Mapping a foolproof customer-facing strategy

A good product, an appealing service and a dynamic brand – hallmarks of every successful company.

But, how often does customer experience lead to deep dissatisfaction, with no collective response and a feeling of being pushed from department to department. Customer journey mapping is integral for any brand looking to provide a seamless positive customer journey experience.

It is a common experience – information received prior to a purchase of a service or product from general marketing literature, sales staff or the company website turns out to be dramatically opposite to the reality. So different that it seems you are dealing with two different organisations.

In corporate sales speak, every time a customer contacts an organisation or its representatives, there is an opportunity for a customer ‘moment of truth’. Translated, this means that these key contact points are opportunities for that company to make good – or bad – impressions, thus becoming memorable points in that customer’s experience or journey.

Take my recent experience when buying a sofa from a well-known furniture shop – supplied through the website of a high-street retailer with after-sales service provided through a third branded party. When I called to enquire on the delay in delivering my sofa, no one was able to tell me what had happened.

Although I later found out the after-sales service provider was actually owned by the high-street retailer, no one would take ownership of the total process, i.e., my overall customer experience. This led to rising dissatisfaction with the level of service I did (or didn’t, in this particular case) receive from the after-sales company – and no empathy or change in attitude from any one I contacted.

In my experience with the retailer, my “moments of truth” were overwhelmingly negative – not conducive to placing my order with them any time in the future. The problem often lies in corporate functional silos.

In plain-speak, company business functions tend to be standalone, formulating distinct strategies and working in parallel with other business functions within the organisation.

Any customer has the expectation that an organisation providing service should have in place an easily navigable journey across all touchpoints, from initial enquiry right through to any required post-sales support.

However, the functional silo organisation is detrimental both to communications within the company and for the outside client. And, even more so, any customer improvement initiative or changes based around customer feedback are harder to implement within this structure.

Making changes

One approach to overcome these barriers is to consider the total customer experience through Customer Journey Mapping (CJM).

This technique looks at the total customer interaction across all touchpoints between him/her and the organisation, from initial contact, through purchasing, after sales support, and hopefully onto renewal / repurchase.

Most importantly, it maps the experience in two distinct categories:

• One that the company provides to the customer;

• Two, that the experience the customer would like to receive the most important factors from their perspective in determining whether they will remain loyal to a brand.

The gaps between the desired customer experience and the one actually received – those “moments of truth” – indicate where action needs to be focused.

It seems simplistic, but the key benefit of Customer Journey Mapping is in the provision of a holistic customer viewpoint, something that can be shared with all departments to improve a company’s brand reputation.

In detail, it enables a single cross-business unit view of the experience delivered by all staff units who come into contact with a customer at any point in their ‘journey’.

In addition, it provides data on key enabling requirements, such as skills, data, processes, measures and more, while highlighting areas where more attention should be focused as well as those less valued by customers (and where costs can be optimised).

Overall, an organisation should consider CJM when seeking any of the following:

• More understanding of the experience of different groups of customers;

• Improvement in efficiency and the removal of inconsistencies in customer experience;

• Identification of a more seamless experience across businesses, functional silos and channels;

• Design of a new customer experience;

• Assessment of the impact of wider internal developments focusing on customer experience;

• Establishment of development priorities;

• Development of cross business alignment across the organisation;

• Improvement of overall measurement of customer experience.

Just as most organisations have learned to gather data on their clients to improve understanding of their requirements, there is a growing trend to knit this information together to provide best practice in all areas of service.

From airlines and hotels through to mobile telephone companies, public sector organisations and the financial services industry, this behind-the-scenes mapping is reaping rewards in terms of brand growth – and ultimately a brand delivering on its promise.

— The writer is a Dubai-based brand and marketing professional.