The pandemic has certainly led to rethinking the ways in which we purchase products and use various services. But before delving into the main news, let's review what the Customer Journey is and why it is so important.
The Customer Journey is the relationship that is established between a company and a customer. A "journey" that begins with the need for a good / service and ends with the purchase. A path that is therefore carried out together, through various moments and points of contact, both offline and online: the touchpoints.
Among the main touchpoints we find:
• Physical: stores, fairs, events, TV
• Digital: social networks, chatbots, sites, newsletters, landing, SEO, Ads
• Third parties: word of mouth, backlinks, third party sites, blogs
The 5 phases of the Customer Journey
A 5-point model is used to describe the Customer Journey, which represents its key moments:
• Awareness: the awareness of a specific type of need by a user.
• Familiarity: ability of the product (and of the brand that promotes it) to make it recognizable among the many offered.
• Consideration: the user is informed and makes a comparison between the different options that various brands offer;
• Purchase: having identified the most suitable product, the user purchases it and becomes a consumer;
• Loyalty: the consumer builds loyalty towards the brand, and will return to buy his products when he needs them.
Today this model is no longer reliable because the consumer has greater awareness and is in possession of multiple tools to make the best choices for him.
The Customer Journey today
According to research conducted by Netcomm and magnews, the Customer Journey is increasingly multi-channel and hybrid. Let's see the main news:
1. There are no longer linear purchasing paths. The digital revolution has brought an overcrowding of touchpoints that multiply and differentiate more and more. A specific design is required that enhances them and puts them in relation to all the others, in order to convey an omnichannel experience. Surely the smartphone remains the most used means of making purchases.
2. There is more and more overproduction of content. Therefore, to capture the consumer's attention it is necessary to create personalized and increasingly immersive content, using artificial intelligence, automation but also content creators and influencers.
3. Take care of the Customer Experience. At the end of the purchasing process it is important to retain the customer. Because it is much more tiring to hire a new one than to continue and nurture a relationship that has already started.
Creating and mapping the Customer Journey: some tips
To best create and map your Customer Journey, follow these steps:
• Identify the Buyer Personas, that is the target of your brand
• Identify the journey/funnel that a user goes through to become your customer
• Describe the various touchpoints the customer encounters and determine if they are coherent and functional
• Always improve your Customer Journey
And the tools to better map this trip? Definitely Smaply, Mural and Miro.
E-Business Consulting, a digital marketing agency active since 2003, deals with 360 ° marketing and communication. With our support, we support you at every stage of your purchase path to create an always effective Customer Journey. Contact us for a free quote.
