User Experience and Customer Journey: Key to Great UX

There’s one thing that any business reaching for success needs to do, and that’s understand their customers. Without information about customer behaviors and why they act, reaching out to them is nothing more than a guessing game.

As we collect this intelligence, it can be weaved into a story that we’ve come to know as the customer journey and user experience.

The customer journey is the unique behaviors and actions that happen through the entire process of engagement that will help us build loyal customer relationships. Generally speaking, most consumers follow a predictable path. But, between industries and individual businesses, there are variances worth paying attention to.

While this is good information to know, you’re probably wondering why it’s so important to UX design. Let’s find out.

The customer journey is the series of interactions and experiences a customer has with a brand from initial awareness through to post-purchase. It includes both online and offline touchpoints that influence a customer’s perception and relationship with the brand.

It isn’t that hard to throw together a design with elements known to boost user experience. There are basics to creating a site that users feel good about using. The problem is that if our approach stops there, we’re actually missing the bigger picture.

The goal of leveraging the customer journey in UX is to identify what’s different about the path your users are taking or the position of the journey they happen to be in. Understanding their unique perspective and building a website they want to use at any time is key to keeping them engaged.

Considering that UX is estimated to overtake price and product as a brand differentiator by 2020, keeping a viable business model means looking at UX from an ever-changing consumer perspective. This absolutely can’t be done without understanding the customer journey.

The first thing a brand needs to do is develop a customer journey map, which is a diagram that defines all the touchpoints between a consumer and a business along the customer journey. This map isn’t focused only on digital touchpoints, but also interactions that occur offline as well. These are also important to UX.

The map is important because it helps identify the points where UX really matters for your business.

For example, a local travel agency might have a map that includes research, planning, booking, the anticipation of travel, the trip and post travel interactions.

This is obviously quite different from a software company with a journey map that includes research, experimentation with a free trial, purchase and long-term customer retention. These are details that matter for user experience management and customer journey.

Let’s illustrate the point. The travel agency above needs to optimize unique features like streamlined, intuitive input fields for booking reservations or a calendar and map features that are easy to use on a small, mobile screen.

Post purchase interaction and personalized content, like travel tips and recommendations based on the user’s destination, also help to keep the customer engaged during a point on the journey that’s unique to travel industry businesses. Micro UX details like this go far in keeping users satisfied with a brand.  A good resource on these interactions is called, Micro Interactions, by Dan Saffer.

Your website is the lifeline of your business. It’s critical that your team understands the customer journey and user experience.

Understanding the customer journey allows businesses to tailor their user experience to meet the specific needs and expectations of their customers at each stage of their interaction. This leads to a more intuitive, engaging, and satisfying user experience.

Customer journeys are important for user experience and customer journey design because they highlight the different touchpoints and interactions that users have with a brand. By mapping these journeys, designers can create more effective and targeted UX strategies that enhance the overall customer experience.

To develop a customer journey map, a business should:

Common touchpoints in a customer journey can include:

Customer journey maps differ between industries due to the unique nature of customer interactions within each sector. For example, a travel agency’s map might include booking and travel experiences, while a software company’s map might focus on trial usage and long-term support.

A positive user experience can significantly impact customer retention by ensuring that customers have a seamless and enjoyable experience with the brand. When customers find a product or service easy to use and valuable, they are more likely to return and stay loyal to the brand.

Micro-interactions are small, subtle design elements that enhance the user experience by providing feedback, guiding tasks, or delighting users. Examples include button animations, loading indicators, and personalized content.

Considering offline interactions in a customer journey map is important because customers often engage with a brand through multiple channels, not just online. Including offline interactions provides a comprehensive view of the entire customer experience, helping businesses to address all aspects of the journey.