4 Tips to Create an Awesome Customer Journey

The customer journey is an important part of every business. From selling million-dollar houses to one-dollar razors, a good customer journey will help develop customers who stay with your business for years.

Understand the Customer Journey

Before we start, it helps to define the “customer journey.” This is the concept of moving a potential customer from initial contact to purchase. It can take many forms, but it usually involves the customer searching, evaluating, experimenting, and purchasing. After the purchase, it hopefully involves retainment or loyalty.

To visualize the customer journey, below are several maps for different products or services found on Mycustomer.com.

In a quick guide by Tutsplus.com, they layout a quick guide to creating a customer journey map.

Simple and straight forward.

• Step 1: Choose a Buyer Persona to Focus on – Creating a buyer persona will give you focus as you create your customer journey map.
• Step 2: Understand Your Persona’s Goals – What do you want your customers to accomplish with your company?
• Step 3: Map Touchpoints – “A touchpoint is any time a potential customer comes in contact with your business—before, during or after they purchase something from you.”
• Step 4: Look at the Big Picture – What experience do you want people to have with your company?
• Step 5: Prioritize – Where are customers getting hung up? Where can you make the biggest impact?
• Step 6: Visualize Your Information – Layout customer journey on a whiteboard or large piece of paper.

Still interested in learning more?

Check out these blogs that provide deep insight into the customer journey.

• All You Need to Know About Customer Journey Mapping by Smashing magazine – Read Here
• Using Customer Journey Maps to Improve Customer Experience by Adam Richardson on HBR.org – Read Here

Enhance the Customer Journey with These 4 tips

Answer All Queries Within 24 Hours

No matter what phase the customer is in, communication is essential. Responding to all queries, from email messages to phone calls, helps maintain contact and show your value as a business. Do your best to answer all queries within 24 hours. Having an answering service can help you respond to customers quicker, enhancing the overall journey at every phase.

Allow Customer Service Reps to Go Off Script

Many businesses have specific scripts that customer service representatives must stick to, word-for-word. While this is important, it helps to let your people go off script and communicate with people on a personal level. Customers want to talk to real people, and allowing your team to go off script (with reason, of course) allows them to provide enhanced, personalized service.

Make Every Effort to Reduce Wait Times

When a customer calls your business, they want to feel valued, but making them wait gives the impression (even if unwarranted) that you simply don’t care. A study from American Express found that the average customer is willing to wait on hold for only 13 minutes. Even more worrisome, roughly one out of every five customers will only wait for five minutes. After that, they hang up and likely search for your competitor; your chances of re-earning their business plummet.

An article Adam Toporek for Salesforce.com, he provides 5 tips to help you reduce customer wait time. Here is a quick summary:

• Find the chokepoints – “At what point in your customers’ journey (or path-to-purchase) are they experiencing the longest wait times?”
• Focus on the front end – “Wait times often occur because your customer is not in front of the person who can help them. Make sure your front-end processes are as accurate and effective as possible.”
• Create self-service opportunities – “The less customers have to wait on someone from your organization to assist them, the less they have to wait overall.”
• Focus on customer expectations – “Do your best to make sure both you and your organization understand your customers’ expectations at every stop along the customer journey.”
• Optimize your staffing – “Make sure you have the right teams in the right places at the right time.”

Create Clear Steps

During the customer journey, your leads will go from one step to another, progressively moving towards the purchase and, if you’ve done a great job, long-term loyalty. Make the progression as clear as possible. Give them clear steps like “click here to order” or “contact us for more information.” Don’t assume they know what to do next; hold their hand and guide them through the customer experience with clear, simple steps.

With these tips, you can create a better customer journey. From the moment a lead learns about your business to the final purchase, if you stick with these tips, they will be happy repeat customers!