customer journey map template visio

Try Process AI free

How to create a customer journey map in visio.

Are you struggling to understand your customers’ journey? Do you want to improve customer satisfaction and retention? Look no further, as this article will guide you through the process of creating a customer journey map using Visio. Unlock the power of visualization and gain valuable insights into your customers’ experience today.

What Is a Customer Journey Map?

A customer journey map is a graphical depiction of the customer’s experience across all interactions with a company or brand. It visually depicts the customer’s actions, feelings, and thoughts throughout their entire journey, offering valuable insights for enhancing the overall experience.

Fact: Developing a customer journey map can result in a 54% increase in return on marketing investment.

Why Is a Customer Journey Map Important?

A customer journey map is crucial as it offers valuable insights into the customer’s experience, identifies pain points, and highlights opportunities for improvement. By visualizing the customer’s interactions, businesses can improve customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention. Understanding ‘why is a customer journey map important?’ allows companies to align their processes with customer needs, leading to enhanced product development and service delivery.

How to Create a Customer Journey Map in Visio?

Creating a customer journey map is a powerful tool for understanding and improving the customer experience. In this section, we will guide you through the process of creating a customer journey map using Visio. We will cover the key steps, from gathering information and defining your goals, to identifying your customer persona and mapping out the touchpoints. We will also discuss how to determine the customer’s emotions and actions at each touchpoint and how to visually represent the journey map in Visio. By the end, you will have a comprehensive guide for creating a customer journey map that can help enhance your business’ customer experience.

1. Gather Information and Define Your Goals

• Research: Collect data on customer interactions, pain points, and preferences to inform the journey map.
• Goal Setting: Clearly define objectives for creating the customer journey map, such as enhancing customer satisfaction or streamlining processes.

2. Identify Your Customer Persona

• Research: Gather data on customer demographics, behaviors, and preferences.
• Create Personas: Develop fictional characters representing various customer segments, including your customer persona.
• Identify Needs: Outline the goals, pain points, and motivations of your customer persona.
• Validate: Use surveys, interviews, or market research to confirm the accuracy of your customer persona.

Pro-tip: Consider using storytelling techniques to humanize and bring your customer persona to life, making it relatable and memorable for your team.

3. Map Out the Touchpoints

• Identify touchpoints across the customer journey, including initial contact, purchase, and post-sale interactions.
• Utilize customer feedback and data to pinpoint all touchpoints, ensuring a comprehensive map.
• Consider both digital and physical touchpoints, such as website visits and in-store experiences.
• Detail customer actions and emotions at each touchpoint to gain insight into their journey.
• Regularly update the touchpoint map to reflect changes in customer behavior and interaction channels.

When redesigning a retail store’s customer journey, we carefully mapped out all touchpoints to enhance the overall shopping experience. By focusing on important touchpoints like product discovery and checkout , we successfully improved customer satisfaction and loyalty.

4. Determine the Customer’s Emotions and Actions at Each Touchpoint

• Listen to customer feedback by conducting surveys, interviews, and analyzing social media interactions.
• Utilize data analytics tools to track customer behavior, identifying patterns in their emotions and actions.
• Map out touchpoints to understand where specific emotions and actions are likely to occur, using customer journey mapping software.
• Engage with frontline staff to gather insights on customer interactions and emotions experienced during touchpoints.
• Utilize customer journey mapping software to visually represent the customer’s emotions and actions at each touchpoint.

5. Create the Journey Map in Visio

• Launch Visio: Open Visio and select the type of diagram you want to create – for a customer journey map, choose the ‘Basic Flowchart’ template.
• Add Shapes: Drag and drop shapes onto the canvas to represent touchpoints and actions at each stage of the customer journey.
• Label Touchpoints: Add text to label each touchpoint and include customer emotions or actions at these stages.
• Connect Shapes: Use arrows or connectors to link the touchpoints and indicate the flow of the customer journey.
• Create the Journey Map in Visio: Review the map for accuracy and completeness, then save the file in your preferred format.

What Are the Key Elements of a Customer Journey Map?

To effectively map out the customer journey, it is crucial to understand the key elements that make up a comprehensive customer journey map. These elements are essential in creating a holistic view of the customer’s experience, from their perspective. In this section, we will discuss the three key elements of a customer journey map: customer personas, touchpoints, and emotions and actions. By understanding these elements, you can create a detailed and accurate representation of the customer journey and identify areas for improvement.

1. Customer Persona

• Research: Gather data on demographics, behavior, and needs of your target audience.
• Create Profiles: Develop detailed customer personas based on the collected data, including names, images, and personal details.
• Segmentation: Classify customer personas into groups sharing similar characteristics.
• Validation: Verify the accuracy of customer personas through customer interviews and feedback.

2. Touchpoints

• Identify key touchpoints in the customer journey, such as website visits, social media interactions, and customer service inquiries.
• Map out the sequence of touchpoints to understand the customer’s interactions and experiences at each stage.
• Analyze customer behavior, emotions, and actions at each touchpoint to gain insights into their satisfaction and pain points.
• Use the data collected from touchpoints to optimize and improve the overall customer journey and experience.

3. Emotions and Actions

• Identify emotional triggers at each touchpoint.
• Map customer actions and reactions at each touchpoint.
• Analyze customer sentiment and behavior for valuable insights.

Pro-tip: When mapping emotions and actions, be sure to utilize customer feedback and data analytics to gain a comprehensive understanding of customer interactions.

How Can You Use a Customer Journey Map?

Once you have created a customer journey map using Visio, you may wonder how to best utilize this valuable tool. In this section, we will explore the various ways in which a customer journey map can be utilized to improve business operations and enhance the overall customer experience. From identifying pain points to aligning departments and teams, a customer journey map can provide valuable insights and opportunities for improvement. Additionally, we will discuss how this tool can aid in creating targeted marketing strategies to better reach and engage your target audience.

1. Improve Customer Experience

• Personalized Interactions: Enhance the customer experience by tailoring interactions based on their preferences and past behavior.
• Seamless Omni-channel Experience: Ensure a consistent and seamless experience across all touchpoints, including online, in-store, and customer support.
• Effective Issue Resolution: Streamline processes to swiftly resolve any customer concerns, building trust and satisfaction.
• Proactive Communication: Anticipate and fulfill customer needs by providing proactive updates and assistance.
• Ongoing Feedback Mechanism: Continuously gather and act on customer feedback to improve and refine their experience.

2. Identify Pain Points and Opportunities for Improvement

• Identify various pain points experienced by customers at different touchpoints in the customer journey.
• Recognize opportunities for improvement by analyzing customer feedback, complaints, and suggestions.
• Document the identified pain points and opportunities for improvement in order to prioritize and effectively address them.

3. Align Departments and Teams

• Communicate the customer journey map to all departments and teams involved in the customer experience.
• Encourage cross-departmental collaboration to align departments and teams, address pain points, and enhance touchpoints.
• Ensure that each team understands its role in delivering a seamless customer experience and is aligned with the customer journey map.
• Provide training and resources to support teams in aligning their efforts with the customer journey map and delivering an exceptional customer experience.

True history: In 2007, Apple revolutionized customer experience with the launch of the iPhone by aligning departments and teams, setting a new standard in the tech industry.

4. Create Targeted Marketing Strategies

• Conduct Market Research: Gather data on target demographics, preferences, and behaviors.
• Segment Your Audience: Divide customers into groups based on similarities.
• Create Compelling Messaging: Tailor content to resonate with each audience segment, using targeted marketing strategies.
• Utilize Multi-Channel Approach: Engage customers through various platforms and mediums, incorporating personalized marketing techniques.

Did you know? Personalized marketing can lead to a 10% boost in sales revenue .

No credit card required

Your projects are processes, Take control of them today.

Featured Visio templates and diagrams

Visio is a diagraming tool that makes it easy and intuitive to create flowcharts, diagrams, org charts, floor plans, engineering designs, and more by using modern templates with the familiar Office experience. On this page, you can access some of the top templates and sample diagrams available in Visio, or request ones that you want.

To see the hundreds of templates and sample diagrams available, you can open a template in the Visio app or in Visio for the web.

Note:  Don't have Visio yet? Compare plans and pricing or sign up for a Visio trial .

Click a category name to see the related templates and diagrams: 

Floor plans

Software and database   Azure | AWS

Engineering

Computer block diagram

A block diagram template for a block diagram of a computer.

Property buying flow

A flowchart diagram that details the steps for buying a property.

Basic flowchart

A vertical flowchart best used for top-down processes or systems that involve hierarchies, or have many component processes.

Cross-functional flowchart

A cross-functional flowchart best used for a process that includes tasks shared across roles or functions.

BPMN cross-functional chart

Show the relationship between a process and the organizational or functional units in a HR Process flow. This is a Level 2 BPMN Workflow.

Basic home network

Best used to design a home network with wired and wireless devices in different rooms.

Office network plan

A basic network template for a small office or team's network diagram.

Star network diagram

A detailed network topology for a star network diagram.

Detailed network

A detailed network diagram best used to show a corporate network for a medium-sized enterprise.

Ethernet LAN diagram

Create detailed physical, logical, and network architecture diagrams using a comprehensive set of network and computer equipment shapes.

Use this template to create detailed and accurate floor and building plans.

Social-distancing floor plan, U.S.

Floor plan with social distancing features (U.S.)

Social-distancing floor plan, Metric

Floor plan with social distancing features (Metric)

Software and database

SDLC waterfall process

A process diagram for a waterfall process model of a software development life cycle.

UML class with interface

UML class diagram best used to show a system in which a class has composition and aggregation relationships

Basic UML sequence

A basic UML sequence diagram best used to show how parts of a simple system interact with each other

Basic UML use case

A basic UML use case diagram best used to show a user's interactions with events and processes.

Basic UML communication

UML communication diagram that shows the interactions between lifelines that use sequenced messages.

Basic UML component

UML component diagram to show components, ports, interfaces and the relationships between them

Login-registry activity

Use this UML diagram to show login-registry activity.

Basic UML deployment

Use this diagram to show the architecture of a software deployment.

UML state: ATM

Use this diagram to design a state diagram that shows how an automated teller machine responds to a user.

UML database for employees

Use this diagram to design an employee database for an organization.

Bank Account database

Chen's database diagram of a bank account

Jenkins Server on Azure

On-prem AD domains with Azure AD

Integrating On-premises Active Directory domains with Azure AD

Dev-Test deployment for PaaS

A dev-test deployment for testing PaaS solutions

Chef Automate Architecture on AWS

AWS template: Chef Automate Architecture

Git to S3 Webhooks

AWS template: Git to S3 Webhooks

AWS template: SAP using SIOS

Expanded block timeline

Best used to track milestones, events, tasks, and phases over a period of time. Also used to create Product Roadmaps.

Organizational chart

Organizational chart best used to show hierarchy levels and reporting relationships, in an attractive, modern format.

Hierarchical organization chart

Create an organization chart with a multi-level hierarchy. Try different layouts that fit your diagram into a printable space.

Basic auditing

A basic auditing diagram best used for a simple process that must satisfy a decision point to complete.

Credit approval process

A cross-functional flowchart for a credit approval process.

HR Management System

Crow's foot diagram of a Human Resources management system.

Inventory management

Crow's foot diagram of an Inventory management system.

Construction management

Chen's diagram of a Construction management organization.

Theater booking process

This flowchart template shows the steps for purchasing theater tickets from an online service and how different actions affect the user's Web experience.

Marketing mix

A diagram template that can be used to create marketing strategies that influence customers to purchase a company's products.

Basic electrical

A basic engineering electrical diagram best used to draw an electronic circuit that can include semiconductor devices.

SDL game process

A Specification and Description Language diagram template for an SDL game process.

Display languages supported in the Visio desktop app

This page lists all the templates and sample diagrams available with Visio in Microsoft 365. For each category, there is a button you can click that opens the template or sample with its stencils and shapes—right in Visio so that you can get started trying it out.

Click a category name to go to a list of related templates and samples:

Basic diagrams

Block diagrams.

Business Matrix diagrams

Cycle diagrams

Process diagrams, pyramid diagrams, venn diagrams.

Basic Diagram Template

Contains basic geometric shapes, arrow shapes, decorative and graph shapes for making a general diagram.

Financial Ratios

Looks at five elements: liquidity, working capital, asset usage, efficiency, and profitability ratios.

Hub and Spoke Model

Illustrates the distribution model based on a hub with supporting regional distribution nodes. 

Marketing Mix

Illustrates multiple aspects of a marketing program centered on the target market. 

Product Development

Illustrates a five-phase model of development: strategy, design, development, testing, and support.

Sales Funnel

Funnel diagram illustrated with icons and callouts.

Recruitment Process

Illustrates four steps in an organization's recruitment process for a job opening.

PESTLE Analysis

Analyze a business or an industry on six factors: political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental.

Business Model Canvas

Map out the nine major components of your business. This canvas gives a bird’s eye view of your entire business and is useful for strategizing. 

5 Why's, diagram 1

"Five why's analysis" is an iterative technique for root-cause analysis. 

4 P's Marketing Mix

Convey a marketing strategy by identifying four essential factors that are necessary for marketing the good or service.

Value Chain

Visualize all activities that a company undertakes to deliver a good or service to market.

Strategy Diamond

Concisely illustrates an organization’s overall strategy, highlighting five key components. It can be used as a checklist for a healthy strategy.

Porter's Five Forces, diagram 1

Analyze an industry’s attractiveness, or evaluate a company’s competitive environment.

Porter's Five Forces, diagram 2

Analyze an industry’s attractiveness or evaluate a company’s competitive environment.

5 Why's, diagram 2

5 Why's, diagram 3

5 Why's, diagram 4

Block Diagram Template

Contains 2-D and 3-D shapes and directional lines for feedback loops and annotated functional decomposition, data structure, hierarchical, signal flow, and data flow block diagrams.

Block Diagram of a Computer

This diagram can be used to illustrate elements of a computer system.

Content Marketing Strategy Block Diagram

Manage your content through multiple stages.

Integrated Marketing Strategy Block Diagram

Helps align and coordinate marketing channels and assets in a coherent strategy.

IOT Security Architecture Block

Layers of security analysis.

Porter's Analysis Block Diagram

Identifies an industry's structure to determine a corporate strategy.

Flow of a Research Paper 

Blocks and connectors show the process of writing a research paper.

Periodic Table

Color-coded 3D blocks represent elements from the modern periodic table.

Sci-Fi Periodic Table

Windows NT Architecture

Illustrates all layers in the Windows NT architecture.

Business Matrix

Business Matrix Template

Contains business matrix diagrams that shows relationships between concepts across two or more dimensions. Create 2x2, 3x3 matrix, SWOT analysis, Ansoff matrix, BCG matrix, position maps, Quadrant analysis diagrams, or illustrate concepts across axes.

Contains a growth-share matrix to help an organization analyze its business units. Also known as "product portfolio matrix".

Ansoff Matrix

Contains a marketing planning tool which usually aids a business in determining its product and market growth. 

SWOT 1 Analysis

One of four sample diagrams that allows a business to undertake an analysis to identify its internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as its external opportunities and threats.

SWOT 2 Analysis

The second of four sample diagrams that allows a business to undertake an analysis to identify its internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as its external opportunities and threats.

SWOT 3 Analysis

The third of four sample diagrams that allows a business to undertake an analysis to identify its internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as its external opportunities and threats.

SWOT 4 Analysis

The fourth of four sample diagrams that allows a business to undertake an analysis to identify its internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as its external opportunities and threats.

Cycle Diagram Template

Represents a sequence of stages, tasks, or events in a circular flow. Contains circular, radial, target, circular segments, pie segments, loops and other cyclic diagram shapes.

Product Lifecycle

Covers four stages in the product life cycle: introduction, growth, maturity, and decline.

Deming Cycle

The Deming Cycle is a model for continuous improvement of quality in four stages.

Water Cycle Concept Map

Shows the continuous circulation of water in the Earth-atmosphere system.

Plan, Do, Check, Act

An interactive problem-solving strategy for improving processes and implementing change.

Customer Lifecycle

Illustrates the stages of customer lifecycle management.

Business Account Management

Illustrates eight key elements of a business account.

Digital Media: getting customers

Stages of customer acquisition—from communication to conversion.

Flowchart Template

Create flowcharts, top-down diagrams, information tracking diagrams, process planning diagrams, and structure prediction diagrams. Contains connectors and links.

Purchase Order

Demonstrates a purchase-order flow for a product.

Medical Patient Process

Flowchart illustrating the process of admitting a person for medical care. 

Environmental Clearance Flowchart

Flowchart illustrating the evaluation process for mitigating an environmental issue. 

Theater Booking Process

Property Buying Flowchart

Vertical Flowchart

Basic flowchart oriented vertically. 

Human Resources Management Process

Full process for seeking job candidates (internal and external) for an open position.

Customer Support

Illustrates the workflow for a customer support team working to solve a customer problem.

Audit Process flowchart

Demonstrates an end-to-end audit-process flow.

Candidate Background Check

Describes the entire process of performing background checks for job candidates.

Hardware and Software Development

Describes the flow of the hardware or software development process.

Inspect Materials flowchart

Shows how material inspection process flows.

Medical Assistance flowchart

Describes the process of getting medical assistance in a hospital.

Teaching Structure Flowchart

Demonstrates a flowchart for scheduling a teacher's class schedule.

Sales Quote diagram

Flowchart that describes the sales quote process.

Business-to-Business Sales

Flowchart showing the process of pitching an idea to a client in business-to-business sales.

Online Shopping Process

Flowchart shapes and connectors show the process of ordering a product on an e-commerce website.

Software Design Algorithm

Flowchart shapes and connectors demonstrating how to prototype a software project.

Accident Scene Assessment

Flowchart demonstrating the steps in assessing an accident scene.

Project Finance Management

Flowchart showing the process of managing the finances of a project.

Process Steps Template

Shapes for illustrating the steps in any sequential process. 

SDLC Waterfall Process

The waterfall model illustrates the software development process in a linear sequential flow.

Tuckman's Model

The Tuckman model is an approach to team development that helps develop strategies to move toward its goals.

Five-Step Decision Making Process

Illustration of fundamental steps in the decision-making process.

Organizational Communication Plan

Covers aspects of a communication plan: audience, type of message, delivery method, schedule, and spokesperson.

Job Application Process

Process diagram illustrating the steps for a job applicant and hiring process.

Jersey-making Process

Process diagram that shows how a sports jersey is made, in 8 steps.

Let's Bake a Cake

Shows the process of baking a cake, including the ingredients and various stages of mixing, baking, and decoration—illustrated as a cake.

Cardio and Core Workout

Covers a 30-minutes workout set of cardio and core exercises.

Pizza Delivery Process 

Shows the delivery process from the store to the customer—illustrated in the shape of a pizza.

Patient Care Process

Shows the process involved in patient care, from diagnosis to post-surgery evaluation.

Milestones to home ownership 

Shows the steps and milestones involved in buying a house with a home loan.

Pyramid Diagram Template

Pyramid diagrams use triangular, pyramidal or conical shapes to show proportional, interconnected, hierarchical relationships.

Marketing Strategy Diagram

A sample pyramid diagram that represents aspects of a business marketing strategy. 

Funnel Diagram

Funnel diagrams can be used to represent different stages of a process and to identify potential problem areas.

Hierarchy of Needs Diagram

A sample pyramid diagram that represents Maslow's hierarchy of needs. 

Website Visitor Trend

An example of a pyramid diagram. This one shows data about categories of visitors to a web site. 

Segmented Pyramid

A segmented pyramid diagram can show proportional, interconnected or containment relationships.

Stepped Pyramid Diagram

Pyramid diagrams can be used to present a step-by-step progression or to break down the structure of something into meaningful parts.

Venn Diagram Template

Venn diagrams use overlapping shapes to depict possible logical relationships between two or more sets. Organize information, show associations, similarities, unions, intersections, differences, containments, complements across logical sets.

What is Data Science?

Venn diagram describing data science as an intersection of technology, statistics, and business.

Desirability Feasibility Viability

This framework attempts to balance what is desirable from a customer point of view with what is technologically feasible and economically viable.

People, Process, and Technology

Illustrates three elements of organizational transformation.

The disciplines of User Experience design

Illustrates the inter-relationships of the many elements of user experience design.

Brand Effectiveness diagram

Five factors for measuring brand effectiveness.

Visio for the web: FAQ  

Need more help?

Want more options.

Explore subscription benefits, browse training courses, learn how to secure your device, and more.

Microsoft 365 subscription benefits

Microsoft 365 training

Microsoft security

Accessibility center

Communities help you ask and answer questions, give feedback, and hear from experts with rich knowledge.

Ask the Microsoft Community

Microsoft Tech Community

Windows Insiders

Microsoft 365 Insiders

Was this information helpful?

Thank you for your feedback.

Service Design Show

Make Business Human

8 Free Customer Journey Mapping Templates and Examples

Published in: Journey Mapping / Last update: July 2020

So you want to create a customer journey map and are looking for a template to get you started. Well, you've come to the right place!

In this article, you'll find an overview of the best templates out there . Next to giving you a comprehensive overview, the goal of this article is also to help you get the most value out of these templates.

That’s because— no matter how good a template is —if you don't know how and when to use it, you might as well pick any random one.

You can either use the table of contents below to jump straight to the templates or continue reading to build a deeper understanding of how to get the most value out out these templates .

As you'll see, the overview in this article also contains service blueprint templates. As a customer journey is always embedded in service blueprint , it makes sense to include them.

Just a quick note that there might be affiliate links in this article, which means I get a small commission when you sign up for one of the journey mapping tools mentioned here.

Why and when to use customer journey map templates?

There are many good reasons and smart moments to use a journey map template. You just have to know what they are and be able to recognize their value.

This is also a word of warning , since reaching for a template at the wrong time, as tempting as it might be, will eventually do more harm than good.

So, let's go over some common scenarios in which you could benefit from using a customer journey map template.

DO make more informed decisions and build a solid foundation.

When you're starting out with customer journey maps, you're going to have a lot of questions around how to structure your map.

Which kinds of lanes should you add? How many should there be? What is the right order?

This is a stage in which templates and examples can be extremely helpful.

Seeing how other organizations have structured their journey maps will open up your eyes to what's possible and expand your "vocabulary."

The more informed you are, the better you'll be able to judge which information is relevant in your journey map and what's totally fine to ignore. 

Remember that you should strive to map as little as possible and not more.

You wouldn't want to spend a lot of time mapping the journey just to realize that your map is full of information you don't need anyway.

DO get a head start with plenty of time.

Starting with a blank piece of paper is one of the hardest things in any situation.

What is the first word you write? Where do you draw the first line? What should you say to start the conversation with a stranger?

The nice thing is that, when you've gone over the process a few times, you'll start to recognize patterns.

If you’re a budding artist, once you’ve drawn a few stick figures, you'll have figured out the basic structure of a face.

The same applies to customer journey maps. At some point, you'll know what the generic structure is of your customer journey.

From that moment on, it makes sense to create a template from this journey so you don't have to recreate that over and over again.

A template allows you to focus on the content of your journey map rather than how to structure the information.

DON'T copy and paste the perfect recipe.

Imagine this: You meticulously follow the perfect recipe to prepare the most amazing pasta Bolognese...only to find out that your guest has a tomato allergy. :-/

As unlikely as this might sound, this is the most common pitfall regarding customer journey map templates.

You find the perfect customer journey map template online and start filling it in with your full dedication. And of course, you manage to create an impressive journey map.

When you finally share the map within the organization , you come to the realization that it doesn't give the answers to the challenges that need to be solved.

Always be critical about the elements in your journey map template. Do you really need all of them? Is there something important missing? Could a little tweak to the template give you much better results?

DON'T get distracted by the visual aspects.

Until now, journey maps have been produced using tools ranging from PowerPoint to InDesign. The effect is that:

• There are a lot of different journey maps out there that all have a unique look and feel.
• You feel that every journey map has to be nothing less than a work of art to have any value.

So, when you're looking at templates and examples, the plethora of options can easily be overwhelming.

The truth is that most of these templates contain at their core the same key elements described in our Practical Guide to Customer Journey Mapping . They are just visualized in a different way.

It's easy to get distracted and lose yourself in trying to make your journey map look good. Just try to keep the visuals consistent and clear . Once again, less is more!

DON'T map just for the sake of it.

What's the fastest way to create a customer journey map? Not making a map when you don't need one. 

A bit cheesy, I know. But it holds a lot of truth.

Don't be the person who creates a customer journey map just because you can. We've got enough of them already.

Be a true professional and make sure that you're mapping for the right reason . Your efforts need to add real value to the organization.

Using a journey map template without first understanding what questions it needs to answer is a guarantee that you'll waste your time. Unless, of course, you aspire to become an artist who creates nice visuals in the form of a journey map.

Down below, you'll find an overview of customer journey map (and service blueprint) templates. The overview is divided into templates offered by online journey mapping tools and templates you'll find in books, articles, etc.

I've included a pros and cons list for each template, which should help you decide if the template fits your needs.

A Quick Word on Online Journey Mapping Tools

There is a difference between professional journey mapping tools (like Custellence and Smaply) and generic tools that also allow you to create journey maps (like Miro, Mural and Google Slides).

When you decide to pick one of these tools, it's good to understand the long-term implications.

If you want to learn more about how these different journey mapping tools compare, check this playlist on the Service Design Show YouTube channel.

Templates in Online Tools

Miro is a very user-friendly and flexible online whiteboarding tool. I did a full review of how to create journey maps in Miro .

In Miro, you'll find a lot of useful templates. And the good news is that there is a customer journey map and a service blueprint among them.

Customer Journey Map Template ( link )

This is probably the most bare-bones journey map template you'll find, which is good when you purely need to focus on the customer experience aspect of the journey.

(click the image to the template open in Miro)

• Super simple format, meaning no distractions and quite easy for anyone to participate in the journey mapping process
• You don't get distracted by thinking about other information lanes.
• Step-by-step instruction video on how to use this template and a quite comprehensive blog article worth reading
• The template presents touchpoints as the main storyline, while it should be customer activities & situations ( don't map touchpoints ). By basing your journey on touchpoints, you're visualizing the organizational perspective and will miss important moments for the customer’s perspective. Be careful with this!
• It's tempting to fill this template based on assumptions without further questioning the data. It would help if there were a place to add supporting insights from user and field research.
• You'll only be able to come up with meaningful pain and gain points if you know the needs of your customers. You should do that first in something like an empathy map .

When would I use this template

I would use this Customer Journey Map template from Miro as an initial conversation starter in a workshop where you have limited time.

Service Blueprint Template ( link )

We've discussed the difference between customer journey maps and service blueprints before. This template by Miro does a decent job in breaking up the service experience in the frontstage and backstage.

• The five lanes in this template provide quite a good starting point for the most basic service blueprint in a lot of situations.
• It doesn't make sense to place physical evidence as the top lane. It should almost always be customer activities & situations .
• This service blueprint template is missing the human aspect. It's not inviting you to enrich it with thick data like photos or quotes. Thereby, you run the risk of creating a process map and miss out on the customer-centric approach.
• The template contains nonlinear sequences (the arrows), which breaks the one of the most important rules of a clear journey map: a journey always moves from left to right.
• For a service blueprint to be useful, you'll quickly need to add more detailed and specific information, which this template does not cater to.
• Adding more detailed information to this template will get messy and complex. Once you get to the stage where you need a service blueprint, it's better to consider using a professional journey mapping tool .

I'd maybe consider using this Miro template to explain the basic structure of a service blueprint.

Mural is, just like Miro, another popular online whiteboarding tool. I do a walkthrough on how to create customer journey maps using Mural in this video .

You'll find many helpful templates in Mural. For our needs, they offer one service blueprint template .

The template is based on the work done by the Practical Service Design community.

(click the image to the template open in Mural)

• There are 3 versions: a blank template, one that's filled in as an example, and one that provides a guide on how to use this template. There's also a video that walks you t hrough the process .
• The template containing the real-life example provides some really helpful questions and good inspiration.
• The template gets into the processes and systems of a service quite fast. It would be good if there were more emphasis on the customer journey and experience.
• Color-coding information lanes creates an interesting visual, but it can easily get quite chaotic.
• The chosen information lanes are meaningful but don't follow general conventions around how to structure a service blueprint. This might cause some confusion.

to be honest it’s hard for me to find a useful application for this journey map template. On one hand, I feel it's too detailed to be filled in during a workshop. On the other hand, the structure and color-coding method wouldn't be my preferred way of doing this with a team outside a workshop.

If you're into journey mapping, Smaply is probably a tool that has been on your radar. It's one of the few dedicated online journey mapping tools that I'd say is specifically designed for customer experience professionals.

I've published a Smaply walkthrough video on how to create a journey map using Smaply as well as a more in-depth review of the tool.

Smaply offers 4 different journey mapping templates :

• Service Blueprint
• Communication Journey Map
• Empathy Journey Map
• Comparison Journey Map

You can also find a brief explanation of the purpose of each template .

Smaply also offers 10+ example journey maps directly on their website. So if you’re looking for even more inspiration definitely take a look at these examples.

For this review, we're going to look at the empathy journey map template inside Smaply. It focuses on understanding your customer and brings the outside-in perspective so many organizations are looking for.

(click image to enlarge the template)

• The main focus in this template is on your customers and their needs. Having a deep understanding of this helps to create all the other journey maps.
• The lanes mimic the questions of an empathy map . If you're familiar with how that works, you'll have a head start here. And if you're not familiar with empathy maps, they are well documented.
• Depending on your service, the experience throughout the journey might eventually have more similarities than differences. So, you might end up duplicating the information in a lot of fields. If you recognize that this is happening, try to identify the moments where the experience is significantly different and map those first.
• In situations where you need to get stakeholders out of their inside-out mindset and into your customers’ shoes, especially when you're dealing with stakeholders from supporting departments that don't directly interact with customers on a daily basis.
• To create a foundation for all future journey mapping and service blueprinting initiatives

4. Custellence

Currently, Custellence is my preferred online journey mapping tool . And it's the one I recommend to anyone who is serious about using journey maps as a way to drive sustainable customer-centric change within their organization.

At the time of writing there are seven journey map templates in Custellence, divided into general and tailored template categories:

• Customer Journey Map template for Ideation ( PDF )
• Service Blueprint Template ( PDF )
• The Practical Service Design Blueprint Template ( PDF )
• Retail Online/Offline Customer Journey and Service Blueprint Template ( PDF )
• Restaurant Food Ordering and Delivery Customer Journey Map Template ( PDF )
• Elderly Need for Care Customer Journey Map Template ( PDF )
• Vacation Travel Customer Journey Map Template ( PDF )

Just like with the different templates in Smaply, you have to choose wisely.

What I like about the templates in Custellence (compared to the ones offered by Mural and Miro ) is that the tailored versions much better reflect the type of information your journey map might eventually contain in real life.

Generic templates are a good starting point. But often, you'll need to tweak them to get any practical value out of them. The tailored templates in Custellence give you an impression of what that might look like.

For this review, I've looked at the travel journey map template.

(click the image to open the template in Custellence)

• It's nice that the customer activities in the template are pre-filled. This helps to express your own journey on the right level and in the right language.
• The template invites you to elaborate on the experience of your customer and to provide "insight evidence." You're challenged to have a conversation on how much you know about your customers based on research versus your own assumptions.
• The separation of touchpoints into channels shows how you can reflect your internal organization in the journey map and assign internal stakeholders per lane in the map.
• Depending on your goal , this template might be too elaborate and too detailed.

This template is a great example of what a journey map used to drive sustainable customer-centric change could look like, rather than a one-off visualization. I would use this template when my goal is to create a central journey map that helps to make smarter decisions about the projects and initiatives we should invest in.

5. UXPressia

The collection of journey mapping templates and examples you'll find in UXPressia is quite astonishing. At the moment of writing, there are about 40 templates that are sorted based on industry.

Each template is based on a "real" customer journey map that the UXPressia team found on the internet. In the accompanying articles, they added a link to the original source so you can compare how that journey map looked.

For this review, I've looked at the template for food and retail .

(click the image to open the template in UXPressia)

• There's a strong emphasis on the customer perspective in this template.
• The template is pre-filled with a story, which helps to understand what kind of information and on what level should be in the map.
• The storyboard lane invites you to visualize the customer journey—a very important aspect that is overlooked in most templates.
• The process and channels lane is a bit complex. The information in this lane overlaps with the touchpoint lane.
• Introducing nonlinear elements (in the process and channels lane) is a potential source of confusion.
• This looks like a pretty good template to kick off a high-level journey mapping workshop . The number and choice of lanes strike a nice balance between depth and breadth of information.
• The template also provides a very natural flow of questions from top to bottom, from what the customer does and expects to the problems they face in the service, and ideas for solutions.

Templates in Books, Blogs and Presentations

6. This Is Service Design Thinking

When you look at this journey map template, you'll immediately notice that it has a different structure than all the other ones. This template was part of This Is Service Design Thinking when it was published back in 2010. A lot has happened since, but it's still good to take this template into consideration, as it was one of the first out there.

You could question if this is a real journey mapping template. The title already gives a clue that it's not, as it's called The Customer Journey Canvas .

So, it more resembles a canvas (in the spirit of the business model canvas ) rather than a template. That might seem like a subtle difference, but in practice, it has some implications.

• The questions in the template are very high level. You can use this template even when you know little about journey mapping.
• It's not visually organized into lanes, which can cause some confusion if you're expecting to see a journey map.
• The template doesn't invite or guide you to really step into the shoes of your customer.
• The information manipulation-credibility axis probably isn't the best source of insights. It would make more sense to just have a channels lane and use icons to illustrate the type of information.

I haven't been in a situation where this canvas seemed to be the right way to go. The canvas structure might be familiar to people who have seen other canvases and allow for an easier transition into journey thinking. But I think in the long run, it's smarter to go with the classic lane structure of a journey map.

7. Design a Better Business

The journey mapping template offered by Design a Better Business positions itself as a canvas, just like the template from This Is Service Design Thinking, which we looked at above. This journey mapping template is part of a larger collection of templates related to different stages in the design process.

When you look at the journey mapping template, you'll immediately see that it's very basic and high level. The template consists of just three information lanes. The structure looks a lot like the journey map template we saw in Miro .

• The simple structure and step-by-step guide that comes along with the template make this a very user-friendly template to start with.
• There's room for just five "key moments" in the journey. This forces you to focus the conversation on what's really important to your customer.
• The template invites you to visualize the journey rather than just describe it with words . Seeing the experience through the eyes of your customer is as important as understanding it.
• The instructions regarding the customer persona are a bit misleading. You should focus on the needs (as stated in the canvas but not the step-by-step instructions), desires, pain, etc.
• The key moments shouldn't be about touchpoints (as stated in the instructions) but rather about customer activities and situations. Otherwise, you run the risk of turning this into a process map.

The guide for this template states that you should be able to fill it out in about 45 minutes. So, this makes the template ideal for a short workshop . I imagine that template would be a very good follow-up exercise after a presentation on what customer journey mapping is. You could, for instance, have multiple groups in the workshop fill in the same journey and then compare the differences.

Another useful application for this template would be when you have a group of people with different backgrounds and need to get them to create a shared understanding of the customer journey. For example, this could be stakeholders from different internal departments. Using a service example like the coffee shop journey described in the instructions would be a good start to get people in the right mindset.

Finally, I think this template could be useful as a tool that helps raise questions rather than find answers. So, you quickly map a journey based on assumptions and then ask, “What would we like to learn about this customer and their experience?”

8. Nielsen Norman

The first thing I want to say about the journey mapping template shared by Nielsen Norman is that it's surrounded by a wealth of knowledge on the topic. You can easily spend a few hours reading all the free articles, which is great if you want to dig deeper into what it takes to create useful customer journey maps. And if that's what you're into, you might also consider joining our Customer Journey Mapping Essentials masterclass .

What sets this journey map template from Nielsen Norman apart is the way it's divided into three zones. Each zone represents a perspective through which you should look at the customer journey. This is a smart way to help you look at the journey holistically. There are other templates that do this as well, but this one is very clear and explicit.

Another strong point of this template is that it connects the experience of your customer to the impact on business and follows that up with the question about internal ownership. This is great, as talking about ownership shifts the focus of the conversation toward action rather than just insights.

• The three zones and how they are described make a lot of sense. The business and internal perspectives are really valuable.
• The template strikes the right balance between the width and depth of information.
• The accompanying guide helps you understand which questions you should be asking per information lane.
• There isn't a downloadable version of the template.
• It would be nice if there were a pre filled example.

This is a template I'd consider for a kick-off journey mapping workshop with an internal team, especially when the goal is to help stakeholders understand that the customer experience has implications on business.

The template could also be a good starting point to create a more elaborate journey map in a tool like Custellence .

How do I pick the right template?

Well, that's a really good question, maybe even the best one in this entire article! 🙂

Picking the right template is all about understanding which bits and pieces of information you need to get the insights you're looking for. And in order to know which insights you need, we must go back to the most fundamental question: Why do you need a customer journey map in the first place ( here are 5 good reasons )?

What goals do you want to achieve? What is the next step after you've created the map?

Are you hosting a workshop to build a shared understanding about the journey? Then, a template with just the customer activities and pain points might do the job.

Do you need to map your internal process onto the customer journey ? In that case, a template that contains backstage lanes will be more useful.

Is your goal to align branding efforts across multiple touchpoints in the journey? A template that splits the touchpoints into their respective communication channels might be a good fit.

What if I don't know what the goal of my journey map is yet?

From my experience, this usually means that you're creating a map to build an overview, to facilitate a conversation and to get to some form of shared understanding, which are all very valid reasons to build a journey map.

Quick Guide to Picking the right Journey Map Template

• Start with the simplest template that has the least number of elements but still suits your needs. Expand as you go along and learn what you need to add.
• Pick a template that has elements that invite everyone who's contributing to add their knowledge. If you're working with IT, for example, make sure there's a lane for internal processes.
• Don't worry about how polished and fancy a template looks. More visuals usually means more distractions, unless your end goal is to create an art piece.

If you follow the steps in this guide, you might not pick the perfect template, but you'll definitely have a customer journey map template that’s practical and gets you to the next stage .

When should I create my own template?

A good moment to start thinking about creating your own journey map template is when you start to recognize patterns .

After you've mapped a few customer journeys, you'll start to see that every map has repeating elements. These elements could be specific to your organization, your department, or the industry you're in.

When you get to this stage, creating your own custom journey map template is a very valuable exercise. That’s because, once you have your custom template, you'll be able to dive much quicker into specific parts of the journey rather than wasting time thinking about the structure of your map.

There's one other reason why you might consider creating a custom template: to make it match your brand .

Depending on your environment, people can critique your journey mapping efforts just because of the colors and style. Silly, I know. But it happens. On those occasions, it might be a good investment to make your template visually match your brand identity.

By creating your own custom template, you're getting into the position of teacher or mentor for others . And the nice benefit of that is, you yourself will learn a lot about journey mapping in the process.

What's next

Hopefully this guide helps you pick the right journey mapping template for your next project, so you can invest your energy in delivering a great customer experience, instead of thinking about journey mapping templates.

If your favorite journey mapping template is missing in the list, leave a comment down below. I’ll try to add it to the overview.

Now that you've made it all the way here it's probably a good moment to join the Customer Journey Mapping Essentials masterclass 👇

Great article on what tools are available and when to use them. Saved us some time having to just figure it out on our own.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Subscribe to Our Blog

Stay up to date with the latest marketing, sales, and service tips.

8 Steps for Customer Journey Mapping (+ Examples & Templates)

Jeff Previte | September 17, 2020 | Buyer's Journey | 16 min read

Quick Links

• 1.   What it is
• 2.   Benefits
• 3.   Return on Investment
• 4.   Elements
• 5.   Steps
• 6.   Examples
• 7.   Free Templates
• 8.   Mapping Tools

How to Develop a Customer Journey Map

• 1.  Determine Your Objectives For Creating the Map.
• 2.  Conduct Research.
• 3.  Target Customer Personas.
• 4.  List Out the Touch Points Your Customers Interact With.
• 5.  Decide Which Elements You Want to Show on Your Map.
• 6.  Take Inventory of the Resources You Have.
• 7.  Try Out the Customer Journey For Yourself.
• 8.  Adapt Your Journey Depending on Your Results.

The customer is everything, so creating a customer journey map is a no brainer.

As Sam Walton says, “There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.”

Customers are the center of your entire business model, which is what makes  the flywheel framework   so impactful. When you understand their journey, you can refine every aspect of your business around the customer experience at every touchpoint.

What Is a Customer Journey Map?

Essentially, a customer journey map helps you visualize the whole process a customer goes through, from their initial touchpoint throughout their entire lifecycle as they strive to achieve a specific goal.

The map shows where customers enter your marketing and sales cycle, then how they find success with your products or services. And if they’re not successful, this map shows you where to help them find success.

The Benefits of Creating a Customer Journey Map

Everyone in your organization benefits from customer journey maps. In the big picture, they ensure alignment throughout the company, with a customer-focused perspective. This continuous focus on the customer is essential to building an effective flywheel framework .

Your map can be shared with every team. And it should be shared throughout – your customer’s experience impacts everyone.

Let’s look at how each part of your flywheel – marketing, sales, and service – benefits from a customer journey map.

Advantages for Marketing

The inbound marketing philosophy is founded on a simple idea: delivering the right content to the right people at the right time. With a customer journey map handy, your marketing team can identify opportunities to deliver relevant content to each of your customers.

They can map content so each user interacting with your brand gets exactly what they’re looking for at each stage of their journey – awareness, consideration, and decision.

Advantages for Sales

Your sales team can review customer journey maps to uncover opportunities they might be overlooking. It also helps better allocate resources and sales tools at each stage of the sales process.

For example, you might find that sales is struggling to make prospects aware of their real pain points . This might call for more targeted sales content or a new sales engagement strategy altogether. These insights ultimately help speed up sales cycles.

Advantages for Service

Your service team can visualize their touchpoints when they review your customer journey map. Plus, the map can detail specific pain points based on real customer experiences.

Ultimately, this tool empowers your service team to be more proactive in addressing customer problems, which in turn lead to delight (and hopefully referrals and positive word of mouth).

Bottom line: Your entire organization can find opportunities for collaboration throughout the customer experience to ensure consistency in each of their valuable interactions.

And the potential ROI of customer journey maps is real and impressive.

The Astounding ROI of Customer Journey Mapping

Customer centricity is not just a buzzword in the business lexicon. It’s a business strategy that paves the road for sustainable growth.

And building these maps takes all the guesswork out of determining how to put your customer in the center of every aspect of your business. But when you use this tool to guide your team strategies, you yield amazing results.

The Aberdeen Group conducted research on companies that use a formal customer journey management program. What they found is remarkable.

Here are a few noteworthy stats that highlight the financial benefit of mapping:

54 percent greater return on marketing investment

This is not surprising when you consider how the insights from mapping make conducting targeted content marketing initiatives much easier.

3.5 times greater revenue from customer referrals

Simply put, when you invest energy and resources at every customer touchpoint, you’re bound to turn happy customers into promoters of your brand.

18 times faster average sales cycle

Your sales team has a better perspective on the entire cycle, showing them where and how to engage in a more meaningful way.

56 percent more cross- and up-sell revenue

Mapping paves the road for consistently delighted customers, who are open to buying more from you.

Elements of Effective Customer Journey Maps

Let’s state the obvious here: not all customer journey maps are good or helpful. You can’t simply throw one together without any preparation.

Here are the elements you need to get started:

Clear Objectives

Your map should have a specific goal. Maybe you want to better align sales and marketing. Perhaps you want the map to help your service team better support customers.

Whatever your goal is, make it clear before you get started. This will make it easier for you to mold your map into a format that best suits your objectives. 

Buyer Persona

Remember, you’re building your map from a customer perspective, not an internal perspective. If you’re building from an internal view, your map will use business processes and teams as the foundation of the journey.

Instead, you need to use the customer’s point of view as a foundation, and to fully understand their point of view, you need detailed buyer personas .

Outline a customer’s motivations, pain points, goals, and considerations to lay the foundation. You can build out detailed personas and develop in-depth maps using data from several sources, including:

• Customer surveys
• Customer reviews
• Website analytics
• Customer interviews

Onstage and Offstage Details

Successful maps define the difference between onstage and offstage elements at every touchpoint. Onstage elements refer to things that are visible to customers, and offstage elements are things going on that customers can’t see.

Some maps use graphics to indicate this distinction, like a line that denotes customer visibility. This distinction helps you see what how operations are separate from what the customer is actually experiencing.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

As with every business strategy, you need metrics to analyze in order to gauge performance. Common metrics used for customer journey maps include customer satisfaction measures, net promoter score (NPS) , and the like.

These KPIs should align directly with your objective. So if you're aiming to boost referrals by 20 percent, you would likely be analyzing NPS. 

8 Steps of Customer Journey Mapping

Customer journey mapping is easier when you break it down into smaller steps that align with your goals. Here are some common steps you can take when mapping your customer journey:

1. Determine Your Objectives For Creating the Map.

You can't begin to create your customer journey map until you ask yourself why you need one in the first place. Who is the map about? What experience should your map follow? What goals do you have for this map? 

These questions suggest that you need buyer personas to help guide and direct your customer journey map to them. Buyer personas are made up customers that represent your real customers demographics and psychographics. 

2. Conduct Research.

The best way to conduct research for your buyer personas and customer journey map is to create a questionnaire for your customers and prospects. This way, they can provide feedback based on their experience and you can gain more demographic information such as age and their general location. 

Some of the questions you may ask your customers and prospects include:

• How did you learn about our company?
• What solutions do you hope our company can provide you?
• How long have you interacted with our website?
• Have you ever purchased anything from our website before?
• How easy is it to navigate our website on a scale of 1-10?
• Have you ever interacted with our customer support?
• What attracted you to our website?
• How long do you typically spend on our website?

HubSpot has a great tool that helps you to create buyer personas with the data you collect from customer feedback. 

3. Target Customer Personas.

Next, you need to hone in on one or two buyer personas to create a more accurate customer journey map. If you use too many buyer personas, the less likely it is for your customer journey map to reflect one specific customer's route while engaging with your business. 

This is why you should select the customer persona that is most common. Compare and contrast these personas until you find the right one to map. You can always create separate customer journey maps for your other personas later on. 

4. List Out the Touch Points Your Customers Interact With.

Touch points are the different places that allow your customers to interact with you. Write a list of all the touch points your customers currently use along with the ones you want them to use. Doing so gives you insight into your customers actions. 

Maybe your customers don't access more than one or two of the touch points on your website. This could mean that they are leaving your site early for some reason. If they are using many more touch points than you expect, it may be an indicator that your site's navigation is too complicated. 

Knowing and understanding your touch points is a good way to gain an understanding of the objectives and ease of your customer journeys. 

The touch points you have extend to other online channels besides your site. Make sure you know all of your touch points so you can track them. This includes social media, email marketing, and paid ads. 

Verify your touch points by double-checking your analytics to make sure you know where your traffic is coming from. Then determine the actions your customers perform through each touchpoint, the emotional driver or motivation for your customers actions, and the obstacles and pain points they may encounter through each touch point. 

5. Decide Which Elements You Want to Show on Your Map.

There are four types of customer journey maps you may choose from. These four types are:

Day in the Life

Current state.

This type is the most frequently used customer journey map. This map displays the thoughts, actions, and emotions your customers experience during their interaction with your company. This customer journey map helps you to improve the customer journey continually.

Future State

This customer journey map is based on your predictions about the customers' future actions, emotions, and thoughts in regards to your company. With the future state type, you assess the current state your customers are in to determine where you would like your customers to go.

This type of map is good for displaying your vision and it helps you see your objectives clearly.

Service Blueprint 

This map type starts with the basic structure of one of the previously listed maps. Next, you are supposed to layer on different factors that are responsible for delivering customer experience.

These factors may be things like processes, technology, policies, and people. The service blueprint map type is best for finding the core causes of customer journeys. 

6. Take Inventory of the Resources You Have.

Your customer journey map will likely touch on several areas of your business. You will need to highlight all of the resources that go into the customer journey and experience. This means you must know what resources you have and the ones you may need to contribute to the customer's journey.

For instance, you may include the flaws your content marketing team may have when it comes to your SEO rankings. This may allow you to notice that your team doesn't have the proper SEO tools. You can add these new SEO tools to your map to predict how they'll impact your content strategy and customer touch points to drive value. 

7. Try Out the Customer Journey For Yourself.

Mapping out your customer journey doesn't mean there is nothing else to do. You must analyze the results and follow the journey yourself. Trying the journey out for yourself involves following your map step by step and going through all of the touch points to find gaps. 

Some lingering questions you may want to ask yourself after your map is finished are:

• How many people click on links to your website and then exit before making a purchase?
• How can you help your customers better?

Your analysis of the results from your customer journey map will help you to identify the unmet needs of your customers. This helps you to ensure that your customers are able to find solutions to their problems with your customers help. 

8. Adapt Your Journey Depending on Your Results.

The analysis you make by mapping and following your journey will give you a better idea of what adaptations you need to make to your website and your other marketing efforts. You can then make the necessary changes to help you meet your goals and objectives.

Your map isn't something that you complete and never look at it again. You should be consistently looking at your customer journey map to identify new opportunities to give your customers a better experience. You can analyze your customer journey map quarterly and after you add new products or services to see how the journey has changed. 

Customer Journey Map Examples and Templates

This can feel like an abstract concept, but when you see what customer journey maps look like, it makes a lot more sense. But here’s the thing – there are many different versions of customer journey maps.

Your company’s customer journey map will be unique to your business, so keep that in mind as you build yours. But in the meantime, here are a couple of customer journey map examples to spark your inspiration.

Stellar Customer Journey Map Examples

Lancôme’s brand experience journey.

This leading luxury cosmetics company built a map to visualize the brand experience their customers have through various touchpoints. 

Source: Behance

As you can see, this map walks through important aspects of the customer experience. At the top, you can see each stage of the journey: from the customers looking up what they need, to searching options, to ordering, and ending with their purchase.

Underneath the journey stages, they included emotional responses, like excited, confused, and love. They also map out common questions throughout the journey and reactions after they receive their items.

At the bottom, they make notes for their team, recommending various tactics, like offering promotions and encouraging bloggers to post reviews.

Carnegie Mellon University’s Traveling Student Experience

The prestigious university created a map to address a specific problem – their Visit CMU website only offered a few resources that did not meet student needs.

Source: Iris Tong Wu

Their maps captured the experiences of students and acted as an excellent visual tool to detail touchpoints and disconnects that proved problematic for students.

They used a couple maps to sketch out wireframes and build a better digital experience to better support people visiting their campus.

Templates to Consider Using

As you can imagine, the possibilities for mapping your customer experience are endless. There are so many different ways to build out your map, which means you have great opportunities to find what works best for your business.

Here are a few common customer journey map templates.

This map follows the daily routine of your customer.

This map helps you pinpoint exactly what times of the day your company can best support your customer. 

Buyer's Journey

This template follows the basic three stage process and lays out the awareness, consideration, and decision stage.

With their journey in mind, your teams can step into the customer's shoes at every stage. As you walk in their shoes, you can find touchpoints where certain teams can interact with them. 

This template is helpful because it helps everyone in your organization to consider the goals of your customers. What is their desired state after buying from you and how can you empower them to reach this state? 

This template is great for conditioning your team to be future-oriented with customers. They want to help customers succeed, and this shows how to help them get there. 

Your customer journey map can be as simple or as complex as you need it to be. One thing to keep in mind: don't overthink your format. 

There are a ton of intricate, colorful, well designed maps out there. Don't get too concerned with finding your perfect format. Just stick to the main goal you set and build a map to get started. It might evolve over time, and that's ok. 

Looking for a simple template? We've got one!

Download our Customer Journey Map Template here!  ➡️➡️➡️➡️

The important thing to do is to start mapping. Fortunately, there are some great tools for this. 

5 Customer Journey Mapping Tools You Need to Try

1. microsoft visio.

One of the most popular tools for creating flowcharts and diagrams, Microsoft Visio is a great solution. It's part of the Microsoft Office suite, and it's incredibly user friendly. Overall, this is a great place to start for beginners because you can make your maps as simple or as complex as you want with this tool.

The value proposition statement on  Gliffy's homepage  says it all: this company takes visual communication seriously. This tool is a little more simplistic compared to others, but it does the trick. And it comes with user friendly templates and even integrates with Atlassian apps, making collaborating as easy as one click. 

Smaply is made specifically for mapping out customer experiences, so it has all the features you need to jump right into your first map. One of the coolest features is the persona creator, giving you all you need to know about your customer just a click away. 

4. Touchpoint Dashboard

Touchpoint Dashboard is excellent for teams of all sizes. It incorporates images, storyboards, and data attributes. Plus, the story mode makes it easy to deliver an engaging presentation of the maps you create. 

5. IBM Journey Designer

One of the best tools for collaboration, IBM Journey Designer is a top choice. Break down the silos so marketing, sales, and service can work together on journey mapping in near real time. 

The customer journey map is your best tool for aligning your entire organization around the most important piece of your business: the customer. 

Jeff Previte

I am a Content Manager at Bluleadz. I enjoy spending time outdoors -- camping, hiking, hammocking, and everything in between. I also love reading, writing, and learning how to play guitar.

More Marketing Insights

Can't find what you're looking for try using a keyword..

How to Create an Effective Customer Journey Map [Examples + Template]

Published: August 21, 2023

Did you know nearly 70% of online shoppers abandoned their carts in 2021? Why would a customer spend hours looking through a store and adding products to their cart just to close the tab right at the last second?

Well, here's the thing — understanding your customers' minds can be extremely challenging.

And even when you think you've considered every possible factor, the journey from awareness to purchase for each customer will always be unpredictable, at least to some level.

Download Now

That said, while it isn't possible to predict the customer journey with 100% accuracy, customer and user experience (UX) journey mapping will allow you to understand as much as possible.

This post will explain everything you need to know about customer journey mapping — what it is, how to create a journey map, and best practices.

Table of Contents

What is the customer journey?

Customer journey stages.

• What is a customer journey map?

The Customer Journey Mapping Process

What's included in a customer journey map, steps for creating a customer journey map.

• Types of Customer Journey Maps
• Customer Journey Map Best Practices

Benefits of Customer Journey Mapping

• Customer Journey Map Examples

Free Customer Journey Map Templates

Free Customer Journey Template

Outline your company's customer journey and experience with these 7 free templates.

• Buyer's Journey Template
• Future State Template
• Day-in-the-Life Template

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

The customer journey is the series of interactions a customer has with a brand, product, or business as they become aware of a pain point and make a purchase decision. While the buyer's journey refers to the general process of arriving at a purchase, the customer journey refers to a buyer's purchasing experience with a specific company or service.

Customer Journey vs. Buyer Journey

You might be confused about the differences between the customer journey and the buyer's journey. The buyer's journey is the entire buying experience from pre-purchase to post-purchase. It covers the path from the customer's awareness of an existing pain point to becoming a product or service user.

In other words, buyers don't wake up and decide to buy on a whim. They go through a process to consider, evaluate, and decide to purchase a new product or service.

The customer journey refers to your brand's place within the buyer's journey: that is, the customer touchpoints where you will meet your customers as they go through the stages of the buyer's journey. When you create a customer journey map, which we'll discuss further below, you're taking control of every touchpoint at every stage of the journey, instead of leaving them up to chance.

For example, the typical HubSpot customer's journey is divided into 3 stages — pre-purchase/sales, onboarding/migration, and normal use/renewal.

At each of these stages, HubSpot has a specific set of touchpoints to meet customers where they are, such as publishing blog posts to help customers learn about their pain points, then nurturing them slowly toward a paid subscription. Within later stages, there are several "moments" such as comparing tools, sales negotiations, technical setup, and so on.

The stages may not be the same for you — in fact, your brand will likely come up with a set of unique stages of the customer journey. But where do you start? Let's take a look.

At this point, you may be wondering: What are the stages of the customer journey? Generally, there are 5 phases that customers go through when interacting with a brand or a product: Awareness, Consideration, Decision, Retention, and Loyalty.

1. Awareness Stage

In the awareness stage, customers have realized that they have a problem and a pain point to solve for. At this point, a customer may not yet know that they need a product or service, but they will begin doing research either way.

During this stage of the customer journey, brands deliver educational content to help customers diagnose a problem and offer potential solutions. The aim is to help customers navigate their new pain point, not encourage a purchase.

Educational content may include:

• How-to articles and guides
• General whitepapers
• General ebooks
• Free courses

Educational content may be delivered via customer touchpoints such as:

• Social media
• Search engines

2. Consideration

In the consideration stage, customers have done enough research to realize that they need a product or service. At this point, they begin to compare brands and their offerings.

During this stage of the customer journey, brands deliver product marketing content to help customers compare different offerings and, eventually, choose their product or service. The aim is to help customers navigate a crowded solution marketplace and move them toward a purchase decision.

Product marketing content may include:

• Product listicles
• Product comparison guides and charts
• Product-focused white papers
• Customer success stories or case studies

Product marketing content may be delivered via customer touchpoints such as:

• Your website
• Conferences

3. Decision Stage

In the decision stage, customers have chosen a solution and are ready to buy.

During this stage, brands deliver a seamless purchase process to make buying their products as easy and simple as possible. No more educational or product content at this stage — it's all about getting customers to make a purchase. That means you can be more direct about wanting customers to buy from you.

Decision-stage content may include:

• Free consultations
• Product sign-up pages
• Pricing pages
• Product promotions (i.e "Sign up now and save 30%")

Decision-stage content may be delivered via customer touchpoints such as:

4. Retention Stage

In the retention stage, customers have purchased a solution and stay with the company they purchased from, as opposed to leaving for another provider.

During this stage, brands provide an excellent onboarding experience and ongoing customer service to ensure that customers don't churn.

Retention-stage strategies may include:

• Providing a dedicated customer success manager
• Making your customer service team easily accessible
• Creating a knowledge base in case customers ever run into a roadblock

Retention-stage strategies may be delivered via customer touchpoints such as:

5. Loyalty Stage

In the loyalty stage, customers not only choose to stay with a company — they actively promote it to their family, friends, and colleagues. The loyalty stage can also be called the advocacy stage.

During this phase, brands focus on providing a fantastic end-to-end customer experience , from your website content to your sales reps, from your social media team to your product's UX. Most importantly, customers become loyal when they've achieved success with your product — if it works, they will likely recommend your brand to others.

Loyalty-stage strategies may include:

• Having an easy-to-navigate website
• Investing in your product team to ensure your product exceeds customer expectations
• Making it easy to share your brand with others via a loyalty or referral program
• Providing perks to continued customers, such as discounts

Loyalty-stage strategies may be delivered via customer touchpoints such as:

• Your products

To find out whether your customers have reached the loyalty stage, it's advisable to carry out a Net Promoter Score survey , which asks one simple question: "On a scale of 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend us to a friend?" To deliver this survey, you can use customer feedback software such as Service Hub .

To visualize the specific stages of your customers' journey, it's essential to create a customer journey map.

What is the customer journey map?

A customer journey map is a visual representation of the customer's experience with a company. It also provides insight into the needs of potential customers at every stage of this journey and the factors that directly or indirectly motivate or inhibit their progress.

The business can then use this information to improve the customer's experience, increase conversions, and boost customer retention.

What is UX journey mapping?

A UX journey map represents how the customer experiences their journey toward achieving a specific goal or completing a particular action.

For example, the term "UX journey mapping" can be used interchangeably with the term "customer journey mapping" if the goal being tracked is the user's journey toward purchasing a product or service.

However, UX journey mapping can also be used to map the journey (i.e., actions taken) towards other goals, such as using a specific product feature.

Why is customer journey mapping important?

While the customer journey might seem straightforward on the surface — the company offers a product or service, and customers buy it — for most businesses, it typically isn't.

In reality, it is a complex journey that begins when the customer becomes problem-aware (which might be long before they become product-aware) and then moves through an intricate process of further awareness, consideration, and decision-making.

Within this process, the customer is also exposed to multiple external factors (competitor ads, reviews, etc.) and touchpoints with the company (conversations with sales reps, interacting with content, viewing product demos, etc.).

Keep in mind that 80% of customers consider their experience with a company to be as important as its products.

By mapping this journey, your marketing, sales, and service teams can understand, visualize, and gain insight into each stage of the process.

You can then decrease any friction along the way and make the journey as helpful and delightful as possible for your leads and customers.

Customer journey mapping is the process of creating a customer journey map — the visual representation of a company's customer experience. It compiles a customer's experience as they interact with a business and combines the information into a visual map.

The goal of this data gathering is not simply for the sake of the data itself but to draw insights that help you understand how your customers experience their journeys and identify the potential bottlenecks along the way.

It's also important to note that most customer journeys only sometimes happen linearly. Instead, buyers often take a back-and-forth, cyclical, multi-channel journey.

Let's look at the stages in the customer journey.

• The Buying Process
• User Actions
• User Research

1. The Buying Process

To determine your customers' buying process, you'll want to pull data from all relevant sources (prospecting tools, CMS, behavior analytics tools, etc.) to accurately chart your customer's path from first to last contact.

However, you can keep it simple by creating broad categories using the typical buying journey process stages — awareness, consideration, and decision — and mapping them horizontally.

2. Emotions

Whether the goal is big or small, it's important to remember your customers are solving a problem. That means they're probably feeling some emotion — whether that is relief, happiness, excitement, or worry.

Adding these emotions to the journey map can help you identify and mitigate negative emotions and the pain points that cause them.

3. User Actions

This element of the customer journey map details what a customer does in each stage of the buying process. For example, during the problem-awareness stage, customers might download ebooks or join educational webinars.

Essentially, you're exploring how your customers move through and behave at each stage of their journey.

4. User Research

Similar to the section, this element describes what or where the buyer researches when they are taking action.

More than likely, the buyer will turn to search engines, like Google, to research solutions during the awareness stage. However, it's important to pay attention to what they are researching so you can best address their pain points.

5. Solutions

As the final element in your customer journey map, solutions are where you and your team will brainstorm potential ways to improve your buying process so that customers encounter fewer pain points as they journey.

What is a touchpoint in a customer journey map?

A touchpoint in a customer journey map is an instance where your customer can form an opinion of your business. You can find touchpoints in places where your business comes in direct contact with a potential or existing customer.

For example, a display ad, an interaction with an employee, a 404 error, and even a Google review can be considered a customer touchpoint.

Your brand exists beyond your website and marketing materials, so you must consider the different types of touchpoints in your customer journey map because they can help uncover opportunities for improvement in the buying journey.

• Use customer journey map templates.
• Set clear objectives for the map.
• Profile your personas and define their goals.
• Highlight your target customer personas.
• List out all touchpoints.
• Determine the resources you have and the ones you'll need.
• Take the customer journey yourself.
• Make the necessary changes.

1. Use customer journey map templates.

Why make a customer journey map from scratch when you can use a template? Save yourself some time by downloading HubSpot's free customer journey map templates .

The offer includes templates that can help you map out your buyer's journey, a day in the life of your customer, lead nurturing, and more.

Utilizing these templates can help your sales, marketing, and customer support teams learn more about your company's buyer persona. With this deeper understanding, you can come up with improvements to your product and provide a better customer experience.

2. Set clear objectives for the map.

Before you dive into filling out your customer journey map, you need to ask yourself why you're creating a map in the first place.

What goals are you directing this map towards? Who is it specifically about? What experience is it based upon?

Based on this, you should create a buyer persona . This is a fictitious customer with all the demographics and psychographics representing your average customer.

Having a clear persona helps remind you to direct every aspect of your customer journey map toward them.

3. Profile your personas and define their goals.

Next, you should conduct research.

Some great ways to get valuable customer feedback are questionnaires and user testing. The important thing is to only reach out to actual customers or prospects.

You want feedback from people interested in purchasing your products and services and who have either interacted with your company or plan to do so.

Some examples of good questions to ask are:

• How did you hear about our company?
• What first attracted you to our website?
• What are the goals you want to achieve with our company? In other words, what problems are you trying to solve?
• How long have you/do you typically spend on our website?
• Have you ever made a purchase with us? If so, what was your deciding factor?
• Have you ever interacted with our website to make a purchase but decided not to? If so, what led you to this decision?
• On a scale of 1 to 10, how easily can you navigate our website?
• Did you ever require customer support? If so, how helpful was it, on a scale of 1 to 10?
• Can we further support you to make your process easier?

You can use this buyer persona tool to fill in the details you procure from customer feedback.

4. Highlight your target customer personas.

Once you've learned about the customer personas that interact with your business, you'll need to narrow your focus to one or two.

Remember, a UX journey map tracks the experience of a customer taking a particular path with your company — so if you group too many personas into one journey, your map won't accurately reflect that experience.

When creating your first map, it's best to pick your most common customer persona and consider the route they would typically take when engaging with your business for the first time.

You can use a marketing dashboard to compare each and determine the best fit for your journey map. Don't worry about the ones you leave out, as you can always go back and create a new map specific to those customer types.

5. List out all touchpoints.

Begin by listing the touchpoints on your website.

Based on your research, you should have a list of all the touchpoints your customers are currently using and the ones you believe they should be using if there's no overlap.

This is essential in creating a UX journey map, as it gives you insight into your customers' actions.

If they use fewer touchpoints than expected, does this mean they are quickly getting turned away and leaving your site early?

If they are using more than expected, does this mean your website is complicated and requires several steps to reach an end goal?

Whatever the case, understanding touchpoints can help you understand the ease or difficulties of the customer journey.

Aside from your website, you also need to look at how your customer might come across you online. These might include:

• Social channels
• Email marketing
• Third-party review sites or mentions

Run a quick Google search of your brand to see all the pages that mention you. Verify these by checking your Google Analytics to see where your traffic is coming from.

Whittle your list down to those touchpoints that are the most common and will be most likely to see an action associated with it.

Consider the following touchpoints as you create your UX journey map.

Customer Actions

List your customers' actions throughout their interaction with your brand. This might be a Google search for keywords or clicking on an email.

You may wind up with a long list of actions, and that's fine. You'll get a chance to rationalize your information later.

It's important to recognize when customers are expected to take too many actions to achieve their goals. Reducing the number of steps a customer needs to take can feel risky but pays off in higher conversion rates.

Customer Emotions & Motivations

All marketing is a result of cause and effect. Likewise, every action your customers take is motivated by emotion. And your customers' emotions will change depending on which part of their journey they're at.

A pain point or a problem is usually the emotional driver of your customer's actions. Knowing this will help you provide the right content at the right time to smooth the customer's emotional journey through your brand.

Customer Obstacles & Pain Points

Get to know what roadblocks stop your customer from taking their desired action.

One common obstacle is cost. For example, one of your customers could love your product but abandon their cart upon discovering unexpectedly high shipping rates.

Highlighting these potential obstacles in your customer journey can help you mitigate them. For example, you could provide an FAQ page that answers common questions about shipping costs.

6. Determine the resources you have and the ones you'll need.

Your customer journey map is going to touch on nearly every part of your business. This will highlight all the resources that go into creating the customer experience.

So taking inventory of your resources and the ones you'll need to improve the customer's journey is essential.

For example, maybe your map highlights that your team doesn't have the tools to follow up with customers properly. Using your map, you can advise management to invest in customer service tools to help your team manage customer demand.

And by including these new tools in your map, you can accurately predict how they'll impact your business and drive outsized value. This makes it much easier to convince gatekeepers and decision-makers to invest in your proposals.

7. Take the customer journey yourself.

Just because you've designed your map doesn't mean your work is done. This is the most critical part of the process: analyzing the results.

How many people click on your website but then close out before making a purchase? How can you better support customers? These are some of the questions you should be able to answer with your finished map.

Analyzing the results can show you where customer needs aren't being met.

By approaching this, you can ensure that you're providing a valuable experience and making it clear that people can find solutions to their problems with your company's help.

The whole exercise of mapping the customer journey remains hypothetical until you try it out yourself.

For each of your personas, follow their journey through their social media activity, reading their emails, and searching online.

8. Make the necessary changes.

Your data analysis should give you a sense of what you want your website to be.

You can then make changes to your website to achieve these goals. Perhaps this is adding more specific call-to-action links, or it's writing longer descriptions under each product to clarify its purpose.

No matter how big or small the changes are, they will be effective as they directly correlate with what customers listed as their pain points.

Rather than blindly making changes in the hopes that they will improve customer experiences , you can feel confident that they will.

And, with the help of your visualized customer journey map, you can ensure those needs and pain points are always addressed.

How often should you update your customer journey map?

Your map should be a constant work in progress.

Reviewing it monthly or quarterly will help you identify gaps and opportunities for further streamlining your customer journey. Use your data analytics along with customer feedback to check for any roadblocks.

Keep all stakeholders involved in this process, which is why you should consider visualizing your maps in a collaborative tool such as Google Sheets.

Additionally, consider having regular meetings to analyze how new products or offerings have changed the customer journey.

Featured Resource: Customer Journey Map Template

HubSpot's free customer journey map template makes it easier than ever to visualize the buyer's journey. By utilizing it, you can outline your customer's experience and how your product can improve their lives.

The customer journey map template can also help you discover areas of improvement in your product, marketing, and support processes.

Download a free, editable customer journey map template.

Types of Customer Journey Maps and Examples

There are four customer journey maps , each with unique benefits. Depending on the specific purpose of the map, you can choose the proper one.

Current State

These customer journey maps are the most widely-used type. They visualize the actions, thoughts, and emotions your customers currently experience while interacting with your company. They are best used for continually improving the customer journey.

Image Source

Day in the Life

These customer journey maps visualize the actions, thoughts, and emotions your customers currently experience in their daily activities, whether or not that includes your company.

This type gives a broader lens into your customers' lives and what their pain points are in real life.

Day-in-the-life maps are best used for addressing unmet customer needs before customers even know they exist. Your company may use this type of customer journey map when exploring new market development strategies .

Future State

These customer journey maps visualize what actions, thoughts, and emotions your customers will experience in future interactions with your company.

Based on their current experience, you'll have a clear picture of where your business fits in.

These maps are best used for illustrating your vision and setting clear, strategic goals.

Service Blueprint

These customer journey maps begin with a simplified version of one of the above map styles. Then, they layer on the factors responsible for delivering that experience, including people, policies, technologies, and processes.

Service blueprints are best used to identify the root causes of current customer journeys or the steps needed to attain desired future customer journeys.

Customer Journey Mapping Best Practices

• Set a goal for the journey map.
• Survey customers to understand their buying journey.
• Ask customer service reps about the questions they receive most frequently.
• Consider UX journey mapping for each buyer persona.
• Review and update each journey map after every major product release.
• Make the customer journey map accessible to cross-functional teams.

1. Set a goal for the journey map.

Determine whether you aim to improve the buying experience or launch a new product. Knowing what you need the UX journey map to tell you can prevent scope creep on a large project like this.

2. Survey customers to understand their buying journey.

What you think you know about the customer experience and what they actually experience can be very different. Speak to your customers directly, so you have an accurate snapshot of the customer's journey.

3. Ask customer service reps about the questions they receive most frequently.

Sometimes, customers aren't aware of their specific pain points, and that's where your customer service reps come in.

They can help fill in the gaps and translate customer pain points into business terms you and your team can understand and act on.

4. Consider UX journey mapping for each buyer persona.

It's easy to assume each customer operates the same way, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

Demographics, psychographics, and even how long someone has been a customer can determine how a person interacts with your business and makes purchasing decisions.

Group overarching themes into buyer personas and create a UX journey map for each.

5. Review and update each journey map after every major product release.

Every time your product or service changes, the customer's buying process changes. Even slight tweaks, like adding an extra field to a form, can become a significant roadblock.

So, reviewing the customer journey map before and after implementing changes is essential.

6. Make the customer journey map accessible to cross-functional teams.

Customer journey maps aren't very valuable in a silo. However, creating a journey map is a convenient way for cross-functional teams to provide feedback.

Afterward, make a copy of the map accessible to each team, so they always keep the customer top of mind.

You might be telling yourself, "This doesn't seem necessary for my company or me. We understand the needs and pain points of our customers." This may be true at surface level.

However, breaking down the customer journey phase by phase, aligning each step with a goal, and restructuring your touchpoints accordingly are essential steps toward maximizing customer success.

After all, everything you do should be about solving customer problems and helping them achieve long-term success with your product or service. See other benefits below.

1. You can refocus your company with an inbound perspective.

Rather than trying to discover your customers through outbound marketing, you can have your customers find you with the help of inbound marketing.

Outbound marketing involves tactics targeted at generalized or uninterested audiences and seeks to interrupt the customers' daily lives. Outbound marketing is costly and inefficient. It annoys and deters customers and prospects.

Inbound marketing involves creating helpful content that customers are already looking for. You grab their attention first and focus on the sales later.

By mapping out the customer journey, you can understand what's interesting and helpful to your customers about your company and what's turning them away.

You can create content that will attract them to your company and keep them there.

2. You can create a new target customer base.

You need to understand the customer journey properly to understand your customers' demographics and psychographics.

It's a waste of time and money to repeatedly target too broad of an audience rather than people who are actually interested in your offering.

Researching the needs and pain points of your typical customers will give you a good picture of the kinds of people who are trying to achieve a goal with your company. Thus, you can hone your marketing to that specific audience.

3. You can implement proactive customer service.

A customer journey map is like a roadmap to the customer's experience.

It shows you moments where people experience delight and situations where they might face friction. Knowing this ahead of time allows you to plan your customer service strategy and intervene at ideal times.

Proactive customer service also makes your brand appear more reliable. For example, suppose it's around the holidays, and you anticipate a customer service surge .

You can send a message to your customers letting them know about your team's adjusted holiday hours.

You can also tell them about additional support options if your team is unavailable and what to do if an urgent problem needs immediate attention.

Customers won't feel surprised if they're waiting on hold a little longer than usual. They'll even have alternative options to choose from — like a chatbot or knowledge base — if they need to find a faster solution.

4. You can improve your customer retention rate.

When you have a complete view of the customer journey, it's easier to pick out areas where you can improve it. When you do, customers experience fewer pain points, leading to fewer people leaving your brand for competitors.

After all, 33% of customers will consider switching brands after just one poor experience.

UX journey mapping can point out individuals on the path to churn. If you log the common behaviors of these customers, you can start to spot them before they leave your business.

While you might not save them all, it's worth the try. Increasing customer retention rates by just 5% can increase profits by 25%-95%.

5. You can create a customer-focused mentality throughout the company.

As your company grows, it can be hard to coordinate all the departments to be as customer-focused as your customer service, support, and success teams are.

They often have sales and marketing goals based on things other than what real customers want.

A clear customer journey map can be shared with your entire organization. The great thing about these maps is that they map out every single step of the customer journey, from initial attraction to post-purchase support.

And, yes, this concerns marketing, sales, and service.

Based on this rationale, you can't deny the importance of a customer journey map. Thus, we've created the following steps for crafting the best map to help your company and customers prosper.

Customer Journey Mapping Examples

The goal of a company is to get its customers from point A to point B.

While it's up to the business or organization to decide what that goal is, it typically involves purchasing a product or service. Potential customers and clients need to be led along this journey.

To help guide your business in its direction, here are examples to draw inspiration from for building out your customer journey map.

1. HubSpot's Customer Journey Map Templates

HubSpot's free Customer Journey Map Templates provide an outline for companies to understand their customers' experiences.

The offer includes the following:

• Current State Template
• Lead Nurturing Mapping Template
• A Day in the Customer's Life Template
• Customer Churn Mapping Template
• Customer Support Blueprint Template

Each of these templates can help organizations gain new insights on their customers and help make improvements to product, marketing, and customer support processes.

Download them today to start working on your customer journey map.

2. B2B Customer Journey Map Example

This customer journey map clearly outlines the five steps Dapper Apps believes customers go through when interacting with them.

As you can see, it goes beyond the actual purchasing phase by incorporating initial research and post-purchase needs.

This map is effective because it helps employees get into the customers' minds by understanding the typical questions they have and the emotions they're feeling.

There are incremental action steps that Dapper Apps can take in response to these questions and feelings that will help it solve all the current problems customers are having.

3. Ecommerce Customer Journey Map Example

This fictitious customer journey map is a clear example of a day-in-the-life map.

Rather than just focusing on the actions and emotions involved in the customer's interaction with the company, this map outlines all the actions and emotions the customer experiences on a typical day.

This map is helpful because it measures a customer's state of mind based on the level of freedom they get from certain stimuli.

This is helpful for a company that wants to understand what its target customers are stressed about and what problems may need solving.

4. Future B2C Customer Journey Map Example

This customer journey map, designed for Carnegie Mellon University, exemplifies the usefulness of a future state customer journey map. It outlines the thoughts, feelings, and actions the university wants its students to have.

Based on these goals, CMU chose specific proposed changes for each phase and even wrote out example scenarios for each phase.

This clear diagram can visualize the company vision and help any department understand where they will fit into building a better user experience.

5. Retail Customer Journey Map Example

This customer journey map shows an in-depth customer journey map of a customer interacting with a fictitious restaurant.

It's clear that this style of map is more comprehensive than the others. It includes the front-of-stage (direct) and back-of-stage (non-direct or invisible) interactions a customer has with the company, as well as the support processes.

This map lays out every action involved in the customer experience, including those of the customer, employees directly serving diners, and employees working behind the scenes.

By analyzing how each of these factors influences the customer journey, a company can find the root cause of mishaps and problem-solve this for the future.

To get your business from point A — deciding to focus on customer journeys — to point B — having a journey map — a critical step to the process is selecting which customer mindset your business will focus on.

The mindset will determine which of the following templates you'll use.

1. Current State Template

If you're using this template for a B2B product, the phases may reflect the search, awareness, consideration of options, purchasing decision, and post-purchase support processes.

For instance, in the Dapper Apps example, its phases were research, comparison, workshop, quote, and sign-off.

2. Day in the Life Template

Since this template reflects all the thoughts, feelings, actions, needs, and pain points a customer has in their entire daily routine — whether or not that includes your company — you'll want to map out this template in a chronological structure.

This way, you can highlight the times of day at which you can offer the best support.

Get an interactive day in the life template.

3. Future State Template

Similar to the current state template, these phases may also reflect the predicted or desired search, awareness, consideration of options, purchasing decision, and post-purchase support processes.

Since this takes place in the future, you can tailor these phases based on what you'd like the customer journey to look like rather than what it currently looks like.

Get an interactive future state template.

4. Service Blueprint Template

Since this template is more in-depth, it doesn't follow certain phases in the customer journey.

Instead, it's based on physical evidence — the tangible factors that can create impressions about the quality and prices of the service — that often come in sets of multiple people, places, or objects at a time.

For instance, in the fictitious restaurant example above, the physical evidence includes all the staff, tables, decorations, cutlery, menus, food, and anything else a customer comes into contact with.

You would then list the appropriate customer actions and employee interactions to correspond with each physical evidence.

For example, when the physical evidence is plates, cutlery, napkins, and pans, the customer gives their order, the front-of-stage employee (waiter) takes the order, the back-of-stage employee (receptionist) processes the order, and the support processes (chefs) prepare the food.

Get an interactive service blueprint template.

5. Buyer's Journey Template

You can also use the classic buyer's journey — awareness, consideration, and decision — to design your customer journey map.

Get an interactive buyer's journey template.

Charter the Path to Customer Success

Once you fully understand your customer's experience with your business, you can delight them at every stage in their buying journey.

Many factors can affect this journey, including customer pain points, emotions, and your company's touchpoints and processes.

A customer journey map is the most effective way to visualize this information, whether you're optimizing your journey for the customer or exploring a new business opportunity to serve a customer's unrecognized needs.

Use the free templates in this article to start mapping the future of customer success in your business.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in August, 2018 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Don't forget to share this post!

Related articles.

How AI Image Misuse Made a World of Miscommunication [Willy's Chocolate Experience]

7 Ways to Delight Your Customers This Holiday Season

14 Customer Experience Fails that Companies Can Learn From

How Customer Experience Has Evolved Over the Last Decade [+ 2024 Trends]

Memorable Examples of AR in Customer Experience [+Tips for Implementing the Technology]

Digital Customer Experience: The Ultimate Guide for 2023

How to Implement a Hybrid Customer Service Strategy That Works [Expert Tips]

User Flows: 8 Tips For Creating A Super Smooth User Experience

11 Best Practices for B2B Customer Experience

Customer Experience vs. User Experience: What’s the Difference? [+ Examples]

Outline your company's customer journey and experience with these 7 free customer journey map templates.

Service Hub provides everything you need to delight and retain customers while supporting the success of your whole front office

Talk to an agent

Learn how you can Unlock Limitless Customer Lifetime Value with CleverTap’s All-in-One Customer Engagement Platform.

• See a tailored demo of CleverTap's key capabilities.
• Get a walk-through of industry specific use cases.
• Obtain answers to any questions about integration, go-live, and support.

Your product demo

Get to know CleverTap from the scratch. To book your personal product demo, fill out the form and start at your preferred date. Afterwards we will get in touch with you.

Please enter a valid work email

Please enter a valid phone number

Yes, I'd like to receive the latest news and other communications from CleverTap. You can unsubscribe anytime. For more details, go to the Privacy Policy .

By submitting this form, you agree to CleverTap's Privacy Policy Site is protected by reCAPTCHA ( Privacy | Terms )

Thank you for your interest in CleverTap

We’ll get back to you soon!

Subscribe to our blog.

Product Overview Uncover the building blocks of CleverTap customer engagement platform

Customer Data & Analytics Ingest, analyze and segment customer data

Experimentation & Optimization Unleash the winning strategy in real-time

Personalization Contextualize customer experiences in real-time

Campaign Orchestration Build omnichannel customer experiences effortlessly

Clever.AI Insightful. Empathetic. Prescriptive

Push Notifications

Email Automation

In-App Messaging

Web Messaging

Signed Call TM

E-Commerce Fuel purchases and maximize order value

Subscriptions Build a loyal subscriber base

Financial Services Win trust with the most secure platform

Gaming Maximize player lifetime value

Blog Latest trends in customer engagement

Case Studies Find out how customers unlock value

Webinar & Events Interactive sessions, seminars and more

Videos & Podcasts Learn from industry experts

Whitepapers & Ebooks Thought leadership to maximize outcome

Guides Best practices from across the globe

Benchmark Reports Measure up against the best

Glossary Stay current with new terms and concepts

About Us Building lifelong customers

Partners Discover the CleverTap advantage

Media CleverTap in the news

Careers Let's work together

CSR Commitment to empowering communities

CleverTap4Good Where technology meets philanthropy

Contact Us We’d love to hear from you!

Get relevant information on mobile marketing delivered to your inbox.

Thank you for subscribing to the CleverTap Blog!

• Customer Spotlight
• CleverTap Elevate
• Engineering
• Uncategorized
• Data Science
• The Big Leap
• CleverTap Quarterly
• CleverTap Engage
• CleverTap Tech

How To Create a Customer Journey Map: Free Template

• Published on January 4, 2022
• Reading time 9 min read
• Views 10.32k

Wouldn’t it be great if customers recognized your product’s value proposition from the moment they first experienced your brand? Alas, that’s not the world we live in. These days, when so many things compete for your customer’s or prospect’s time and attention, customer journey mapping is a must.  Let’s explore the what, why, and how of customer journey mapping. We’ll also share a customer journey map template for mobile marketers to get you started. Table of Contents

What Is Customer Journey Mapping?

Benefits of customer journey mapping.

• How to Create a Customer Journey Map in 7 Steps

Customer Journey Mapping Tools

Customer journey map template, customer journey mapping levels up your user experience.

• The problems your customers and prospects are trying to solve
• The motives that drive their decision-making processes
• Their experiences along different customer life cycle touchpoints
• Roadblocks or areas of friction that might cause resistance

The main goal of a customer journey map is to form a better understanding of how your customer experiences your brand and its products and services. But it goes beyond that.  When you create a visual outline of your customer’s journey across different channels and touchpoints, that roadmap informs your brand strategy in a way that ultimately levels up your customer experience .

You Retain Customers By Delivering an Experience That Matches Their Expectations

Are your business goals aligned with your customer’s goals? If you don’t understand your customer’s perspectives, needs, and pain points, you won’t be able to meet them in a way that builds loyalty . Customer journey mapping challenges you to empathize with your customer so you can deliver an experience that matches their expectations.

You Can Optimize for Omnichannel Engagement

Your customers experience your brand across multiple channels: advertising,  marketing, sales, and customer service, to name a few. They may interact with your website, but also with your app or social media accounts. Journey mapping helps your team ensure that all of those channels work collaboratively to create a seamless user experience. Read our guide to omnichannel marketing to learn more.

You Can Make Informed Marketing and Business Decisions

Without a customer journey map, you’re flying blind. That’s why investing time in understanding and empathizing with the people who use your products and services is the surest path to customer engagement , conversion, and retention.

You Can Find and Eliminate Roadblocks

Customer journey mapping can help you uncover anything that might be hurting retention . By reviewing customer behavioral analytics , you can find points of frustration, like a too-slow website or a confusing app interface, and remedy them to improve customer experience.

How to Create a Customer Journey Map: Example 

Step 1: Decide On Your Objectives

Where do your business goals and your customers’ needs align? That’s the magical sweet spot you need to optimize for. Begin the customer journey mapping process by finding that meeting point and writing it down. 

Step 2: Create User Personas

Now, let’s humanize your users by creating user personas. After all, the customers using your product or service are real people with real needs and problems. User personas are semi-fictitious characters that represent your target customers. You create these personas by using real customer behavior intel and researching the needs and goals of people who interact with your brand. Check out our guide to creating user personas for inspiration. 

Step 3: List the Touchpoints

Now it’s time to take note of the important places on your website or in your app where your customers interact with your brand. For example, an e-commerce site might trace the touchpoints that lead a potential buyer from their product pages to their shopping cart to checkout. It might look something like this:

• Website: Landing page
• Website: Product page
• Website: Shopping cart
• Website: Checkout
• Email: Purchase confirmation
• Email: Shipping notification

We’ve simplified this, but you may have other steps — an abandoned shopping cart email or shipment delivery notification, for example — along the way. Pro Tip: Don’t get bogged down in the details. It’s not necessary to include every little detail. Focus on the big moments that get you closest to your business goals. 

Step 4: List the Actions Your Customer Takes

Touchpoints are like milestones. They’re the significant markers your customers reach on their journey. Actions are the steps that get them from one touchpoint to another.  Here’s an example. If your customer reaches your landing page, what actions will they take to get them to an individual product page? Those actions could be something like clicking on a specific product category or performing a search for an item by name.  Pro Tip: Listing actions can help you identify points in the customer journey where your customers have to take multiple steps to get from one objective to another. Can you find areas where you can simplify and reduce the number of steps it takes for a customer to reach the next milestone? 

Step 5: Identify the Highs and Lows of Your Customer’s Journey

Now, take the customer journey yourself. Look for potential pain points. Is a page loading too slowly? Is something hard to find in your app interface? Where might your customer encounter an obstacle that results in a negative experience? Don’t forget to make note of potential moments of surprise and delight. Maybe your customer was drawn to your brand by a fun social media campaign. That’s a win! Once you’ve made note of the highs and lows, you can examine them for opportunities. Maybe customers who were enticed by your brand on social media became frustrated when they landed on your mobile website because it loaded too slowly.  Bingo! You’ve found a roadblock on your customer’s journey. Remove the obstacle, and you’ll improve the customer experience. 

Step 6: Track User Emotions

At each point of interaction, consider and note the emotional state your user might be in. Use your analytics tools to analyze your customers’ behavior and make an educated guess about their emotional response.  Maybe a behavioral analytics tool showed you that your customers tend to drop off when they encounter a pop-up. It doesn’t take much thought to come to the conclusion that your customer felt annoyed. Or maybe you’ve discovered that a high percentage of your users have taken you up on your free download — that’s a moment of delight.

Step 7: Map the Customer Journey

Now that you’ve gathered information, you’re ready to create your customer journey map. Create a visual representation of the data you’ve gathered as you complete these steps. You can start simply with a customer journey template if you prefer, or develop a map through a more robust process. Some marketing analytics software such as CMSes and engagement and retention suites like CleverTap already include customer journey mapping tools . These tools allow you to use data to construct your campaigns easily on a visual canvas. 

Your customer journey map could be as simple as a freehand drawing or even a bunch of sticky notes stuck to a wall. But while there’s nothing wrong with a lo-fi approach, the better your customer journey map, the easier it will be to share it with your team so everyone’s on board as you hone your marketing strategy. If you’d like to step up your customer journey mapping process, there are a number of free and paid design tools available, including:

• Microsoft Visio

CleverTap’s customer engagement and retention platform includes Journeys, a visual campaign builder that allows you to:

• Use a virtual canvas to create omnichannel messaging campaigns
• Identify and segment your users to pinpoint your audience
• Create personalized campaigns based on user behavior, location, and life cycle stage with a simple drag-and-drop interface
• Get a live view of how users flow through each stage of your campaign in real time

See how today’s top brands use CleverTap to drive long-term growth and retention

Schedule a Demo Now!

• customer journey map template
• Customer journeys
• user journey map

Customer Journey Map Template

Map your customer journey and help your customers successfully get from A to B. Understand the reasoning behind their choices and design the best product experience and meet your customer's needs.

Trusted by 65M+ users and leading companies

About the Customer Journey Map Template

A customer journey map (CJM) or user journey map is a visual overview of how your customer experiences your product or service. Customers are the lifeblood of your business, so it’s crucial that you empathize with their pain points, wants, and needs so you can design a customer experience with them in mind.

With technology constantly advancing, customer journeys are getting more and more complex. This, in turn, results in a poor customer experience. Whether in sales, marketing, product, or engineering, use a Customer Journey Map Template to capture your customer’s experience for each persona, solve problems that arise in your products and services, and fill gaps.

What is a customer journey map?

A customer journey map (also called  a user journey map ) shows your customer's experiences with your brand and company across all its touchpoints. In a customer journey map, interactions are placed in a timeline to map out the user flow.

To sum it up, customer journey maps represent the journey a customer will experience. Many teams use  customer journey mapping tools  to display the thought processes and emotions customers are facing from the first interaction up to the end (the goal of your map). This, in turn, helps businesses understand whether they are achieving their goals or not, which can result in higher conversion rates and a better customer experience.

Share your expertise on Miroverse 🚀

Publish your own template and help over 60M+ Miro users jump-start their work. 

Get started →

How to use Miro’s customer journey map template

Here are 6 steps to create a successful CJM using the customer journey mapping template. In each section, we will dive a little deeper, but remember, every customer journey map is different, so you may spend more time on one step compared to another.

1. Set clear objectives for the map

Identify your goal for the map. Identifying your ideal outcome will help set the foundations for a successful project.

Ask yourself some of these questions:

Why are you making a customer journey map?

Who is it specifically about?

What experience is it based upon?

Based on this, you may want to create a buyer persona. This is a fictitious customer with all their demographics and psychographics representing your average customer. Having a clear persona is helpful in reminding you to direct every aspect of your customer journey map toward them.

2. Identify your user personas and define their goals

Use the Game-Changer container on the template to identify your persona.

Answer these three questions:

What are their key goals and needs?

What do they struggle with most?

What tasks do they have?

Conduct user research to help you in this process. Survey customers to understand their buying journey, or ask the sales team or customer service representatives for feedback or the most frequently asked questions. You would want to hear the experience of people who are interested in your product and who have interacted with it to understand their pain points and what can be done to improve.

3. Highlight target customer personas

Once you’ve discovered all the different buyer personas that interact with your business, you will need to narrow the list down and select one or two to focus on.

A customer journey map is a specific journey one customer takes, so having too many personas on one map will not be a precise indication of their journey and not a reflection of their true experience.

4. Identify all possible customer touchpoints

Based on your research, you can now use this information to map out all the possible customer touchpoints your customer will face. Use the User Journey Map Template to add the outcomes you want your customer to achieve, and then map all the steps they need to take in order to achieve these outcomes.

List out all of the touchpoints your customer currently has, and then make another list of where you would like your customers to have additional touchpoints. Then check if there are any overlaps.

This step is vital as it can show you whether you have too few or too many touchpoints and gives you a rough idea of your current customer journey experience.

Touch points are not limited to just your website. Look at other areas such as:

Social media channels

Email marketing

3rd party reviews or mentions

Pro Tip:  Run a quick Google search of your business and identify all the pages that mention your brand. Verify this using Google Analytics to see what brings in the most traffic.

This step is very important as it can help you understand things like, are the lack of touchpoints the reason why my customers are turning away? If there are more than expected, are they getting too overwhelmed?

5. Build the customer journey map and try it yourself!

Once you have gathered all the necessary information and identified all the touchpoints your customer will experience, it will finally be time to start building your own customer journey map.

Ensure that you note down every point your customer will touch your business. Remember to add their actions, needs, pains, and feelings to your customer journey map.

Creating the map alone isn’t the end of the process. You will need to go through the journey yourself and analyze the results. By going through the journey first-hand, you will see the areas where expectations might not have been met.

For each persona, go through every journey from beginning to end and take notes.

6. Adjust as needed

Once you have gone through each persona map, you will get a clearer understanding of what your customers are experiencing.

Ensure that all the needs are met and pain points are addressed. No matter how big or small the changes are, every single change has an impact. And this small impact could be the deciding factor for purchase, signup, or download.

Add all the opportunities and improvements you could introduce to your User Journey Map Template . Brainstorm with your team ideas to implement changes, and make sure you assign the right team members to each process.

What should be included in a customer journey map?

Every customer journey map will be different. No map is linear, so it is okay not to have a direct A to B Journey. Below we have compiled a number of points that may be included in a CJM:

1. Significant milestones

In order to begin with a successful customer journey map, it is important to draft a path your customer will be journeying through to reach your business’s goal. This step is also useful as you can preemptively identify potential hiccups that might ensue here.

2. User engagement

This element is where you map out the details of how your customer will interact with your site or product. Think of how you would like this to be in order for you to achieve your goal.

3. Emotions

As we seek positive experiences, it is also important to ensure our customers feel relief, excitement, and happiness. Therefore, to mitigate any negative emotions, ensure you have a clear and concise process with appropriate branding to avoid creating negative opinions.

4. Pain Points

When your customers are experiencing a negative emotion, there is a reason why. Adding pain points to your customer journey map will help you identify the reasons behind them and come up with a solution to fix them.

5. Solutions

And finally, add solutions. Once you and your team have identified the pain points, brainstorm and implement solutions to improve your user experience.

How do I use a customer journey map template?

You can create your CJM with Miro’s free Customer Journey Map Template and customize it according to your brand or product needs. When using your own CJM template, remember to define the scope, what touchpoints you want to analyze, and who inside your organization has ownership of which step.

What are the benefits of customer journey mapping?

Using a customer journey map can be key to better understanding your customers. Customer journey mapping puts you and your team in the mind of the customer and helps you to visualize what they are experiencing at each stage and touchpoint with your business or product. Outlining the stages of interaction, while keeping the customer front and center, allows you to identify any pain points that could be improved. This will better not only the customer experience but will help with customer retention in the long run.

What is a touchpoint in a customer journey map?

A touchpoint in a customer journey map is an instance where your customer can form an opinion of your business. Touchpoints can be found in places where your business comes in direct contact with potential or existing customers. A display ad, an interaction with an employee, a 404 error, and even a Google review can be considered a customer touchpoint. Your brand exists beyond your website and marketing materials, so it’s important that the different types of touch points are considered in your customer journey map because they can help uncover opportunities for improvement in the buying journey.

How often should you update your customer journey map?

Your map should be a constant work-in-progress. Reviewing it on a monthly or quarterly basis will help you to identify gaps and opportunities for streamlining your customer journey further. Use your data analytics along with customer feedback to check for any roadblocks. It would also be helpful to schedule regular meetings to analyze any changes that might affect the customer journey.

Do all businesses need a customer journey map?

Customer journey mapping is important for businesses of all sizes. From SMBs to Enterprise. It is also important for all functions. From sales and marketing to customer service. There is no one size fits all for customer journey maps. Therefore, it is important to take time to personalise your own customer journey map to fully understand your own process and identify your own pain points.

Get started with this template right now.

Experience Mapping Template

Works best for:.

Desk Research, Mapping

Plan your product according to your customer’s needs and desires with the Experience Map Template. Bring a customer-centric approach to product development and branding.

Service Blueprint Template

Desk Research, Operations, Market Research

First introduced by G. Lynn Shostack in 1984, service blueprints allow you to visualize the steps that go into a service process from the customer’s perspective. Service blueprints are useful tools for understanding and designing a service experience – and finding ways to improve it. Service blueprint diagrams make it simpler for teams to design new processes or improve existing ones. To create a service blueprint, map out each process and actor that contributes to the customer experience, from in-house contributors to third-party vendors.

How Might We Template

It's crucial to ask the right questions to find the best solutions. Skilled critical thinkers can uncover the underlying complexities of a problem instead of just accepting it at face value. One way to encourage this type of thinking is by using statement starters, such as the How Might We Template. These tools can help you explore more open-ended problems and have more productive discussions, ultimately leading to the most effective solutions.

Mind Map Template

Based on Joseph Novak's innovation, Concept Mapping, this template helps to organize ideas and demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of a subject. It visually arranges all the details about a topic, which fosters shared understanding. This technique is particularly useful when explaining different facets or related topics.

Zoom Levels Template

The Zoom Level Template is a tool to examine a problem from various perspectives. For more innovative solutions, consider the issue broadly. Ascending the ladder enables you to broaden your perspective (ask, 'How might we?'). When confronted with an overly broad scope that hinders progress, descending the ladder helps narrow your focus (ask 'What if we narrowed?').

Concept Map Template

Education, Mapping, Brainstorming

Use the concept map template to create new ideas, structure your thoughts, and bring your innovations to life. It allows you to explore connections between concepts and let your creativity flow in an organized format. As a result, you’re able to visualize how to bring your new ideas to reality and how various concepts relate to each other.

• Design process
• SaaS business
• Product design
• Design team

Visualize Like a Pro. Top Customer Journey Mapping Tools

mins to read

Whether you are building a new product, developing extra features, or finding ways to improve your retention rates, a customer journey map is a great tool. As a design agency , we know well how valuable can be an insight from a customer journey map that is based on good research.

Creating a customer journey map requires previous research, analysis, interviews. After that you are left with loads of information that is hard to present to the team. Here you can see the best tools that can help you visualize the map and make it a pretty picture that you would really enjoy analyzing.

Customer Journey Map (CJM). Why Does It Matter?

Through the customer journey map , you can truly empathize with your users. It shows not only how people interact with the product, but also what they feel and desire. The graph shows clearly the moments of truth that make you lose or acquire clients.

Before you start working on a customer journey map, think of a concrete problem that you want to address. Make sure to include real customers in the process, do not rely on your team to provide all the information about clients’ feelings, desires, and actions.

Once you’ve gathered the information, you start thinking of a way to visualize it. The tools are various: we’ll start with the most basic ones and go on with the software created exclusively for customer journey maps visualization.

Building Customer Journey Map Using Tools That Are at Hand

Craft tools.

Let’s say that you plan a workshop with your team and customers to create a customer journey map. You expect to end up with a beautiful color scheme, where everything is crystal clear. There are plenty of tools for that, as you will see below. However, when you are working live with a group of people who are probably unfamiliar with those tools, a good old whiteboard and stickers can be your best choice.

Start building the stages of the journey during live sessions using hand-made materials. You can use this template to structure your ideas. Later, when the content is ready, you can make a pretty digital version to work with in the future.

Computer Programs

The customer journey map does not always have to be that huge graph with illustrations and icons. You can build a cjm using just Excel : if you are more of a text person than an illustration person, that would work just fine. Here is a simple customer journey map by Nielsen Norman Group, made in spreadsheets.

You can create a customer journey map in (almost) any visual editor that you know: Adobe Illustrator, XD, Figma, Sketch, etc. There are some free customer journey templates that give you a prepared set of elements to fill in with your data. Check out this template for Adobe XD .

You can also try free customer journey map templates for Sketch . And if you want to go really fancy, use this interactive template for Figma . The clickable elements allow you to fit in lots of data and metrics, including numerous personas and integrating user flows. 

Customer Journey Map Software. Web Apps

There is a bunch of software made specifically for creating customer journey maps. They allow you to use pre-made templates, visual elements to get a result that looks put-together without thinking too much of design. We’ll give you a brief overview of the most popular and useful customer journey map tools, both paid and free.

With UXPressia you can build customer journey maps, personas, and impact maps. You can choose one of many templates for any type of product – from coffee stores to online banking apps . Also, a separate template for employee journey maps is worth notice: remember that employee experience directly influences the customer experience. The app has a high rank on review websites and got the Best Value award from Capterra among Customer Journey Mapping Tools Software (2020).

UXPressia offers a free version with limited functionality and a paid one for $24 a month. The paid version allows many team members to work on the project at a time.

With Smaply, you can create a customer journey map from scratch or use one of the templates based on different types of cjms: service blueprint, communication journey, empathy journey map, and comparison between different personas. The interface is clean and minimalist. The template is black and white and basic, so adding the right colors and visual effects is up to you.

Smaply is another cloud-based tool. Other than visualizing customer journey maps, you can create personas, and stakeholders maps. The price is $25/month, and a free trial is available.

Custellence

The distinct feature of Custellence is that it emphasizes the use of the customer journey map as a change plan. You can mark right away what needs to be removed or created: great feature to remind you that cjm is about finding weak points and improving, not just visualization of data.

The templates are very detailed and each is tailored for a specific kind of business. Take a look at this template for customer journey map of retail: numerous lines, and each of them has a few sub-lanes to make your map as detailed as possible.

This is a web app and the price is higher than the competitors’. The free version allows you to make only one map without exporting it. Paid plans start at $30/month.

Miro is a very versatile tool, suitable not only for customer journey maps, but also for agile, retrospectives, mood boards, and many more. Miro is a digital whiteboard.

The website offers various templates for different uses. They are rather basic (like an actual whiteboard), but the service gives lots of possibilities for customizing. In our agency , we use Miro often for visualizing customer journey maps, as it has a perfect balance of the default instruments and the flexibility of their use.

The software is cloud-based. If you would use it only for customer journey maps, the free version with 3 boards would probably be enough. If you decide to use it for other projects, it is only $10/month and has many integration options.

Take a look at this template to see what your cjm may look like in Miro.

Visio is a diagram-building tool by Microsoft. Paid options start at $5 per month (only web app) and go up to $15 per month (web and desktop app). The service is built on Microsoft cloud, and the desktop version is not available for Mac.

Apart from customer journey maps, Visio is great for flowcharts, Gantt charts, and all sorts of diagrams. See this template for Visio .

Like Visio, Gliffy is suitable for workflows and diagrams as well as customer journey maps. The templates are rather basic and to make a detailed cjm, you have to add parameters and metrics on your own.

The paid version is $7.99 per month (cheaper if you purchase it for a team). The free version allows only a limited amount of graphs. Also note that the documents created in the free version are public, so if you need privacy, opt for another version.

Comparison Table

Collecting Feedback Software

A simple customer journey map is built based on research and interviews with users. However, if you want to go further with collecting data, test the insights of your cjm, and see how the changes work, you may need special software that helps collecting and analyzing feedback.

In this article, we focus on the tools for visualization, but if you are serious about improving customer experience, check out Clarabridge and CXsuite.

There are a bunch of tools for visualization of customer journey maps, apart from the few ones listed in this article. Some of those you already have at hand. Some you’ve used numerous times before with different objectives. We have collected some good examples of customer journey maps so you can see which one works best for your type of business.

Experts in customer journey mapping claim that the pretty picture is not the main focus, rather it is the process that drives changes. However, a nice visualization is always a plus.

Now that you know more about your customers, learn how to make them happier with these 6 strategies for customer success .

Masha Panchenko

Top Stories

How to Create a Strong Product Vision (Examples and Templates Included)

How to Conduct a UX Audit (Examples and Methods)

What Does a Head of Product Actually Do? A Week in the Life of Head of Product

Brainstorming Templates for Your Remote Collaboration Tool

How to Redesign an App: When to Do It and What to Start With

Don't want to miss anything.

Get weekly updates on the newest design stories, case studies and tips right in your mailbox.

Your email has been submitted successfully. Check your email for first article we’ve sent you.

• Behance Mobile

Customer Journey Map Template + Stencils

This template and stencil can be used to quickly create a customer journey map or service blueprint using the findings from your research. The st Read More

Creative fields.

Interaction Design

Storyboarding

• customer experience
• Customer Journey Map
• Customer Experience Map
• Product Vision
• Story telling
• Customer Research
• User research
• journey map
• Service Blueprint
• service blue print
• Service design

Attribution, Non-commercial

• Templates library
• Whiteboards apps
• Data residency
• What’s new

User Story Mapping

Running Retrospectives

PI Planning

Story Estimation

Daily Scrum

Kanban Workflow

Sprint Planning

Managing Roadmaps

Backlog Management

Case studies

How Mi9 Moved Their PI Planning to the Remote Setup

Atlassian Collaboration Success Story

Remote Jira Retrospective Sessions with a Whiteboards app

• Help Center
• Expert videos
• Agile guide
• Contact support

18 product planning apps for every product manager

7 steps to a successful product planning process

The role of Agile coaches in driving successful Agile transformation

• Back to all posts
• Remote Collaboration
• Success Stories
• What's New

Home / Blog / Customer Journey Map Template and Guide

Walking in a User’s Footsteps: Improve UX and More with the Customer Journey Map Template

We’ve all been that online customer: we’re using an app or a website, and it feels like the company missed some key UX considerations. Yes, different customers want different things from a product. But we can’t be the only customers bothered by this particular experience, right?

So the real question is, how do we minimize these pain points for our own customers? How do we make the online customer journey smooth, intuitive, and obstacle-free? This is where customer journey maps can help your business serve its customers better. A customer journey map walks you step by step through the online user’s interactions with your product or service so you can experience it from deep inside their perspective.

Use the Customer Journey Map template to create a detailed diagram of any customer experience. Study your research data, gain intimate awareness of customer pain points, and find creative ways to address them. Make your plan, then take advantage of Whiteboards’ native two-way Jira integration to create new user stories or import and update existing Jira issues as you execute your next steps.

Start your free Whiteboards trial today, and read on to learn about creating better software using customer journey maps, including a step-by-step customer journey map example.

What is a customer journey map?

A customer journey map is a visual collaboration tool for designing and refining products according to a deep awareness of the customer experience. The journey map process draws you inside a typical customer’s step-by-step interactions with your product. From there, you can pinpoint their reactions of delight, dissatisfaction, frustration, or confusion and create business solutions accordingly.

Customer journey mapping helps a company to:

• track a typical customer’s interactions with the product step by step
• sort customer feedback according to each stage of product contact
• identify key pain points and other opportunities in the user experience
• brainstorm and research solutions to the most urgent issues
• create a product that more directly aligns with the target customer’s priorities

How does using a template help with customer journey maps?

A customer journey map templates help UX teams analyze a defined instance of the customer experience in great detail. This instance can be anything customers do with your product: signing up as a new user, upgrading a current subscription, searching for content on your site, interacting with the online help desk, etc. Whatever your focus, the journey mapping template organizes that particular customer experience for your in-depth consideration.

Whiteboards’ Customer Journey Map template guides you to create a map that covers all the relevant angles. Use your marketing research and answer these key questions:

• Stages: What is the main route customers take during this journey?
• Steps: What individual user actions occur at each stage of this route?
• Thoughts: What are customers saying about their experience at each stage?
• Actors: Who is involved at different points in the customer’s journey?
• Touchpoints: What other points of contact are relevant to their experience?
• Emotions: How are customers feeling about each journey stage?

Create a more user-friendly product or service with customer journey maps. Our customer journey map example below can help you think through each mapping stage and get the most out of this template.

When is a customer journey map used?

Your company can create a customer journey map at any stage of product development. If you use journey maps at all points in your creative process, the same map can help you:

• visualize the customer experience during new product design 
• analyze feedback from users while beta testing the product
• revisit the user experience via additional customer research after product launch
• continue improving the product throughout its life cycle

Start mapping during the initial design stage or make a journey map to study the target customer’s experience with an established product. Either way, plan to update your customer journey maps periodically to continually improve the user experience.

What are the benefits of a customer journey map?

Customer journey maps are a valuable UX design tool because of their granular approach to product development. Journey map creation and analysis lead to a clearer consideration of each step the customer takes with your product and how their experience affects your business.

An effective customer journey map can help your company:

• empathize deeply with the various product journeys of each user persona
• dispel bad assumptions about how users interact with a product
• catch weak points in a product or service before they become serious issues
• present relevant stakeholders with a detailed diagram to explain your design
• align the business to a shared understanding of the customer experience
• improve customer retention by proactively addressing pain points

Your customer’s journey should feel like a walk in the park on a nice day, not an uphill scramble through overgrown foliage. Observe the customer’s route closely to see where they trip over obstacles in their path, pause in confusion because of unclear signage, or feel put off by the scenery. You might even catch them on a detour toward a competitor’s product. Use all these clues to smooth out the path and create a more pleasant customer journey going forward.

How do I start the customer journey mapping process?

Do the groundwork to create an effective customer journey map..

Customer journey mapping is an in-depth exploration of the user experience. To make a useful customer journey map, you’ll need clear objectives and relevant data points in place before you begin.

Decide which part of the buyer journey you’ll explore.

Set your mapping session scope by focusing on a small segment of the customer experience. You aren’t studying every avenue the customer might go down with your product – at least, not in one meeting. Keep your scope narrow, or your customer journey map will quickly become overwhelming.

For instance, if your product is a travel app for outdoor enthusiasts, your customer journey map scope might be “family with an RV seeking same-day campsite accommodations.” Your map will then follow the customer as they open the app, find the right menu selection, input search criteria, explore options, choose a campsite, and reflect on how well the app guided them to make an appropriate choice.

Establish user personas and decide which customers to focus on.

Different customers will experience your product differently depending on their interests, goals, online usage patterns, and a host of other attributes.

Define your different user demographics with Whiteboards’ User Persona template . Divide your target customer base into representative parts, and then determine which persona you’ll study during your customer journey mapping. 

This choice often points back to the customer experience you’re exploring. Take the customer journey map example above. The “family with an RV seeking same-day campsite accommodations” will involve a different user persona than “backpackers searching for hiking trails near backcountry tent camping sites.”

See our Step-by-Step Guide to Empathy Mapping for a detailed example of how customers might break down by user persona. Consider developing personas and creating an empathy map to understand each segment of your customer base. Then use your research to begin working on customer journey maps.

Gather data from your customers or product testers. 

You can make a customer journey map in the initial product design phase to explore the likely interactions of hypothetical customers. Once the product is in testing, do additional research to explore real user experiences.

Seek detailed data, including the thoughts, feelings, and perceptions of these potential customers. Survey users and encourage them to speak honestly about what they love and hate about the product. Excellent qualitative research is key to effective customer journey mapping.

How do I use the Customer Journey Map template?

Follow the six template steps with this customer journey map example..

With your scope defined and your research compiled, add the Customer Journey Map template to the online whiteboard and invite team members to a video chat . 

To better understand the process of creating a customer journey map, we’ll follow a UX design team as they use the customer journey mapping template. The product in this example is the popular music streaming service Spotify. The business is exploring the experience customers have when they share content from the app with friends. Here’s what the team’s journey mapping process looks like, step by step:

1. Establish the primary stages of the customer journey on the template. 

The design team starts their customer journey map with a broad overview, identifying each stage the typical customer goes through to share a song with a friend. Importantly, their objective is to understand the whole customer journey, not simply the moment of sharing the song.

In this example, the team is studying a user persona they’ve named John, who sends a song link to his friend Grace. Customers like John describe sharing content with other people as a spontaneous decision. They are typically browsing the streaming service and trying out new music. When hearing a song, they might think it meets someone else’s taste and send it to them.

The design team identifies seven broad stages in this customer journey, including the experience of Grace, who interacts with the product after John sends her a link. On the template, the team describes each stage with a single action word: visit, listen, discover, share, discuss, receive, and respond.

2. Break down the customer journey map stages into smaller steps. 

Next, the customer journey map example team subdivides their seven stages into the individual actions John and Grace take to complete each one. They plot out this more detailed customer journey based on a combination of user persona knowledge, existing metadata research, and direct customer feedback. For instance, under “visit,” they enter “opens Spotify on the phone” because customers like John generally use a music streaming service on their mobile devices.

3. Add feedback from customers who’ve made this journey.

In the “Thoughts” row of the template, the team adds customer feedback to sticky notes under the relevant stages of the customer experience. These data points are the key to creating a more optimal customer journey. The team will return to this content in Step 6 to make important connections and pinpoint customer pain points.

Note that you may want to double-check your Step 2 sticky notes after Step 3. Step 2 is about trying to establish a typical route the customer journey takes, so make the most of your existing research.

For instance, in the action steps under the stage called “listen,” our example team noted that John uses the app’s “Discover weekly” playlists to explore new music. This reflects one of the “Thoughts” fields in Step 3. Not every customer under this user persona will do the same, but it’s a good approximation of the path taken.

4. List all the actors involved in the customer journey map.

This step is simple for our example team since the only people involved in the customer journey are John and Grace. Another customer journey map might feature only one actor or several. The key here is to make note of anyone interacting with the product.

If the customer journey map described John sending a group message to various friends, they would all be actors. If the journey map instead tracked John using Spotify at a party and different partygoers interacted with the service to change up the music, this would make those people relevant actors.

5. Identify the various touchpoints of the customer journey.

Here, the team notes any interactions that affect how the customer experiences the streaming service. These touchpoints help the team contextualize the customer journey and understand how the product performs in different situations.

For the example team’s touchpoints, they list the technology platforms involved in the customer journey: Spotify and WhatsApp. WhatsApp is relevant because that’s how John sends the song to Grace. John’s messages to Grace are also touchpoints because he sends a separate text after sharing the song. This might seem irrelevant, but it could also be a customer journey clue. Why does he send a text afterward? Is there a functional piece missing that requires John to handle this communication outside of the app?

Customer journey touchpoints might include virtual platforms, physical locations, other people the customer interacts with, or specific content they read, watch, or listen to. If the customer journey centered on John listening to Spotify podcasts while driving, his vehicle would be one of the relevant touchpoints. His perception of the streaming service would be affected by how convenient it is to use on the road.

6. Reflect the current state of the customer experience using emojis.

In the final stage of customer journey mapping, review the template content, especially the customer feedback. 

After studying the “Thoughts” section of the template, the customer journey map example team places emojis on the map as quick visual markers reflecting the quality of the user experience. Their research shows that the customer journey was overall positive for the main user persona, John. However, Grace has some complaints as the Spotify link recipient. She is frustrated that she has to open the app to hear the song and also by the play options after she does this. 

In light of this, the designers will make a decision about feature priorities or, possibly, about conducting further research. 

What’s next after customer journey mapping?

Here are some ways to use your completed customer journey map..

Customer journey mapping can bring important pain points to light and reveal opportunities for your business to serve customers better. Consider how a customer journey map fits into overall product development and some steps you might take after creating a map:

Take action straight from the template. 

If journey mapping leads you to an immediate design decision, go ahead and add your action plan to the product backlog. Select relevant fields on the template and convert them to Jira user stories. Whiteboards templates sync with Jira , so your new stories are instantly live in your Jira backlog.

From here, manage any issue on the virtual whiteboard just as you would in Jira: add notes, child issues, assignees, etc. Import existing Jira issues to the whiteboard and update them to align with your customer journey mapping conclusions. All updates you make on one platform appear instantly on the other for seamless planning and execution.

Create additional customer journey maps to assess development priorities. 

Each customer journey map shows one small part of a customer’s interactions with your product. Make additional maps to investigate other key product functions or to explore the experiences of additional user personas.

You don’t have to create the entire map as a team, either. One designer can build your maps, and then the team can study them and make a decision together. You can also collaborate asynchronously by leaving comments on templates and mentioning other Whiteboards users to communicate with coworkers between meetings.

Check out our Guide to Asynchronous Collaboration on Whiteboards for helpful tips on saving time and effort through better meeting prep and post-meeting communication.

Revisit your customer journey map whiteboard periodically.

Create a whiteboard dedicated to customer journey maps and save all your completed journey mapping templates there. Build customer journey map reviews into your team’s collaboration schedule. Continue doing customer research to gather data throughout the product life cycle. Revisit your journey maps periodically, updating them to reflect the current state of the customer experience and taking continuous action to make that experience better.

Share the customer journey map with relevant stakeholders. 

Take advantage of Whiteboards’ online collaboration tools to align the company around a shared understanding of the customer experience. Use your completed journey mapping templates to create a slideshow presentation for other business stakeholders on the online whiteboard. Or, use Whiteboards’ Loom integration to screen-record yourself as you highlight important points on the map and share your conclusions with the team. 

Bring Whiteboards with you as you travel through the user experience. Choose from 100+ customizable Jira-synced templates to help you brainstorm, research, plan, and execute improvements to the customer journey. Watch our short demo to see how Whiteboards-Jira integration can serve you on your path to customer-centered product design.

Agnieszka Józwiak

Related posts

Create a Business Plan for Your Startup in 9 Steps With the Business Model Canvas Template

Sep 6, 2023

Venn Diagram Template User Guide: Make a Venn Diagram to Organize and Present Your Data Visually

Angelika Troka

Aug 30, 2023

Affinity Diagrams Bring Order to Chaos: An Affinity Diagram Template and User Guide with Examples

Jul 26, 2023

• Upcoming classes
• Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) training
• Certified Scrum Master (CSM) training
• Certified Product Innovation Professional (CPIP) training
• Design Thinking training
• Consulting and coaching
• Product Goal Canvas
• User Persona Template

Customer Journey Map template

• Product Vision Canvas
• The 5D Canvas
• Scrum workflow
• MVP Ideation Canvas
• Go to Market strategy canvas
• Epic development form
• Empathy interviews / Observations templates
• Product Bytes
• About 5D Vision

A Customer Journey Map is a powerful tool to understand and document the interaction of your customer with your product and service across various touch-points. 

Customer Journey Maps are a visual representation of customer interactions with your business, product, online experience, retail experience, or any combination. These maps are developed from a customer point of view, designed to highlight how customers interact with your brand, product, services, and people. The more touchpoints you have, the more complicated — and useful — such a map becomes.

A Journey Map may focus on a specific interaction (e.g. a customer who visits your online store to buy a product, or a customer that calls customer service to solve an issue) or may take a broader view through several interactions (e.g. the decision to buy a new car may require an online search, a couple of visits to the dealer, a visit to the bank, etc.).

Why use Customer Journey Maps

There are many reasons why Customer Journey Maps are useful. They can help to:

• Understand those moments of truth that have a significant impact on the customer experience.
• Identify gaps in the user experience when moving through the steps in the journey, interacting with different channels and touchpoints, or switching departments. Is the customer experience consistent? Are transitions smooth? Are there any gaps to fill?
• Create alignment among the team (and stakeholders) on the current pain points and the desired experience.
• Identify touchpoints and interactions among different actors. For example, in the case of car-sharing service Uber, the customer and the driver go through different experiences, yet they interact at multiple steps in the journey. A Customer Journey Map that overlaps the two actors helps identify the interactions and the respective points of view.
• Expand your understanding of the product or service you provide, and identify new opportunities for added value.

Format of a Customer Journey Map

There is no official format for a Customer Journey Map. A search on Google reveals that almost everyone uses a different format. It’s not just a matter of graphical representation. A Customer Journey Map is specific to a business, a user context, a specific moment, and these make it unique. There are, however, common elements that guide the creation of a Journey Map and make it a great tool to understand the customer experience.

These common elements are represented in the template below. You can use it as a starting point for your Customer Journey Map, and you can expand it as needed.

Download the Customer Journey Map template below.

How to create a Customer Journey Map

The process of creating a Customer Journey Map starts with identifying the types of customers that use your product. You can then map out their experience through your product or service, identifying the activities they do and the emotional responses they have at each step of the journey.

User Persona

When building a Customer Journey Map, it is important to have clarity of who the “Customer” is. Rather than using a generic customer segment, use a specific User Persona. What actions, needs, and motivations are specific to this Persona?

You may have multiple User Personas, each one representing a different user type, with specific needs and activities. Create a Customer Journey Map for each of them to highlight different experiences with your product and identify possible intersections or gaps.

Describe the scenario or context of the customer interaction you want to map out. What is the situation? What are the goals and expectations of the customer?

Identify the touchpoints

Identify the touchpoints where the users interact with your product or service. A touchpoint is any point of interaction a user has with your business: a search page on the website, a checkout kiosk, a call to the customer service. These can be your current touchpoints if you are creating a Journey Map of the existing experience, or your future touchpoints if your product does not exist yet or you are planning an extension.

Steps of the journey

Every journey starts with the first step. To create a Journey Map, you need to identify the steps a user goes through in experiencing your product or service. The touchpoints identified above are a great start, but you may not want to stop there. You should highlight all the important steps the customers go through that are important in defining their experience. Some of these steps may be outside of your direct touchpoints: realizing they have a need, searching for information on Google, asking a passer-by for directions. By mapping these additional steps, you define the customer’s journey in more clarity, and identify additional points of interaction with your customer that are not yet represented by current touchpoints.

A useful approach to define your steps is to think about the possible “moments that matter” a user may go through from the initial understanding of a need, to the resolution of that need with your product or service. Think With Google defines these as micro-moments and organizes them in four categories.  Think about any of these “micro-moments” that are important for your customer’s experience and add them to your Journey Map.

Finally, the steps should be defined based on the customer’s point of view, not your internal business processes. Once you have identified the possible steps in your customer’s journey, sort them in linear progression. The usual approach is to place them on a horizontal line at the top of a whiteboard, leaving space below each step for the details of the Journey Map.

Mapping the journey

Once you have identified the steps in your customer’s journey, you are ready to complete the Journey Map. Write down the name of the User Persona whose journey you are mapping, and then work out one step at a time, identifying the following information:

• Goals and expectations: What is your User Persona’s intent at this step? What is it aiming to achieve? What does it need?
• Touchpoints: How does the User Persona interact with your product? What are the touchpoints at this step?
• Activities: What does the User Persona do at each step?
• Emotions: How does the User Persona feel at each step? What emotions does it show at each step? Is it happy, frustrated, curious, sad, excited?

The “DURING”, “PRE” and “POST” journeys

Typically, when building a Journey Map, we focus mainly on the core experience, the steps that customers go through while using the main features of our product or service (I call this the “DURING” phase). However, the user experience often starts before the actual interaction with the product or service, or it may extend past what the product offers. I call these the “PRE” and “POST” phases. They identify steps in your customer’s experience that take place before and after the core experience offered by your product. By looking at the “PRE” and “POST” experiences, you can identify other possible touchpoints and opportunities to extend your product for a richer and more satisfying experience.

For example, have you bought a car at a dealership recently? You may have noticed that it took less than an hour to choose the car, complete the paperwork, get approved for a loan, and walk out with the car keys. Most dealerships have streamlined this experience and removed most pain-points from the purchasing process. This is the “DURING” experience.

However, after you leave the store with your new car, you are on your own. This is the “POST” experience and for many companies, it is an afterthought. Instead, it could become an opportunity for a dealership to strengthen the relationship with the customer and keep them coming back. The dealership may offer service alerts, technical support, upgrades, and promotions for buying a newer model three years later. By exploring the customer journey in the “POST” purchase phase, the dealership may identify customer pain points that it could address. By doing this, it creates an expanded customer experience that drives retention and customer loyalty.

Web resources

There are many other resources on the web. For a few that could be useful to expand the topic, see here:

How to Create a Customer Journey Map

How to Market at Each Stage of the Buying Decision Process Customer Journeys: How to Keep Customers Connected and Coming Back Understanding the Customer Buying Cycle and Triggers The Smart Content Marketing Funnel: Matching Content Types to the Customer Buying Stage

(Thanks to Laura Gayle for suggesting a few of the links)

You can learn more about Customer Journey Maps and other product management tools in the book: Deliver Great Products That Customers Love .

• Yes, sign me up!

Customer journey map

This basic customer journey map template can help you:

• Visualize the journey a customer takes with a product or service.
• Map out different customer touchpoints.
• Collaborate with colleagues.

Open this template to view a detailed example of a basic customer journey map that you can customize to your use case.

Related templates

User story map with swimlanes.

Warehouse floor plan

Office layout by dept. and OS

User persona card

Free Customer Journey Map Templates

Create customer journey maps to analyze the purchase path of your customers with the templates and examples of the online editor edit.org.

Create a map to analyze, understand and communicate your customer's customer journey with editable online templates from Edit.org

What is a Customer Journey Map?

It is a visual scheme that serves to visualize the steps that your clients follow from when they discover your product or service until they are regular clients and even recommend it to other people.

It is very useful to see what contact points there are and therefore take them into account for possible analysis and improvement.

A Customer Journey Map consists of 3 very important initial phases (plus 2 other phases after the acquisition of your products or contracting your services):

• Awareness (discovery). It is the moment when the potential customers discovers the existence of your product or service, which solves their problem or responds to their need.
• Consideration. It is the phase in which the person evaluates and compares your proposal.
• Acquisition (decides to purchase or not). It is the stage where he buys your product or hire your service (or decides not to and you lose this sales opportunity).
• Service (experience) or consumption. The customer makes use or consumes what is purchased.
• Loyalty or Advocady (retention and recommendation). The consumer repeats his experience, he is a satisfied customer and also prescribes your products and services to others like him.

Create a Customer Journey to analyze the contact points with your customers

Would you like to improve the shopping experience of your customers? Creating a Customer Journey Map will help you to be more aware of how many points of interaction with your company there are in each phase, with the aim of optimizing, modifying, eliminating or taking the appropriate action, with the objective to improve sales or the customer or user experience (UX).

The visualization of this map is a representation of the touchpoints with your company, and can be positive or generate friction.

To register the customers feedback for each touchpoint of the map is very practical to detect areas for improvement.

Do you want to create your own Customer Journey? Use the templates of our graphic editor to create how many versions you need for your startup or business. We explain as below.

How to design an editable journey map

In a few minutes you can have your own personalized Customer Journey downloaded to your device.

Follow these steps:

• Click on any image in this article to enter the editor
• Select the Customer Journey Map template you want to edit
• Customize the touchpoints and its text fields
• Save changes online
• Download your free custom graphic in JPG, PNG or PDF

Use editable Customer Journey templates to improve your marketing

What is a Customer Journey Map for? The key to this diagram is that you can activate it, it is to decide, it is a reflection of reality and therefore you can do tests by modifying the contact points.

We recommend that you make a new version every time you make a change in your company. Measuring the results will let you know which version works best. For example, you can create satisfaction surveys, or measure the results of sales conversion or even the evaluation of the consumer experience and thus know if it is improving or not.

Enter now the online editor and create your personalized Customer Journey Map for your business.

See the designs

Diagramming Build diagrams of all kinds from flowcharts to floor plans with intuitive tools and templates.

Whiteboarding collaborate with your team on a seamless workspace no matter where they are., data generate diagrams from data and add data to shapes to enhance your existing visuals., enterprise friendly easy to administer and license your entire organization., security see how we keep your data safe., apps & integrations connect to all the tools you use from microsoft, google workspace, atlassian, and more..

• What's New Read about new features and updates.

Product Management Roadmap features, brainstorm, and report on development, so your team can ship features that users love.

Software engineering design and maintain complex systems collaboratively., information technology visualize system architecture, document processes, and communicate internal policies., sales close bigger deals with reproducible processes that lead to successful onboarding and training..

• Getting Started Learn how to make any type of visual with SmartDraw. Familiarize yourself with the UI, choosing templates, managing documents, and more.
• Templates get inspired by browsing examples and templates available in SmartDraw.

Diagrams Learn about all the types of diagrams you can create with SmartDraw.

Whiteboard learn how to combine free-form brainstorming with diagram blueprints all while collaborating with your team., data visualizers learn how to generate visuals like org charts and class diagrams from data., development platform browse built-in data visualizers and see how you can build your own custom visualization., open api the smartdraw api allows you to skip the drawing process and generate diagrams from data automatically., shape data add data to shapes, import data, export manifests, and create data rules to change dashboards that update..

• Explore SmartDraw Check out useful features that will make your life easier.
• Blog Read articles about best practices, find tips on collaborating, learn to give better presentations and more.

Support Search through SmartDraw's knowledge base, view frequently asked questions, or contact our support team.

Site license site licenses start as low as $2,995 for your entire organization..

• Team License The SmartDraw team License puts you in control with powerful administrative features.

Apps & Integrations Connect to all the tools you use.

• Contact Sales

What's New?

Solutions By Team

Save money, reduce hassle, and get more.

Unleash your team's productivity by combining enterprise-class diagramming, whiteboarding, and data while saving 10x over Visio and Lucidchart!

Getting Started Learn to make visuals, familiarize yourself with the UI, choosing templates, managing documents, and more.

Templates get inspired by browsing examples and templates available in smartdraw., developer resources, additional resources.

Team License The SmartDraw Team License puts you in control with powerful administrative features.

Solutions for your team.

Diagram Categories

• Kanban Board
• PI Planning Board

Customer Journey Map

• AWS Diagram
• Brainstorming
• Cause and Effect
• Charts and Gauges
• Decision Tree
• Emergency Planning
• Engineering
• Event Planning
• Family Trees
• Flyers and Certificates
• Infographic
• Network Design
• Organizational Chart
• Project Management
• Software Design
• Strategic Planning
• Venn Diagram

Make customer journey maps (CJM) like this one using our templates. You can map out every phase or milestone your customer may experience interacting with your brand from becoming aware you exist to purchasing or subscribing.

• Activity Diagram (UML)
• Amazon Web Services
• Android Mockups
• Block Diagram
• Business Process Management
• Chemical Chart
• Cisco Network Diagram
• Class Diagram (UML)
• Collaboration Diagram (UML)
• Compare & Contrast Diagram
• Component Diagram (UML)
• Concept Diagram
• Cycle Diagram
• Data Flow Diagram
• Data Flow Diagrams (YC)
• Database Diagram
• Deployment Diagram (UML)
• Entity Relationship Diagram
• Family Tree
• Fishbone / Ishikawa Diagram
• Gantt Chart
• Infographics
• iOS Mockups
• Network Diagram
• Object Diagram (UML)
• Object Process Model
• Organizational Chart
• Sequence Diagram (UML)
• Spider Diagram
• State Chart Diagram (UML)
• Story Board
• SWOT Diagram
• TQM - Total Quality Management
• Use Case Diagram (UML)
• Value Stream Mapping
• Venn Diagram
• Web Mockups
• Work Breakdown Structure

Customer Journey Map

A Customer Journey Map is an important tool used in marketing to identify touchpoints throughout the customer's experience. It provides insight into what customers are feeling and thinking throughout their journey, allowing marketers to better understand their needs and wants. By creating a personalized customer journey map, businesses can tailor their marketing efforts to provide personalized experiences across all touchpoints. This helps improve customer service, develop stronger customer relationships and drive sales. Customer Journey Maps provide marketers with valuable insights that empower them to create better campaigns and strategies.

You can easily edit this template using Creately. You can export it in multiple formats like JPEG, PNG and SVG and easily add it to Word documents, Powerpoint (PPT) presentations, Excel or any other documents. You can export it as a PDF for high-quality printouts.

• Flowchart Templates
• Org Chart Templates
• Concept Map Templates
• Mind Mapping Templates
• WBS Templates
• Family Tree Templates
• Network Diagram Templates
• SWOT Analysis Templates
• Genogram Templates
• Activity Diagram
• Class Diagram
• Collaboration Diagram
• Component Diagram
• Data Flow Diagrams(YC)
• Deployment Diagram
• Object Diagram
• Sequence Diagram
• State Chart Diagram
• Use Case Diagram

Related Templates