There are few things as useful to a business as a well-plotted customer journey map. Ideally, the plan outlines where the customer comes into contact with the company, as well as any problems that may exist when this happens. This can prevent common customer-facing difficulties and help the business deal with feedback in a more efficient manner.
Sadly, many businesses leave the entire development of the customer journey map to the marketing team, even though other departments interact with the client just as much or more. Below, 12 members of Forbes Agency Council offer some advice on how other departments can positively contribute to the development and maintenance of the customer journey map.
Members explain how to engage departments across your organization in building a customer journey map.
Photos courtesy of the individual members
1. Keep Your Doors Open To Ideas
Anyone in the company who can provide relevant data can contribute to the customer journey mapping. That’s why it is important to nurture an open-door policy that will allow your employees to speak their potentially valuable ideas, no matter what their job description is. Someone might not be a strategist, but they might speak to the customers on a daily basis and know exactly what they need. – Fran Biderman-Gross, Advantages
2. Use An Impartial Researcher
It’s ideal to have all teams that touch the customer present in the journey mapping process. However, it is best when an impartial researcher does the actual journey mapping. An outside researcher is better able to examine the company through the perspective of the customer and ask the vital journey related questions: “And then what happens?” “What happens in between?” “But what if X happens?” – Tripp Donnelly, REQ
3. Think Like The Consumer
It is the responsibility of every person in a company to think about the end consumer. Across any firm, each person across each team should be thinking about how their action impacts the end consumer. Each team member should be asking themselves, if I were the end consumer, is this how I’d like the end product, service or experience? – Anas Ghazi, Kantar
4. Develop A Shared FAQ Process
Creating a shared sheet with potential response categories and example responses can help get visibility on common challenges at each step in the journey from different POVs. It provides an opportunity to have nuanced answers to the same questions depending on who a customer is speaking to — whether it’s a social-led response that drives engagement or scripted answers from your customer care reps. – Cj Roberts, Pandemic Labs
5. Form A Customer Insights Team
Companies often have a fragmented view of the customer journey, especially when there are different owners for each touch point operating in informational silos. Consumer insights teams can be a linchpin that merges cross-functional insights and uncovers the “why” behind touch points, which leads to more meaningful personalization of marketing and CRM strategies. – Camille Nicita, Gongos, Inc.
6. Get Sales/Service Input On Customer Pain Points
Having a single department mapping the entire experience can lead to an inaccurate account. Involve sales/service teams first and foremost to find out what is working and what is not within your onboarding process. Ask them for the customer’s points of pain, as well as their own, within the process. It will lead you into a much more clear and fluid illustration of your customer’s journey. – Michael Smith, MDS Media Inc.
7. Seek Insight From Key Shareholders
Including other teams is critical to developing effective maps. While the marketing team develops the maps, key stakeholders need to have input at the right times. Walking the halls to bounce preliminary maps off of key stakeholders is one way to get needed input and engaging various teams within the organization. – Bo Bothe, BrandExtract, LLC
8. Partner With Tech And Counsel For Data-Led Mapping
Technology and counsel teams are key partners to make sure the fullest, most privacy-safe customer portraits and journeys are being created. Customers especially appreciate the thoughtful use of data to help make their lives easier, and by partnering with technology you can bring this ask to life. – Kieley Taylor, GroupM
9. Get Your Tech Team To A/B Test
The customer journey must be mapped. Once it is, we are able to identify bottlenecks throughout the process, thus making it possible for our teams to simplify each step along the way. The technology team can then perform a series of A/B tests to help optimize each step for an easier, more efficient use. With tests from our tech team, the customer experience is improved and more refined. – Charles Mazzini, Hyperlinks Media, LLC
10. Create A Line Of Communication With Sales And Product
It’s dangerous for one department to outline the entire customer journey without consulting other parties that interface with customers. To fix this issue, bring sales and product teams into the journey mapping meetings. Make them aware of your goals and the initial outline of the customer journey. Their perspective will stir up ideas the marketing team didn’t even know were an option. – Jim Huffman, Growthhit
11. Involve Staff On The Front Line Of Customer Engagement
Staff with direct contact to prospects and customers hear the latest in industry issues, the customer pain that your product or service may relieve. Involve the front-line personnel to help understand why customers come to your firm for solutions. What job do they seek to accomplish? What are they trying to fix? – Jim Caruso, M1PR, Inc. d/b/a MediaFirst PR – Atlanta
12. Host Regular Sessions For The Broader Organization
Surfacing different perspectives and understanding diverse modes of thinking is vital to building a seamless journey, and usually reveals challenges and opportunities previously missed or glossed-over. Open up the input process every two weeks in a 30-minute session where self-selected colleagues feel welcome to come prepared with feedback and visual examples. – Serenity Thompson, A23 Advisors
