Adaptive Paths Guide To Experience Mapping
Adaptive Paths Guide To Experience Mapping
Adaptive Paths Guide To Experience Mapping
EXPERIENC
MAPPIN
E
G
HIGH
POINT
TROUBLE SPOT
LOW POINT
First Edition
Published August 2013
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Of course, customers don't care about these efforts. They care
about meeting their needs across touchpoints and across the
competitive landscape.
04
New challenges require new approaches. Organizations are THE VALUE PROPOSITION
recognizing the need to think holistically, but they are struggling
to do so. Projects often focus on individual touchpoints, Create a shared frame of
technologies, and features without a clear picture of the total reference around the customer
customer experience, and ownership exists for touchpoints experience.
and products, but not for the customer journeys that cut
across them. This verticalization of functions and roles within
organizations prevents individuals from collaborating, and Build organizational knowledge of
prevents them from seeing how their work fits within the overall customer behaviors and needs
customer experience. across channels.
05
Experience Mapping
The four s tep s to making sense of
cross-channel customer journeys
UNCOVER THE TRUTH CHART THE COURSE TELL THE STORy USE yOUR MAP
study customer behavior and Collaboratively synthesize key Visualize a compelling story Follow the map to new ideas
interactions across insights into a journey model that creates empathy and and better customer experiences
channels and touchpoints understanding
06
You w a n t to tell
a story, b u t it has
to be a true story.
sTEP 01
UNCOVER THE
TRUTH
The value of a n experience m a p is directly tied
to the quality of insights it communicates.
Piecing together the big picture of how As a best practice, we recommend you scour your organization
and why customers are interacting with for existing data and insights relevant to the experiences you
different channels, touchpoints, products are attempting to map. It will help you get started, while bringing
and services is where your journey begins. focus to your research around remaining, unanswered
start with the obvious, don't reinvent the questions.
wheel, talk to your customers, never rely While doing new research takes more investment of time and
on just one data source, and be iterative! money, it’s a critical step in the experience mapping
process, to ensure you end up with an artifact you can
confidently use to support strategic thinking.
07
As you work toward this understanding, look to a variety of
information sources. For early stage discovery, call center logs,
customer satisfaction surveys, or existing personas could be
excellent resources. Your research should collect insights that
add breadth and depth to the existing knowledge you uncover,
and for this, talking to customers is indispensable.
08
The Building
Blocks of R E SE A R C H DISCOVERY
Experience
Mapping
Human experience is complex, and mostly
intangible. Yet the challenge of experience
mapping is to uncover, little by little, Qualitative Quantitative Qualitative Quantitative
critical information about your customers’
experiences. Through trial and error, we’ve
developed a simple framework to guide
the discovery and research work required
in the experience mapping process. We
DOIN THINkING FEELING
B U IL DI NG BLOCKS
call them building blocks. The key building G
blocks are Doing, Thinking, and Feeling, but
to understand the full context of DEVICE RELATIONSHIP
S S
customer experience, we also consider
Place, Time, Devices, and Relationships.
PLACE TIM TOUCHPOINTS
Don't forget Channel and Touchpoints! E
We recommend sorting your research Doing What actions Thinking How do Feeling What
and discovery work into building blocks are customers taking people frame and emotions do people
by asking yourself key questions along to meet their evaluate their have
the way. We've provided a few examples needs? What are experience? What along their journey?
for Doing, Thinking, and Feeling to help their key behaviors? do they expect? What are the
you get started. highs? The lows?
09
Quantitative
Research
Many insights can be drawn from
reviewing web analytics and digging
deep into data sources that reveal what
current customers are doing when they
interact with your organization. Paired
with customer satisfaction data, you can
spot issues in your customer funnel or see
which channels and touchpoints generally
get higher or lower marks.
10
Qualitative Research
Having conversations with customers is a common and reliably
successful method used to gain insights for an experience map.
You'll want them to focus on a story that is relevant to the
product, service, or problem area you are investigating. When
possible, interviewing or observing customers in their natural SkETCHNOTING
setting will provide you with the richest data.
Creating sketchnotes of your customers’
We recommend following a directed storytelling technique that stories as they are recounted to you can help
guides the conversation with a series of open-ended questions. you create visual artifacts that engage
stakeholders better than text notes.
Your goal is to encourage the paticipant to share their story.
Foster an engaging conversation, rather than pointed questions,
and focus your observations on the experience mapping
building blocks. Remember that the core building blocks are
Doing, Thinking, and Feeling.
11
THINkING
(FRAMING)
HEARING
SEEING
FEELING
(MOTIVATIONs)
DEVICE
DOING
(BEHAVIOR)
STEP 0 2
CHART THE
COURSE
This is not a solo adventure.
We love making experience maps. We By this point in your experience mapping project, you should
want to stress, however, that it is a have a key group of stakeholders from across the organization
collaborative activity. The process of who have been kept in the loop of your discovery and research.
experience mapping is just as important Even better, some of them have participated. The discussions
as the actual artifact, and stakeholder experience mapping fosters, the consensus it builds, and the
participation creates direct customer shared reference it creates will be critical to push your organization
empathy among the people who can most toward embracing new insights and taking action.
affect the experiences customers have.
15
1 The lens is an overriding filter through which you view
the journey, such as a persona, more general experience
principles, or a value proposition.
A few years ago, we did a survey of Takeaways are typically added to the map late in the process,
publicly available experience maps and once you have begun to pivot from understanding the current
compared them to the ones we have state of your customer experience to envisioning the future
created in our practice. While there state. There are different takeaways you could include, but they
were few quality examples and major should answer the questions “So what?” and “What now?”
differences in how all these maps were
designed, we did see some patterns More: http://adaptivepath.com/ideas/the-anatomy-of-an-e
that led us to define a basic framework xperience-map
16
Rail Europe
Experience Map GUIDING PRINCIPLES EMERGE AS yOU BEGIN
TO UNDERSTAND THE JOURNEy.
IDENTIFy THE STAGES
An experience map, at its core, is a visual OF THE TyPICAL
CUSTOMER JOURNEy.
narrative of the customer journey. Your
goal is to bring this data to life through a
visually engaging infographic that is easy
to comprehend. Your model should include
the key building blocks – Doing, Thinking,
and Feeling – but your information
design should emphasize the most
important dimensions of all of your
customers’ journeys. This could be
transitions between phases, switching
channels, or the location of interactions.
BUILDING BLOCKS
PROVIDE STRUCTURE
TO THE JOURNEy
MODEL.
IDENTIFy KEy
OPPORTUNITIES SHOW WHAT CUSTOMERS ARE DOING
AS yOU WORK. SO READERS CAN UNDERSTAND THE
EXPERIENCE AT A GLANCE.
17
FACILITATING A SUCCESSFUL WORKSHOP
The Experience
Organizational cultures vary, but a good rule of thumb is to
Mapping Workshop schedule well in advance, and prepare to facilitate with great
You've formed a group of key stakeholders professionalism. Here are the steps we recommend:
from across the organization. It’s now
time to get them all together and take 1 Set the context Prepare a short presentation to
stock of what you've learned. catch everyone up on your discovery and research
work.
An experience mapping workshop is hard
2 Organize yourselves Divide participants into teams of four to
work, but fun and incredibly productive. six. Make sure each team has a balance of different roles
and functions.
Your role as facilitator is to create a
clear context, outline the goals, guide 3 Deconstruct Each team will need to go through the research
participants through the activity, and notes and pull out the building blocks.
keep everyone motivated and happy. The
goal of your workshop is to deconstruct 4 Stage As the sticky notes build up, have one person from
your research into the building blocks and each team move them to the butcher paper, starting
then construct a customer journey model with Doing.
from those pieces. You will need the
5 Construct From this point on, the team should start to group
right physical space, attendees, supplies,
duplicate stickies and begin finding relationships among them.
and
a sufficient amount of time in order to run 6 Shape By the end of the session, each group should be
a successful session. moving from figuring out the customer journey to arranging
the key insights into a story.
PARTNERSHIPS
GUEST
INFORMATIO
SERVICE
USER EXPERIENCE N
S
TECHNOLOG
y
MEMBERSHIP PROGRAMS
EXECUTIVE
19
THE ROUGH MAP USE BUILDING BLOCKS TO TEST STAGES WITHIN THE
BUILD STRUCTURE. GROUP. yOU CAN ADD
After the dust has settled, you should GROUPING By COLOR HELPS AND REMOVE THEM AS
GET THE IDEAS DOWN FAST. THE STORy EVOLVES.
have a pretty good grasp of your customer
journey model and many insights to
consider including in your experience map.
Your next step is to clean up the outputs
from your session. Don’t let too much
time go by without sharing what you have
modeled.
20
Design for im pact.
STEP 0 3
TELL THE STORY
Like any good story, there's a beginning,
a middle, a n d a n end.
Your workshop activities and sticky note You have correlated your data, modeled the key moments of your
work will have resulted in a strong outline. customer journey, and identified some engaging quotes that
To ensure your experience mapping summarize key insights. Before you begin visualizing your map,
project ends with a bang, not a whimper, you will need to make some decisions about what will be included
invest time in crafting and visualizing a in your story, and what won’t. This means separating important
compelling story. insights from nice-to-have details, while identifying the relative
priorities among your building blocks. Take a moment to evaluate
your work and identify the key components of the story your map
will tell.
21
stand out from across a room, and what is OK to be discovered
after closer inspection?
"YAY!"
"OH, NO!"
"CAN SOMEONE
HELP ME?"
• How will t hi s • Is t here a trial period for • Can I sav e money by • Does t h i s s t o re have a
THINKING
• Ex cit ed, but a l it tl e • Worrying about money • In the mood to s pend • Happy • S a t i s f i ed
FEELING
an xi ous
• Wants to co n s u l t • Con v i nce d • Reliev ed • Ready to refer
• U nsure fr i en d s and family for fr i en d s and fami ly to
• Ex cit ed to own • I mpressed
• Ready to get advi ce s e rv i ce
somethi ng brand new
s t a rt e d
Then layer other building blocks and data onto that foundation.
The key is to realize ideas quickly, iterate your story and
visual model, and keep at it until a compelling narrative
emerges.
To tell afearlessly,
sketch great story,
andyou'll
try toneed to itfocus,
keep communicate
simple. When it all comes
hierarchy, 3
together, it's time for the final payoff: using your experience map.
24
It's a catalyst,
n o t a conclusion.
STEP 04
USE YOUR
MAP
Your journey
Your experience h you
map allows a stojust
chart begun.
We recommend you circulate your map far and wide. Get it into
new courses of action to better meet the organizational bloodstream, so it can begin to impact decision
the needs of your customers. It is also a making across your organization. Present it in meetings. Print it
symbol that can unite people from across large and post it where it will get attention. Produce a tabloid-
your organization, supporting a focus on sized version that will make its way onto the desks of executives.
the broader customer experience. Package it with other insights and recommendations, such as
experience principles and personas. Most importantly: use your
map as a tool.
25
This seems to be the heyday of experience mapping, although it
is not a new concept. As organizations struggle to make sense
of their omnichannel customer interactions, mapping the larger
experience is increasingly seen as a smart and effective way
to do so. As a collaborative activity with a tangible outcome, it
helps stakeholders break free of the nearsightedness of their role,
their channel, or their touchpoint to look at the organizational
capabilities needed to support the holistic customer experience.
26
Insights to Action Issue/Opportunity Identification and Prioritization
Using the structure provided by your map, chronicle issues
In our practice, we employ experience or opportunities for addressing customer pain points at each
maps to apply systems thinking toward stage of the customer journey. Prioritize according to business
generating new ideas and concepts and customer value. This method helps you quickly work with
collaboratively with our clients. The stakeholders to identify high-value areas of opportunity.
resulting ideas better account for the
Experience Storyboards
relationships between customers and
Using your map and simple storyboard templates, along with
the broader ecosystem of channels,
additional tools like personas or experience principles, use rapid
touchpoints, places, and other people.
ideation to generate stories of future experiences. This approach
It helps stakeholders feel confident that
provides stakeholders with a forum for ideas grounded in the
the strategies derived from their work
insights of your customer journey.
will benefit both customers and the
organization. Future Experience Mapping
Using the map as a reference, define the ideal customer
Just as no two maps are alike, there isn’t
journey through mapping out what customers would ideally
a single approach to using an experience
do, think, and feel as they interact with touchpoints on the
map to generate new ideas. We often
way to satisfying their needs. This method encourages cross-
invent new, just-in-time approaches to
functional collaboration to define cross-channel experience
meet the unique strategic objectives of our
principles.
clients or to work within the constraints
of time and budget on an initiative. Here
are three examples of how an experience
map can be put into practice. What
these methods have in common is
iterative collaboration with stakeholders.
Always remember: it’s not a solo journey.
27
CHARTING YOUR FUTURE
Uncharted
If you've made it this far through our
guide, you know that it takes quite a bit
Territories
Rigor in your research and creativity in of time and effort to make and use an
your mapmaking should lead to the use of experience map. We hope the information
your experience map as a strategic tool presented here equips you for the
for multiple planning and execution cycles. challenge of mapping your customers'
Yet, the static nature of your artifact will journeys. If your organization needs help
be in opposition to the changing world pulling it off, contact us. We're happy to
around it. This is to be expected. Be on talk about working together.
the lookout for changes in marketplace,
For those of you embarking on your own
customer needs, and organizational
mapping journey, let us know how it's
objectives. Hopefully, your experience map
going! We'd love to hear from you and see
has helped drive many of these changes;
your maps. Feel free to use the #xmapping
don't be afraid to change it as needed.
tag on Twitter, or send us photos and
Our goal in writing this guide was simple: stories at xmapping@adaptivepath.com.
to get more organizations to focus on
Happy mapping!
the customer journey across channels,
touchpoints, time, and place. Why? Too
much thinking goes into the pieces that
make up experiences and not the whole. ABOUT ADAPTIVE PATH
Too little work goes into looking at the big
We're experienced guides, strategic
picture and designing to help customers
thinkers, design doers, and expert jugglers.
navigate the complex world around them.
Too little time is spent working across silos We make great experiences happen across
to support the needs of customers. touchpoints, businesses, and industries.
28
Thanks to Adaptive Path staff for their work in creating this guide:
Brandon Schauer, Patrick Quattlebaum, Chris Risdon, Bryn Bowman,
Pam Daghlian, Rae Brune, Amber Reed, Iran Narges, Toi Valentine,
Gabrielle Parsons and Evi Hui. A special thanks to our summer
interns for all their help: Shahrzad Samadzadeh and Jason Ham.