If you want to ensure customers have a positive experience with your company from start to finish, it helps to identify all the steps they take before making a purchase. Customer journey mapping is an effective method for charting this path that can help you better understand how your customers interact with your brand.
While it is possible to create a customer journey map using quantitative data alone, relying solely on analytics will often leave you blind to the feelings and emotions that drive purchase decisions. That’s why qualitative research is necessary to create a reliable journey map that accurately reflects the customer experience every time they interact with your business. Here is a closer look at journey mapping and how to use qualitative research to create a flawless experience for your customers.
What Is Customer Journey Mapping
Customer journey mapping is the process of creating a visual representation of the steps a customer takes when interacting with a business. It starts with the first time a customer becomes aware of your brand, charts purchases and conversion points, and explores any further interactions they have with your company after buying.
Journey maps are a great way for businesses to visualize how customers move through the marketing funnel, which empowers you to better address their needs, overcome obstacles, and continue to provide an exceptional experience.
Exploring the Gaps in Traditional Customer Journey Mapping
With so much raw data on customer behavior available, it’s easy to fall into the trap of creating a customer journey map based entirely on metrics from your website, social channels, and support interactions.
While this information certainly can be useful for understanding the what and when of customer interactions, it often fails to explain the why and how.
For example, web data can show you when a customer abandons their cart before completing the purchase but it doesn’t explain why they changed their minds. Qualitative insights can help fill those gaps so you can overcome future obstacles to conversion and effectively re-engage any customers who lost interest before buying.
The Role of Qualitative Research in Customer Journey Mapping
Qualitative research explores the deeper psychological factors that impact buying decisions, including the customer’s unmet needs, motivations, and pain points. It can add depth and nuance to a journey map, allowing you to keep track of not only what actions customers take but also the reasoning behind their choices.
You can use a few different qualitative research techniques to enhance your customer journey mapping:
- In-depth Interviews: One-on-one interviews with prospective or existing customers can be useful for unpacking emotional responses at different touch points and how they feel about their overall experience.
- Ethnography: Observing customers while they are shopping can be great for identifying unconscious behaviors and unforeseen friction points that influence purchase decisions.
- Projective Techniques: Methods like sentence completion, personification, and collaging can reveal hidden beliefs and perceptions customers have about a brand, providing deeper insights into their feelings and motivations at every stage of the journey.
How To Incorporate Qualitative Insights Into a Customer Journey Map
While qualitative research can be very useful for exploring customer attitudes and motivations, you’ll need a solid plan to acquire the insights required to create a successful customer journey map. Here are the 4 steps you should take to plan your research.
- Identify Main Touch Points: Start by mapping out the different stages of the customer journey, including awareness, consideration, purchase, and post-purchase.
- Collect the Data: Conduct interviews, focus groups, and ethnographic studies to explore how customers think and feel at each stage of the journey identified in the first step.
- Analyze Patterns and Pain Points: Look for any noticeable trends in customer responses to identify recurring themes in emotions, needs, and frustrations. Emphasize any findings that reveal areas where the customer experience can be improved based on feedback.
- Visualize the Journey: Create an empathy-driven visualization of the customer experience that includes actions (what customers do), thoughts (what’s on their mind at each stage), and emotions (how they feel before and after making a purchase).
By using qualitative research to build on the quantitative data at your disposal, you can create a more detailed and insightful journey map that accurately depicts your customer’s feelings and state of mind when they’re interacting with your brand.
Create Better Customer Journey Maps With the Help of New Perspectives
Conducting qualitative research studies and using the data to create detailed and accurate customer journey maps can be a challenge without the necessary expertise and resources. If you want to get a better understanding of your customers throughout every stage of the journey, New Perspectives can help. We’ll provide the support and guidance needed to acquire the rich qualitative insights you need to create an effective customer journey map. Contact us today to get started.
