A Journey Mapping Glossary

Terms associated with Journey Mapping

Every discipline has its own set of rhetoric, catch-phrases and dreaded TLAs (three-letter acronyms).  We thought we would take a moment to define some of the terms that are commonly used within the customer experience and journey mapping disciplines.

360 Degree View of the Customer refers to the compilation of all the data about a customer in one place. Linking on-line behavior, off-line behavior, preferences, transaction data, etc. in a single view of the customer experience.  We have done a lot of research on this topic, which you can find here and here

Customer Experience refers to the various interactions the individual has with a company/brand over time. It takes into account the entire lifecycle, including stages such as awareness, consideration, purchase, repurchases, loyalty and churn. It seeks to understand the customer’s point of view and then to design interactions and experiences that make it easy for them to accomplish their objectives.

CEM – Customer Experience Management

Contact Strategy refers to the effort taken to better interact with customers once the company has undertaken a journey mapping effort. Usually a segmentation has been completed using the customer data, so that the company can be strategic in how it targets its communications efforts going forward.  Read here for more on contact strategy planning.

Customer Interactions / Transactions refer to the way in which a customer interacts with the company’s touch-points, for example opening an email, sharing a link, attending an event, or complaining on social media.

Customer Journey Mapping is a visual representation how the organization is or isn’t aligned to customer needs, created in order to assess:

  • Inbound interactions that are customer driven
  • Outbound interactions that are company driven
  • Interactive and face-to-face interactions
  • How different interactions tie together
  • Customer needs, emotions, perceptions
  • The customers’ expectations of their experience with the company
  • Areas where the company may be failing to meet customer expectations

Head here for our thought leadership on journey mapping best practices.

Customer Satisfaction refers to the measure of a customer’s satisfaction with your product or service. Usually this comes in the form of a survey that is filled out by the customer as close to the time of the interaction as possible.

CX – Customer Experience

Diagnostic refers to the effort of collecting voice of customer, employee and institution to understand the current state of the customer experience.

Digital Journey refers to an individual’s digital experiences with a company or brand. There is always a need to integrate the digital with the off-line journey, as customers usually use multiple channels to get what they need. Digital only tells part of the story.

Emotion refers to the way the customer feels about their interactions with a company or brand. Emotions can affect any interaction and may change from the beginning of an interaction to the end. An angry customer being treated fairly and respectfully by a customer service agent could turn the customer’s emotional state from angry to satisfied or even delighted.

Interaction Points (IPoints) refer to the points of interaction between the customer and the company or brand. These are used in the mapping process to represent separate interactions, and can include any and all information on the touch point, emotions, customer segments involved, satisfaction data, etc.

Loyalty -is faithfulness or a devotion to a person, country, group, or cause. Building a long term relationship with an individual over time so you become their preferred provider and they give you the majority of their business over time as you earn their trust. Loyalty requires building trust through providing a consistent experience.

Moments of Truth refer to important moments from the individual’s point of view. These are moments during the long-term relationship with the company or brand that represent a crossroads. Whatever happens at this point could cause the customer to abandon the company or could encourage the customer to continue to do business with the company.

Multi-channel and Omni channel. Multi channel is enabling a customer to interact with you in multiple channels ( on the web, in person, through your call center etc.). Omni-channel is focused on integrating all the channels to make it easier for the customer to interact with you in any channel. The Omni-channel experience requires that you integrate your customer data across the enterprise in order to have enough data to answer their questions and solve their problems.

Net Promoter Score refers to a metric that determines the likelihood your customers will recommend your product or service to others.

Pain Points are the interactions from a customer’s point of view that deliver a poor customer experience and do not promote the long-term relationship.

Path to Purchase refers to the customer’s journey from awareness to purchase. It is a subset of the customer journey that focuses on how the customer most directly gets to the purchase decision.

Roadmap refers to the plan of action based on what was learned in the Journey Mapping effort. Findings and recommendations lead to initiatives for improvement, which can be prioritized into immediate, medium- and long-term programs.

Story Maps refer to maps that tell the story from a particular customer’s point of view. They are highlighted with icons and color at certain points so as to showcase points of brilliance and points of pain.

User Experience (UX) UX refers to the design of an experience to deliver the best experience for a consumer to use your product/service. UX professionals work with customers to understand how they use the product and design based on this input.

Voice of the Customer (VOC) refers to the feedback received from customers directly. The data may be may collected in person, (call center, or in store, social media) via a survey, from a focus group, or through observation (ethnographic research).

Voice of the Employee (VOE) refers to the feedback received from front line employees who deal with customers every day. The data may be collected in person, by shadowing front line staff, by interviews or by surveys.

Voice of the Institution (VOI) refers to the feedback received from senior strategic stakeholders who have a good overall understanding of the complexities behind the business that may be affecting the customer experience for better or worse. The data may be collected by one-on-one interviews or by surveys.

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