customer-journey-map

name	customer-journey-map
description	Create customer journey maps documenting touchpoints, emotions, pain points, and opportunities. Outputs visual journey maps, moment-of-truth analysis, and prioritised improvement backlog.
argument-hint	["customer segment","journey scope","data available","format needed"]
allowed-tools	Read, Write

Customer Journey Map

A customer journey map visualises a customer's experience across all touchpoints with your product or service. It reveals where customers struggle, what delights them, and where they drop off — giving the team a shared, evidence-based view of the customer experience.

Process

1. Define scope. Which customer segment? Which journey (acquisition, onboarding, core use, renewal, support)? Start narrow — one segment, one journey.
2. Gather data. Customer interviews, session recordings, support tickets, NPS verbatims, analytics funnels. Don't map assumptions — map evidence.
3. Define stages. The high-level phases the customer moves through (Aware → Consider → Try → Buy → Use → Renew).
4. Map touchpoints. Every interaction with your product, team, or brand at each stage.
5. Add emotions. What is the customer feeling at each point? Use evidence, not empathy alone.
6. Identify pain points and moments of truth. Where do emotions dip? Where do decisions get made?
7. Find opportunities. What would move the emotion curve up? Prioritise by impact and effort.
8. Socialise and act. The map is only valuable if it drives decisions. Put it on the wall; reference it in sprint planning.

Journey Map Template

# Customer Journey Map: [Segment] — [Journey Name]

**Customer segment:** Mid-market B2B SaaS buyer (IT Manager, 50-500 employees)  
**Journey scope:** First awareness to first successful workflow automation  
**Last updated:** 2024-03-15  
**Data sources:** 12 customer interviews, Hotjar recordings, support ticket analysis (n=340)

---

## Stage 1: AWARE
*Customer realises they have a problem and starts exploring solutions*

### What they're doing
- Googling "how to automate [workflow]"
- Asking peers on LinkedIn/Slack communities
- Reading analyst reports and comparison sites

### Touchpoints
- SEO / blog content
- G2/Capterra listings
- Peer recommendations
- LinkedIn ads

### Emotions: 😐 → 🤔
Frustrated by manual process; cautiously hopeful that solutions exist

### Pain Points
- Overwhelming number of solutions; hard to differentiate
- Our G2 profile has fewer reviews than competitors
- Blog content is generic; doesn't speak to their specific workflow

### Opportunities
- Publish workflow-specific content (not generic automation content)
- Increase G2 review count (customer success initiative)
- LinkedIn case study ads by industry vertical

---

## Stage 2: CONSIDER
*Evaluating 2-3 solutions; building internal case*

### What they're doing
- Signing up for demos
- Sharing with decision-makers (VP Ops, CTO)
- Calculating ROI
- Reading case studies from similar companies

### Touchpoints
- Demo booking flow
- Demo itself (sales/SE)
- Pricing page
 Case studies
 Free trial


Interested but uncertain; worried about justifying the investment internally


 "The demo showed generic examples — I needed to see our exact use case"
 "Pricing page was confusing — I couldn't figure out what tier we needed"
 "No case studies from companies our size"


⚡  — answered in first 10 minutes of demo  
⚡  — ROI calculator or reference customer


 Build industry/use-case specific demo flows
 Add ROI calculator to pricing page
 Create 3 case studies for 100-500 employee companies
 Add "for companies like yours" tier recommendation

---





 Setting up their first workflow
 Inviting colleagues
 Hitting first technical blockers


 Onboarding email sequence
 In-app onboarding checklist
 Documentation
 In-app chat support


Initial excitement → frustration at setup complexity → relief if they succeed


 62% don't complete first workflow in first session (session recording evidence)
 Top support ticket: "How do I connect my [most common integration]?"
 Onboarding checklist: 8 steps — most abandon after step 4


⚡  — 73% of users who complete first workflow convert


 Reduce onboarding checklist to 3 steps ("quick win" then optional steps)
 Pre-built integration templates for top 10 integrations
 Proactive in-app help at known drop-off points (step 4)

---





Relief at decision; anxiety about rollout


 Contract negotiation takes average 3.2 weeks for mid-market
 No self-serve upgrade path — must contact sales for team plan
 Onboarding call scheduled 2 weeks after purchase


 Self-serve team upgrade (no sales required under $5k ARR)
 Onboarding call within 3 days
 Implementation checklist shared pre-call

---





High initial satisfaction → gradual familiarity → "what else can this do?"


 Power users hit limits and don't know about advanced features
 "I forgot about the feature — never discovered it" (NPS verbatims n=12)
 Support response time perceived as slow (> 4h)


 Contextual feature discovery (show advanced feature when relevant, not in a list)
 Power-user webinar series
 Support SLA improvement: < 2h for business hours

---





 Renewal email sent to billing contact, not product champion
 No proactive usage summary before renewal


 Usage summary report emailed to champion 60 days before renewal
 QBR offer for accounts > $10k ARR

Emotion Curve (Visual)

Emotion
  10 |                    😊              😊
     |         😊    😊      😊   😊
   5 |    🤔                           
     | 😐                        😤
   0 |
     |_________________________________________
      Aware  Consider  Try    Buy    Use   Renew

Moments of truth: ⚡ = critical decision or drop-off points

Prioritised Opportunity Backlog

| # | Opportunity | Stage | Impact | Effort | Priority |
|---|------------|-------|--------|--------|----------|
| 1 | 3-step onboarding quick win | Try | HIGH | LOW | P0 |
| 2 | Pre-built integration templates | Try | HIGH | MED | P0 |
| 3 | Industry-specific demo flows | Consider | HIGH | MED | P1 |
| 4 | ROI calculator on pricing page | Consider | MED | LOW | P1 |
| 5 | Self-serve team upgrade | Buy | MED | MED | P1 |
| 6 | Usage summary 60d before renewal | Renew | HIGH | LOW | P1 |
| 7 | Mid-market case studies (×3) | Consider | MED | MED | P2 |
| 8 | Contextual feature discovery | Use | MED | HIGH | P2 |
| 9 | Support SLA < 2h | Use | MED | HIGH | P2 |

Anti-Patterns to Avoid

Anti-Pattern	Problem	Fix
Mapping assumptions	Team already knows their blind spots	Ground every pain point in data (interviews, tickets, recordings)
Too broad scope	"B2B customer, entire lifecycle" is unmappable	One segment + one journey at a time
Beautiful map, no actions	Decoration, not tool	Every map ends with a prioritised opportunity backlog
One-time artefact	Experience changes; map becomes stale	Review and update quarterly
Team builds it alone	No buy-in from other functions	Cross-functional workshop; include sales, support, CS
Only showing pain	Successes are learnable too	Map moments of delight alongside pain points

10 Rules

1. Ground every emotion and pain point in evidence — not team assumptions.
2. Start narrow: one customer segment, one journey phase, one channel.
3. The most important output is the prioritised opportunity backlog — not the map itself.
4. Moments of truth are the highest-ROI improvements — identify and prioritise them first.
5. Build the map in a cross-functional workshop — CS, sales, support, and product see different parts of the journey.
6. The emotion curve reveals where to invest — improve the dips, protect the peaks.
7. Update the map quarterly — customer experience changes with the product.
8. "First value moment" in the Try stage is almost always the highest-impact opportunity.
9. Pain points need a root cause — "signup is confusing" leads to different fixes than "signup is slow."
10. Share the map widely — every decision-maker should have the customer journey front of mind.