Once you begin to form a more holistic view of the customer’s journey, you can define the interactions that truly impact the customer experience—which are the ones you want to measure.
Cynthia Grimm, Chief Customer Experience Officer, CX Solutions (formerly TARP Worldwide), recommends focusing on the key drivers of overall satisfaction. Consider: What are the points of pain? What are the make-or-break issues in the customer journey?
“A customer can have lots of questions, issues and transactions, but there may be only a few that really make a difference in whether they will buy from you again or recommend you,” Grimm says. “What issue, transaction or touchpoint has the greatest impact on the customer’s willingness to buy again and their willingness to recommend you? That becomes the defining moment.”
While companies will have different terminology, the key touchpoints to measure will often cover the following six aspects of the journey, says Leslie Pagel, VP, Customer Experience, Walker Information:
- Learning—creating awareness so that the company is included in the consideration set.
- Purchase process—giving the company the best possible chances for being selected.
- Onboarding (or installation, delivery, etc.)—optimizing the customer’s first experience in using the products and/or services.
- Using—the ongoing use of the product or service.
- Paying—making it easy for customers to pay for what they purchased.
- Maintaining—ongoing support and services.
