Key takeaways:
- Crafting CJMs can be overwhelming due to intricate interactions and variables.
- Marketers struggle with managing and integrating abundant data from various sources.
- Continuous updates and maintenance are challenging due to the dynamic nature of customer journeys.
- Achieving seamless cross-functional collaboration is hindered by conflicting priorities and communication barriers.
- CJMs often lack support from key decision-makers, hindering effective implementation.
Customer journey mapping is a great concept, but many people have found that applying and consistently using it is much more difficult and much less romantic than it looks – that’s why an astounding number of companies drop it sooner or later. Let’s examine the most frequent reasons why it’s so frustrating, along with solutions our CJM tool offers.
1. Complexity beyond expectations
At first glance, crafting a CJM might seem straightforward—a graphical representation detailing the customer’s interaction with a brand. Yet, the devil lies in the details. The process of gathering accurate data, deciphering multiple touchpoints, and integrating diverse customer perspectives can quickly snowball into an overwhelming complexity. Marketers find themselves entangled in a web of intricate interactions and variables, struggling to streamline the labyrinthine nature of the customer journey into a cohesive map.
Out of Dark solution: Our super simple drag-and-drop interface makes even the most complicated CJM easy to read, along with tagging and assigning customer personas to individual touchpoints (activities) that help you to elegantly segment them.
2. Data overload and integration woes
In today’s data-rich landscape, marketers grapple not with scarcity but with the abundance of information. Corralling data from various sources—CRM systems, social media, website analytics—poses a challenge. The struggle doesn’t end there; integrating these diverse datasets into a coherent CJM that truly reflects the customer’s journey remains a Herculean task. Marketers often face compatibility issues, isolated information, and the puzzle of merging qualitative and quantitative data into a unified narrative.
Out of Dark solution: We have ready-made integrations with the most popular analytics, advertising, e-commerce, and other SaaS tools that will automatically import your data to the CJM. Alternatively, you can add the data manually.
3. Dynamic nature and maintenance hurdles
The customer journey is not a static roadmap; it’s an ever-evolving expedition influenced by market trends, consumer behavior shifts, and technological advancements. This dynamism necessitates continuous updates and maintenance of the CJM. However, in the fast-paced business landscape, dedicating resources, time, and effort to consistently refine and update the map becomes a challenging endeavor. Marketers find themselves in a constant battle against obsolescence, struggling to keep the CJM relevant and reflective of the current customer landscape.
Out of Dark solution: Our tool is specifically made for customer journey mapping and every single feature is dedicated to making it more easier and effective – updating it is a matter of minutes. If people were using spreadsheets until now, it’s no wonder they gave CJM up.
4. Cross-functional collaboration bottlenecks
Crafting an effective CJM demands a collaborative effort across departments—marketing, sales, customer service, product development, and more. However, achieving seamless cross-functional collaboration is easier said than done. Conflicting priorities and communication barriers often impede the process. Marketers face an uphill battle in rallying diverse teams to contribute their insights and align their perspectives to construct a comprehensive and accurate CJM.
Out of Dark solution: You can assign your team members to specific touchpoints, making it very clear who’s responsible for what. You can also discuss ideas and opportunities right in the app, keeping everything organized.
5. Lack of buy-in and ownership
Customer journey maps often fail to gain the necessary traction and support from stakeholders within the organization. Without buy-in from key decision-makers, CJMs can become isolated initiatives, lacking the resources and prioritization required for their effective implementation. This lack of ownership can hinder the ability to align CJMs with overall business objectives and ensure that they are incorporated into the company’s DNA.
Out of Dark solution: When you create a CJM in Out of Dark, it can serve as a marketing knowledge base your bosses can use to keep track of the marketing activities, but also to onboard new marketing employees and consultants who will instantly get a grasp of your whole marketing apparatus. When you show it to whoever is not sold on CJM yet, we think you won’t have a difficult time convincing him.
6. Inadequate tools and technology
Despite the wealth of data available, marketers often encounter roadblocks due to inadequate tools and technology. Many existing CJM platforms might lack the necessary functionalities for seamless data integration, visualization, or real-time updates. Marketers struggle with outdated or incompatible software that fails to meet their evolving needs, hindering the creation and maintenance of an effective CJM.
Out of Dark solution: We partially addressed this one in #3. Our tool addresses literally everything people used to complain about when using other tools, many of which weren’t even developed to be used for CJM.
7. Lack of standardization and best practices
The absence of standardized methodologies or universally accepted best practices for CJM poses a significant challenge. Marketers often grapple with ambiguity in terms of where to begin, which framework to follow, or which metrics to prioritize. This absence of clear guidelines can lead to confusion, inefficiencies, and inconsistencies in CJM implementation across organizations, causing frustration and hampering its effectiveness.
Out of Dark solution: Our tool provides you with everything you need to create a proper CJM. The best practices are built into our features. If you want to, you can also use our CJM templates from various industries.
8. Lack of actionable insights and recommendations
Creating a CJM is not an end in itself; it’s a tool to guide actionable improvements to the customer experience. However, many CJMs fail to provide specific, actionable insights and recommendations that can be implemented by marketing teams. Without clear guidance on what to do with the insights gained from the CJM, it becomes a mere exercise in documentation rather than a catalyst for change.
Out of Dark solution: We use artificial intelligence to crunch the performance data of your customer touchpoints and give you practical insight every day. It’s like an analyst who greets you every morning with something he found buried in the numbers.
