Steps to build a customer journey: mini-guide/cheat sheet

From ICP to MVP.

Step 1: Build your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile) and KPIs

You may already be well aware of the calibre of customer your product stands to serve, but it’s important to quantify this before you start building your customer journey.

This is called the ICP (Ideal Customer Profile), and it’ll serve as the blueprint for all the customer journey mapping you need to do. Not only that, your ICP will also be the primary point of reference for all lead generation efforts – even if hands change in your marketing team.

How to build an ICP (Ideal Customer Profile)

ICPs typically consist of the following fields:

• Job title – The official designation of your ideal customer. Most common for B2B products and services. E.g.: Head of IT.
• Job function – A list of roles as they relate to the job title. Note that job title and job function are two separate values, even though they are often misunderstood and used interchangeably. Also more relevant for B2B. E.g.: SOC oversight, risk management strategy, AI ethics governance.
• Industry – Relevant mainly for B2B.
• Age – Not always mandatory, but common for many B2C models such as FMCG and retail.
• Sex – Again, more common for B2C product models.
• Company size – An essential field for B2B, especially SaaS. But typically necessary for any product model that is tiered, or for B2B organisations that aim to target prospects who only meet a certain size requirement.
• Pain points – These may be all known pain points that a prospect may have, which your product can solve/relieve. E.g.: Excessive alerts and false positives, inability to triage alerts based on severity, over/under utilisation of resources.

The below fields will be appended to your ICP as blank fields. A real customer record will include fields filled out. While fields such as name and email address are typically agnostic, others may or may not be relevant, depending on the nature of your product and the industry you serve:

• First name
• Last name
• Phone number
• Email address
• Postal address
• Social media profiles

Ensure all the fields you need are available in your CRM. Want to be even more frugal? Use a simple spreadsheet. Whether you use Excel or Google Sheets, both will give you the option to build pivot tables that can help you identify and quantify trends. It’s simple, yet highly effective.

When you’re ready to scale over to a fully-fledged CRM, you’ll be better equipped with what you exactly need out of one, thereby helping you make the best software purchase decision.

Also read: The four harsh realities of lead generation

Step 2: Identify all your customer touch points, and build your CTAs

Note every single touch point that your customers have, in order to purchase your product or service.

A customer touch point has to be front-facing (so customers can access it) and require a CTA (guiding them on the next step they need to take).

For existing products, this is simpler as your team may be familiar with all possible touch points.

For new products, brainstorm all possible touch points, and make a note of them. While every entry way can usually be identified in the first go, it is likely that a new, unexpected touch point or two may unveil itself later on. This is perfectly normal; you’ll only learn more about your product as you go, no matter how many contingencies you plan for in the beginning.

As for CTAs, these should be succinct and straightforward. Correspond each of your CTAs (if there are multiple) with their appropriate touch points.

For e.g.:

1. To ‘Sign Up’ for a free trial, your website and mobile app will be the main (and likely only) touch points.
2. For enterprise-level inquiries i.e. ‘Know More’, every other touch point, such as phone, email and social media (including the website and app) would be relevant.

Jot these in a spreadsheet, as you’ll need it for the next step. Which brings us to:

Step 3: Create and test journey flows with your team

This is where it gets challenging, but also fun! Together with your team, note down a step-by-step flow for each touch point.

For example:

1. Land on example [dot] com/signup
   • Enter name and email address, click Sign Up
   • Display email verification link message
     • If verification succeeds, refresh page and show dashboard
     • If verification fails, display message + option to re-send link
2. After log in
   • If first log in after sign up, initiate tour
   • For successive logins, show where user last left off

If multiple CTAs exist per touch point, build a step-by-step workflow per CTA as well. You can build a simple list like the one shown above, or if you prefer, a flowchart on Miro, Confluence or other whiteboarding application.

Be sure to note every step, no matter how small. Per step, also address the following, and append feedback if necessary:

• Intent: Does this step signify what a user wants to do, and why?
• Staff: Who is responsible for this stage of the flow?
• Resources/infrastructure: What is needed at this step?
• Reporting: Which KPI does this step connect to? For instance, the feedback left in a post-interaction questionnaire affects the NPS for your product/service.
• Failovers: what happens in case team members or resources responsible for this step are unavailable, or there’s a malfunction?

Review and iterate your customer flows to make sure they are comprehensive. Once they are copacetic (to the best of your team’s knowledge), proceed to the next step.

Also read: The obsession with marketing – before doing any product development

Step 4: Launch small, preferably an MVP

By step 3 you would’ve realised just how extensive your customer journeys are. Many business leaders are surprised at the fact, especially as initial assumptions make many believe they are much simpler and shorter.

At this point, it’s reasonable to feel overwhelmed at the multitude of steps and flows in front of you, and the many components each of these steps require to function optimally.

While the journeys you’ve identified are optimal for your business, you don’t need to implement all of them in one fell swoop. Consider implementing them in phases for an easier and more efficient rollout.

Alternatively, you can also consider simplifying your existing flows. But be careful to not reduce too much, as that can risk your flows to break, or reach dead ends.

In other words, build a minimally viable customer journey that gives customers what they need, for a start. Once established, build more journeys that offer additional options to your customers, incrementally.

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