The Art of Customer Journey Mapping: A Guide for Entrepreneurs, Coaches, and Small Businesses

Define Your Target Audience

The first step in customer journey mapping is to define your target audience. Who are your ideal customers? What are their needs, goals, and desires? 

You must know precisely who you’re targeting to create a successful customer map. 

An excellent way to start is by analyzing customer data and conducting surveys and interviews. My personal favorite is interviews to hear people’s stories, what problem prompted them to seek a solution, where they initially looked for answers, what questions they were asking, and what emotions were they feeling along the way. This information will help you understand the behavior patterns of your ideal customers and how they interact with your brand.

Don’t get too overwhelmed here. When you google persona, it’s easy to think you need to create an elaborate description. You can start with the essentials and place them in a story. 

Let’s try an example.

We’ll assume you’re a financial planner who focuses on middle-class individuals and families because you know they’re at a crossroads, and the decisions they make will impact them and their future generations.

So we can start with a family making between $50-120K/year.  

What is their goal, and what prompts them to seek your help? Seeking financial advice is frequently triggered by some life events such as marriage, having children, moving to a new city, a career change or buying a home. In all the cases, they’re embarking on a new experience with financial implications and need help navigating. 

Our ideal customer description grows to a family making between $50-120K/year who is expecting their first child and is wondering how they will cover the increased costs, save for future expenses like college and mitigate the likelihood of less income if one of them shifts from full-time to part-time. 

You can begin to picture this family. Let’s go a little further into the emotions they’re feeling. And while we’re at it, we’ll add more details and name them for easy reference later. 

Trey and Denise Cook are a young couple who are expecting their first child. Trey is a marketing analyst, and Denise works in customer support. Together they make $110K/year. They don’t yet own a home but would like to. Right now, they are stressed and wondering how they will cover the increased costs, save for future expenses like college and mitigate the likelihood of less income if one of them shifts from full-time to part-time. Trey gets frustrated when they talk about money because he doesn’t know what to do, and they both wonder if there is a path forward for a middle-class family in a big city with rising housing prices and everyday expenses. 

At this point, you should be able to picture the Cook family and imagine their other questions or needs. You can begin to identify what kind of content or service would be perfect for them. 

Being able to effectively envision your potential client is the goal of an ideal customer persona. Now, we’re ready to move on to the map.

Build the map

A prospect moves through multiple stages before they become a customer. We use these stages when I work with entrepreneurs on their customer journey maps.

• Awareness
• Consideration
• Decision
• Delivery & Use 
• Loyalty & Referral

We list these stages left to right across the top of our whiteboard. After placing our ideal customer persona on the far left, you should create horizontal rows for these questions:

• What are the customer’s activities?
• What are the customer’s goals?
• What are the touchpoints between the customer and the business?
• How is the customer feeling?
• What path might the customer take? (leave a lot of space for this one)
• What are the business goals?
• What KPIs will measure the success of those goals?
• What business activities support the customer? 
• Who is responsible for these activities?
• What technology supports the process?

At this point, you should have a large matrix and may feel a little overwhelmed with all the boxes. It’s ok, that’s a normal feeling at this moment. As we work through the map,  you’ll see a clearer picture emerge.

Define the Customer and Business Roles

Both the customer and the business play a role in the journey, and you want this represented on your map. 

You can begin by working through the first four rows related to the customer. The first stage in the customer journey is Awareness. During this stage, the customer is becoming aware of their problem. They may be researching to understand or name the challenge they’re facing. Let’s work through it as an example.

Early in the journey customers are paying with their time and attention, not yet their money.

Awareness + Customer Activities

In this box, you identify what the Cooks are doing as they become aware of their financial situation. Some 

• Talk with peers who are a year or two ahead of them.
• Google “financial checklist for new parents”
• Ask their parents for advice
• Discuss it with each other in the evening
• Think/worry about it while driving or working. 
• Scroll through financially focused-podcasts to see if anything seems helpful.
• Read articles online that relate to their situation.

Awareness + Customer Goals

Early in the journey, the goal is likely to be something like:

• Understand what will be the financial challenges of early parenthood. 
• Have a list of the things they should be thinking about and doing.
• Discover some options they could consider later on.
• Determine if there is already a set plan they could follow. (this goal is going to likely carry through into the consideration stage)

Customer goals are vital to understand because if your content, activity or offer doesn’t align with that goal, it will be ignored.

Awareness + Touchpoints

When the customer is in the awareness stage, what touchpoints are they likely to have with your brand?

Here are some options to consider.

• Instagram posts
• Explainer videos
• Articles on your website
• Endorsement from another client

These can stay general like above, or you can make them more specific like, “Instagram post giving new parent financial statistics.” 

Awareness + Experience/Emotions

How is your ideal customer feeling at this point in their journey? Maybe a combination of excited, nervous, unsure and curious.

For now, we’ll skip the Path and work through the business side of the map.

Awareness + Business Goals

While working through the top half of the map, you were thinking through the customer's perspective. Now it's time to think from your perspective as an entrepreneur, coach or small business owner.

What are your business goals when a potential customer is in the awareness stage? Here are some possibilities for our financial planner example.

• Educate ideal customers on what they should be thinking through financially before and after having their first child.
• Position their business as someone helpful to middle-class families. 
• Collect contact information for market-qualified leads.

Awareness + KPIs

The KPIs clarify how you will measure success according to the goals you just defined. Here are a few examples.

• Organic Traffic
• Referral Traffic
• Lead Magnet Downloads
• Social Engagement

These will end up being much more specific depending on the actual business the customer journey map is being created for.

Awareness + Business Activities

What are you or your business doing to achieve your goals for your ideal customer in the awareness stage? The list doesn’t need to be long. In fact, it should be pretty focused. Here are some examples.

• Posting daily on Instagram.
• Creating and sharing helpful content, both written and video
• Answering relevant questions on platforms like Quora
• Inviting current customers to refer others. 

Awareness + Business Responsibility

Who will do or ensure these activities are done effectively? In our financial planner example, it’s probably themselves, or if they have a team, it could also include:

• Content creator
• Social media manager

Awareness + Technology

What technology will be needed to support your business activities and goals in your ideal customer’s awareness stage? For our financial planner, some might include.

• Web hosting
• Social media automation
• Video production
• CRM
• Email automation

Many of these will be included in other stages of the customer journey. The CRM is a critical part of your marketing OS and should be in all the stages. 

‍

We just worked through a lot, and that was just part of the first stage in the customer journey. Building out a solid customer journey map is a crucial deliverable in our Brand Intensives because when done well, you have a clear marketing plan to execute.

You would repeat this process from here, working through the customer journey stages. Once each stage is completed, it’s time to move on to mapping the path. 

Mapping the Path

This is where the real fun begins. In the path, you will identify likely entry points for your ideal customer and then draw out a happy path from those entry points to purchase and then to referral. 

There are various paths a customer can take, and there are innumerable more in real life.

In a live Brand Intensive, this would be a very interactive session, but we might end up with a financial planner customer journey map, as you see below.

‍

‍

As you can see, there are various paths a customer can take, and there are innumerable more in real life. However, the goal is to identify the ideal path the customer might take so you can ensure it is fully optimized. 

Someone might start on a different page on the site or read three articles rather than just one. Whatever exact path they take, this map shows it should be easy for them to download the checklist and then be invited to schedule an Expecting Session.

The Expecting Session is a brief 20-minute meeting to qualify the customer and determine if they are a good match for your services and if they are interested in buying. At this point, they are paying with their time and attention, not yet their money. 

If they are a good fit, then the financial planner would recommend scheduling a Roadmapping Session. The Roadmapping Session is not free but should be reasonably priced, close to your typical rate, but slightly lower. 

Both the customer and the business play a role in the journey, and you want this represented on your map

During this session, our financial planner would work with the Cooks to map out a financial plan that considers their growing family. During this session, they get to see the financial planner in action and even get to practice paying for their services. Once the session is over, they have the opportunity to sign up for long-term service.

In a Brand Intensive, we would continue mapping the path through the delivery of that service and how to cultivate long-term loyalty and referrals. We do this because the whole customer experience is part of your brand.

Identify Pain Points and Opportunities

Now that you’ve drawn out the map, it’s time to identify pain points and opportunities in your customer journey. 

What triggers are causing customers to leave? Is there an area for improvement? This is where you can use the customer data and feedback to pinpoint areas where the customer experience breaks down. 

You must cultivate a history and relationship with your potential customers before you ever actually meet them.

These insights can help you make better business decisions and improve customer retention. Mapping out the customer journey can also help you identify opportunities to upsell or cross-sell to your customers.

Optimize Your Customer's Experience

It’s time to implement changes to improve the customer journey. Based on your findings, you can adjust your marketing strategy, customer support, website design and more. 

Experiment with different approaches and analyze the results to see what’s working and what’s not. Keep in mind customer journey mapping is not a one-time event. The customer journey is continually evolving, and regularly reviewing and updating your map is essential.

Being able to effectively envision your potential client is the goal of an ideal customer persona.

You can continue to optimize your customers' experience based on the insights and data gathered from your journey map. You can do this by implementing changes that address your customers' pain points, testing new experiences, and continuously updating your journey map to reflect the changing needs of your customers.

‍

Customer journey mapping is an effective way to understand and meet the needs of your target audience. 

It provides you with a visual representation of the customer experience and helps you identify pain points and opportunities to improve and grow your business. As a small business owner, entrepreneur, or coach, you can use customer journey mapping to make better business decisions and create a loyal customer base. 

Customer journey mapping is an art, so experiment and be creative to see what works best for you and your customers.

Creating a customer journey map may seem challenging, but it's a critical step toward improving your customer experience and driving growth. By understanding your customer's journey, defining personas, mapping touchpoints, creating a journey map, and optimizing experiences, you can deliver a memorable experience that keeps customers returning. 

Imagine your ideal customer moving seamlessly from an Instagram post to your website to scheduling a call. All along the way, they feel like a friend is guiding them to what they want and need.

Ultimately, they are thankful for your being able to engage with your small business, coaching service or non-profit.

Customer journey maps can get complicated. Customers take all sorts of different paths, and it’s easy to get lost in the weeds as you try to work through the process. 

Architecting customer journeys is part science, part art and fully collaborative. Like I said before, it’s one of our favorite sessions to facilitate with small businesses and non-profits. 

So, if you want help, just ask. We'll start with a story session to hear your story and explore together what the best next step might be.

We'd love to work with you to craft an overall narrative to guide your customer touch points. When the map reaches the right level of clarity, we’ll help you prioritize the right paths for your ideal customers and current business realities. If you want help implementing all the writing and design along those paths, we’re here for that too.