Customer journey mapping is the structured representation of all the phases a customer goes through with your company. The result is a map containing clearly defined stages, the corresponding touchpoints and the expectations customers have during each phase.
The main challenge lies less in drawing the map than in segmentation. A new customer in the first quarter has different needs from an existing customer in their fifth year. A customer with a maintenance contract experiences your company differently from a project customer. Companies that divide their journey according to these segments can later collect more precise feedback and make more targeted improvements.
Feedback is most effective when collected immediately after a significant moment. Companies that send out one large customer survey each year receive blurred average results. By contrast, companies that ask short, targeted questions at defined trigger points receive responses that can be linked to a specific experience. Five points have proven effective in practice.
Feedback only becomes valuable when it leads to decisions. Three mechanisms ensure that responses result in improvements.
The retention process is the most financially powerful lever in the entire journey. Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company showed in the Harvard Business Review that a five per cent increase in customer retention can increase profits by between 25 and 95 per cent, depending on the industry. Existing customers purchase more, incur lower support costs and are more likely to make referrals.
A fixed feedback point several months before the renewal date works better — around four months in advance for annual contracts. The customer’s feedback then provides two benefits at once. If the customer is satisfied, you understand which aspects matter most to them and can place these at the centre of the renewal discussion. If there is criticism, enough time remains to resolve the issues before negotiations begin. An IT service provider that follows this approach enters the meeting with answers to the issues that genuinely concerned the customer during the previous year.
Systematic journey feedback requires a CRM as its foundation. Triggers, responses and customer data must be stored in one place. Otherwise, feedback remains scattered across isolated survey tools and Excel spreadsheets that no one consolidates. We illustrate how this can be implemented using HubSpot, the platform we work with.
No one on the team had to remember any of these dates. This possible because the CRM records each customer’s lifecycle phase, segment, contract start date and renewal date, while also providing standard survey formats for satisfaction, customer effort and likelihood to recommend. For the quarterly evaluation, all responses are available in dashboards organised by journey phase.
Every feedback question along the journey is an investment in customer loyalty. According to the Harvard Business Review, acquiring a new customer costs between five and 25 times more than retaining an existing one. Companies that listen before problems escalate need to acquire fewer new customers, renew contracts on better terms and receive more referrals. Satisfied existing customers are the most stable foundation which a mid-sized company can grow.