Imagine holding a gun with no sight on it. And with a barrel pointing backward. Missing targets would be the least of your concerns. We’re talking shooting your head off. This may sound like a scene from some cheesy comedy thriller but it’s what happens when you start using a tool without knowing why. And while CJM has personas, digging info and finding touchpoints as its essential components, there’s still something that must go before all of them. And that is a clear vision of your goals.
First aim, then shoot
Before you dive into making personas and having fun brainstorming with your brothers in arms you’ll have to do one more thing - take a few steps back to have a bird’s eye view on your business. To do that you’ve got find out:
- Problems that you’re trying to solve
- Goals that your company pursues
- Values that your product brings to the customers. Values that are missing and/or values you want to create.
- The place of the customer in your business model
- What you hope to achieve by using CJM
These questions are not that easy to crack. But you got lucky today as at UXPressia we love cracking difficult questions. And here’s what you can do.
Learn as much as you can about your product
Reviewing your product as well as your business at large would be the right start. It doesn’t matter if you’re mapping for yourself or you’re doing it for a client – having a fresh new look won’t hurt you. On the contrary, with CJM in mind, there are high chances that you’ll discover something unique about the product you’re designing for. To do that, you may
- Make observations of your product or service.
- Talk to the customers.
- Talk to the staff that interacts with customers on a daily basis.
- Use every other source of data that can help you see the product.
- Refer to manuals and technical documentation.
- Use Vision and Scope document to see how stakeholders see the product/service and whether they are the same.
Once you have the answers, you’re good for the next stage.
Photo: http://www.sv-hubertus.nl
Identify your targets
Review your goals – specific and global (don’t forget to keep in mind goals of your customers and see how these two match). Being straightforward with what you really want to get in the end is an integral part of building a truly working customer journey map. And it benefits your business greatly too, to say the least. Business Model Canvas can help you see a bigger picture.
Here we give you a short but powerful list of sound goals you may set for yourself. And by the way, CJM can score them all.
- Better understand the end-to-end customer experience. This one is at CJM’s gunpoint. Creating a smooth CX path for your customers is something you don’t just want. It’s something you’ve got to have. Otherwise, drop your weapon. It is an outstanding user experience that makes winners, well, winners. Products can be copied in a wink. But CX is a different story.
- Improve cross-functional processes. Despite the focal point of CJM may seem to be the front-line, one of the side effects of mapping is actually improving the backstage. How’s that? By helping your staff to have the same picture of people they design product/service for.
- Eliminate silos. Silos can lead to a drastic downturn in the way you deliver your services, so the earlier you wipe it out the better. CJM can help here too. When properly built and acted upon, it lets you identify the gaps in the UX path. And these gaps often correspond to the gaps between departments.
- Improve marketing efficiency. Personalized content is what gets to people’s hearts passing by their minds. A map, once completed, will give you a perfect leverage for unprecedented influence.
- Retain customers. Journey maps show your customers in a way you’ve never seen them before. Knowing what drives users allows you to give them reasons for coming to you more and more.
- Get a single view of your customer. And also help both front-line and back-end office understand their impact on CX. When drawing CJM involves more than just UX guys, the whole team gets the same vision on the customer. A cherry on top – you got both ends working in accordance never known before.
- Become a more customer-centric business. Plot twist - it's a bonus #7 target.
And as a final touch, put these goals right on the map so it becomes a reminder of why you’re mapping in the first place. You’ll be on the right track all the way with no chance of going astray.
Setting right goals is one of the most important steps in creating customer journey maps. And with such accurate weapon as the CJM, you won’t miss any of your targets. But make sure you choose your guns as carefully as you set your goals. At uxpressia.com we’ve got some impressive armory you definitely want to check out. Load your CJM with our armor-piercing templates to make perfect shots now!
