Digital Customer Journey: What Brands Need to Know

The digital customer journey has become the backbone of modern business success, as more customers interact with brands online than ever before. The customer experience should always come first in any firm. That process frequently begins long before a person decides to buy something and doesn’t stop when the transaction is done. Gaining a better understanding of the entire situation is necessary to enhance the customer experience (CX).

In order to increase profits, the customer experience is essential. Studies from CX Index show that loyalty is driven more by a positive CX alone than by price and brand combined, accounting for almost two thirds of the entire effect. An efficient method of figuring out how to enhance consumers’ interactions with a company is to look at the digital customer journey map.

Digital customer journey mapping is a concept that modern digital marketers must grasp thoroughly, along with its benefits and applications for their complete digital marketing plan.

What is a Digital Customer Journey?

From initially observing the product to purchasing and using it, this is the route to purchase and retention. The customer journey encompasses all of the customer’s touchpoints, or points of connection with your organization, and gathers information about transactions, cross-device browsing history, customer care encounters, and consumer data.

In the past, a customer’s journey to a business always started with exposure to an advertisement on television or radio, continued with a visit to a physical store and a purchase. The experience is considerably different in the modern world because of technology:

• In the United States, the average household has 22 connected gadgets.
• The typical American uses their phone for five to six hours each day.
• Between June and December 2023, 79% of smartphone users made a transaction.

B2B Digital Customer Journey Touchpoints

Anything a B2B buyer uses to communicate with a seller or vendor is referred to as a touchpoint. This covers both digital (website, app, chatbot, etc.) and in-person encounters (phone, live chat, events/conferences, etc.). Touchpoints (e.g., emails, blog posts, on-demand films, etc.) might be one-sided and asynchronous, or they can feature live, real-time communication.

The most typical B2B customer touchpoints in the digital journey, according to McKinsey, are as follows (in no specific order):

• Mobile app
• Website(s) that contain blogs, documentation, PDFs, and more
• E-procurement/ecommerce portal
• Your procurement department
• Video conferencing/virtual events
• Live chat
• Email
• In-person meetings and events
• Phone
• Web search engines

Also Read: C-suite’s Playbook to Digital Business Experience

What are the Steps to Map the Customer Journey?

Step 1: Conduct customer research

Using information from primary research, you develop a digital consumer journey map. A key component of making customer-centric decisions is gathering and evaluating data about target audiences.

Conduct focus groups, in-person interviews, and brainstorming workshops to make sure you have accurate information.

Step 2: Design a buyer persona

Make buyer personas using the research data that has been gathered. A buyer persona is a profile that takes into account the traits and actions of the ideal customer, including their demographics.

Consider the various demands and expectations of your personas when creating a digital customer journey map. With the help of these personas, you can gain a deeper understanding of your clients’ requirements, issues, and motivations.

Step 3: Leverage the power of personalization

An issue with brands competing for consumers’ attention is option overload.

You can make an impression and customize products to meet the demands of your customers by personalizing their experience. Instead of wasting resources, you may use personalization to show target personas the right messaging.

Step 4: Describe the phases of a customer’s digital journey

Finding the steps that will compel your customers to complete a purchase is the next step.

At every stage, take into account the viewpoint, thoughts, goals, and pain points of the consumer. This will enable you to comprehend the challenges and goals that each customer is attempting to meet.

Step 5: List all your touchpoints with the potential customers

Touchpoints are places where potential customers engage with your company.

They may include:

• Websites
• Social media profiles
• Blogs
• Ads
• YouTube videos
• Ebooks
• Chatbots

Make a list of every customer touchpoint and assess how well it fits the journey for each one first. Keep in mind that based on the customer journey map of each buyer profile, different touchpoints apply.

You may determine which touchpoints are most important to them during the purchasing process by outlining them.

Next, maximize every interaction point for conversion and customer onboarding.

If you’re not sure, find the sources of traffic using web analytics.

Step 6: Sync up your touchpoints to provide a seamless customer experience

Put everything together after you’ve identified the key phases of a customer journey and the customer touchpoints.

To assist customers from beginning to end, create a digital customer journey map that is well-organized.

Step 7: Regularly customer journey maps frequently

Since changes are frequent, maintaining a customer journey map requires constant investment.

Find opportunities to enhance customer satisfaction after you’ve created a digital customer journey map.

Gather consumer feedback often and utilize it as the basis for enhancements in order to do this.

The customer journey is also something you may personally go through. As you progress through each level, make a note of any challenges you face.

To get you started while you examine the customer journey, consider the following questions:

• Was the procedure of making a purchase simple?
• Regarding customer service, how simple was it to contact?
• Was the representative friendly?
• How much time does the entire exercise take?
• Do the details at each level still make sense?
• What is a smooth customer experience that you should provide?

What About B2B Customer Mapping?

The fundamentals of journey mapping apply regardless of whether you’re selling to consumers or businesses. Even if you are trading with businesses, you are still selling to individuals within those businesses; there are simply more of them, therefore you will need to adjust your feedback procedures a little.

The following considerations should be made when it comes to B2B customer mapping:

• Compared to a B2C transaction, a B2B transaction involves a wider range of individuals: As a result, you’ll need to develop more customer profiles. Dealing with the CIO, executives, managers, tech staff, and call center assistants, for instance, is part of the job description for an online finance platform provider. These individuals, divided into personas, are all your customers.
• The value of B2B customers is higher: Long-term commitment is required to establish commercial connections, and losing a customer can have a significant financial impact. In order to optimize your customer segmentation and prioritization, consider this: a CIO, for example, has a larger purchasing power than a single call center assistant.
• The response from B2B customers is distinct. Because business-to-business trade relies heavily on referrals and interpersonal communication, businesspeople frequently know one another. Reaching out over the phone to discuss an issue is more appropriate than sending out a form questionnaire. To make each of your B2B customers feel acknowledged and unique, you’ll need to tailor your feedback strategies far more.

Final Thoughts

Businesses looking to better understand and maximize their client interactions must map out the B2B digital customer journey. Businesses can obtain significant insights into customer behavior, preferences, and pain points by thoroughly mapping the major stages and interactions.

Businesses may coordinate their efforts to provide a smooth and fulfilling experience at every touchpoint by having a thorough understanding of the B2B customer journey. In the end, a successful business-to-business customer journey map directs companies toward providing outstanding experiences.