you have and the ones you will need to improve the customer’s journey.
Analyze the results
Just because you have designed your map doesn’t mean your work is done. The most important part of the process is analyzing the results as this can show you where customer needs aren’t met. By approaching this, you can ensure that you are providing a valuable experience and making it clear that people can find solutions to their problems with your company’s help.
Take the customer journey yourself
The whole exercise of customer journey mapping described at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com remains hypothetical until you try it out yourself. Therefore, for each of your personas, follow the journey they take through their social media activity, reading their emails, to searching online.
Make the necessary changes
Your data analysis should give you a sense of what you want your website to be. You can then make the appropriate changes to your website to achieve these goals. This may mean making more distinct call-to-action links or writing longer descriptions under each product to make its purpose clearer.
Find the sweet spot where your customers’ goals and your own align
Before you start customer journey mapping, nail down your business goals. Any marketing and communication you deliver during the customer journey should be focused on helping your brand reach those goals.
Recognize pain points and moments of delight
How might your customers feel at the pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase stages as they attempt to achieve their goals as discussed at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com. Find the moments where your customers might have negative experiences.
Visualize your customer journey map
Go beyond just writing down your customer journey and communication touchpoints, and create a visual map of them. This doesn’t need to be a polished, heavily-designed visualization. Simply write each of your touchpoints down on individual sticky notes or papers, then pin them to a wall. This will help your team take a bird’s eye view of the entire customer journey.
Ask customer service reps about the questions they receive most frequently
As revealed at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com, sometimes, customers are not aware of their specific pain points – they simply feel when something isn’t working for them. That is where your customer service reps come in as they can help fill in the gaps and translate customer pain points into business terms that you and your team can understand and act on.
Review and update each journey map after every major product release
Every time your product or service changes, the customer’s buying process changes too. Even a slight tweak, like adding an additional field to a lead form, can become a significant roadblock for customers. Therefore, it is important to review the customer journey map before and after implementing changes.
Make the customer journey map accessible to cross-functional teams
Customer journey maps are not very valuable in a silo. Creating a journey map is a conventional way to bring cross-functional teams together to provide feedback. Afterward, make a copy of the map accessible to each team so they always keep the customer top of mind.
These are some of the tips to consider when it comes to customer journey mapping on Google, with more on this topic to be found over at RunRex.com, guttulus.com, and mtglion.com.