Understanding your Customer’s Journey is one of the most important aspects of running a successful Digital Marketing campaign. Every company will have a unique customer journey. The blueprint for the customer journey largely depends on a host of variables including, but not limited to; industry, product or service you’re selling, what digital marketing channel the customer is engaging your coming through, the content they’re interacting with, etc. The company’s brand and reputation also matters in your success. If a consumer is not aware of your brand, you’ll need to work harder to tell your story and create a UVP (unique value proposition).
We do not recommend running Digital Marketing ads unless you have the tools to measure your success and target the right audience. The best way you can do this is by creating a detailed customer journey map. To give it more context you should familiarize yourself with the 4 Ps of marketing. The four Ps of Marketing (Product, Price, Place & Promotion) are also known as the ‘Product Mix’. The product mix is a crucial tool in determining a product’s offering to the customer.
As you go through the exercise of mapping out your customer’s journey you’ll likely learn that each target audience, who are buying different products and services, at different price points and in multiple places or locations will need to see a different promotion. There are many differences between the customer journey online and in traditional Marketing channels like TV, Radio, Print, etc. The biggest advantage you have with the online world of consumers is that your message can reach them anywhere and anytime right on the palm of their hand. Below we’ve created a simple workflow or horizontal funnel illustration to help you pinpoint what you’re doing to reach your prospects and customers at each step of the journey. If you’re an existing business you’ll want to start by looking at your current customer database. Study the demographics and psychographics and apply the data to each phase.
Awareness
Do people know about your business? Facebook and Google My Business are often the first touchpoint a customer has with your business: over 50% of customers say they use social media to research and discover new products. Easily engage with your current customers and make connections with new followers by frequent social posting.
Findability
Do customers find your business where they are searching? When 88% of consumers who do a local search visit or call a business within a day, you need to be found and accurate across high-traffic sources. 46% of all searches are for local information. Having accurate and up-to-date contact info, hours of operation, and more online ensures that customers find your business first. Are you engaging with your customers across the social media sites?
Reputation
Do consumers trust your business? A positive online reputation is often what makes a consumer choose one business over another. In fact, 95% of consumers use online reviews to make purchase decisions. Monitor and respond to your reviews to rank above the competition and drive more business to your door.
Conversion
Can people easily contact you or buy online? Are your landing pages optimized for phone calls or form inquiries? When mobile visitors search for your business, they’re usually looking for key information: location, store hours, phone numbers and product information. Your website needs that information, and should be easy to find and navigate.
Advocacy
Do your customers recommend you to others? 95% of people read reviews before making a purchase decision. Improve the online reviews your potential customers read by asking for reviews from your happy customers. They’ll boost your star rating and drive more sales! Getting referrals from your clients is one of the best ways to lower your cost per acquisition. In my experience, referrals will typically turn into a “lay down” sale, which basically means they’ll convert much higher and faster than a stranger.
Why is it important to understand your Customer Journey?
Understanding your customer’s journey is important because it is a strategic approach to better understanding customer expectations and for optimizing the customer experience. There are a number of benefits to mapping out the customer journey such as:
- Enhance the Customer onboarding process
- Compare the customer experience you’re delivering against what the customer actually received
- Learn the differences in buyer personas from when they’re a prospect to customer
- Understanding the workflow and touchpoints in your buyer’s journey
What tools can I use to learn more about my Customer Journey?
- SEM Rush offers a suite of Digital Marketing tools on the cloud. The tools are affordable and easy to use. The tool offers features that will enhance your Keyword Analysis, Traffic Journey’s and more.
- The Business Model Canvas, a tool created by Stratygizer and used by Business programs like the Jim Moran Institute
- OCMP (Online Certified Marketing Professional) is a nonprofit organization in the digital marketing industry. They offer a number of courses and partnerships with the top digital marketing agencies and marketers in the world
As you go through your funnel, another tool or framework you can use to enhance your Customer Journey is called Design Thinking. Our CEO, Alex Oliveira, has done a lot of research into Design Thinking. The team at Prediq regularly uses this framework to improve the Customer Journey by introducing empathy to the customer experience and service, as well as innovation across every touchpoint. Alex was featured on the Lead Generation World Podcast to discuss how we use Design Thinking in our Online Lead Generation campaigns.
How do you create Content that integrates with the Customer Journey?
As a member of the Boca Chamber of Commerce, our team at Prediq works with the Tech Committee to organize workshops that will help Small Businesses increase their knowledge of all things related to Technology, Digital Marketing and Sales. In this Zoom session we discussed “How To Create Effective Website Content.” We broke it up into 4 sections.
1) Preparation Checklist
We touched on the importance of conducting a website audit, having a consistent brand message, choosing the right CMS (content management system) like WordPress, Joomla, Wix, SquareSpace, Drupal and others, finding the right hosting plan for your website like GoDaddy, Siteground, WP Engine and others, Website compliance elements like ADA, Privacy Policy, Forms, having a Sitemap and more. Here are some website stats you may want to learn more about http://blog.prediqmedia.com/55-stellar-statistics-for-websites/
2) Content Strategies
We discussed the differences between Owned Media, Paid Media, Shared Media and Earned Media. The difference between Information Content VS Purposeful Content. What type or format of content do your prospects and customers want to consume? We covered the importance of secret shopping and customer journey on the website. Would a live chat agent help you generate more business? Could you learn more about your customers by conducting a survey using Survey Monkey? The importance of creating Landing Pages. We went through the main elements of a Landing Page like the Heading, Form, Call To Action, Image and layout. For Keyword Research we recommended tools like SEM Rush, Keyword.io, ahrefs and others. We touched on the importance of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and what some of the ranking indicators are such as backlinks, speed and content. We also covered the importance of Reviews across the search engines. We provided Content Creation resources like Upwork, Canva, 99 Designs, Wave.video, LinkedIn ProFinder and Textbroker. Next we discussed the Blog Game Plan. Before you embark on writing a blog ask yourself questions like. -Who Are You Writing For? -Who is your Target Audience? -Utilize Google Analytics & Facebook Insights What Kind of Post Are You Writing? -How-To Post -List-Based Post -Curated Collection Post -SlideShare Presentation Post -Newsjacking Post Begin with a Topic & a Working Title (Google prefers 65 characters) -Write an Intro -First, grab the reader’s attention. -Describe the purpose of the post and explain how it will address a problem the reader may be having. -Organize the info so readers are not intimidated by the length or amount of content -Edit/proofread your post, and fix your formatting. -Image – Make sure you choose a visually appealing and relevant image for your post. -Tags are specific, public-facing keywords that describe a post. Think of tags as “topics” or “categories,” and choose 10-20 tags that represent all the main topics you want to cover on your blog. -CTA- At the end of every blog post, you should have a CTA that indicates what you want the reader to do next — subscribe to your blog, download an ebook, register for a webinar or event, read a related article, etc. -Meta Description- They are ideally between 150-160 characters and start with a verb, such as “Learn,” “Read,” or “Discover. -Page Title and Headers -Anchor text is the word or words that link to another page — either on your website or on another website. Tips on how to improve keyword research http://blog.prediqmedia.com/3-seo-tips-to-improve-your-keyword-research/
3) Measure & Analyze
We covered the importance of measuring the data and results of your Website and Marketing campaigns. Google Analytics is the tool of choice for Small Businesses. Benefits of using the tool include getting to know your website user’s flow or customer journey. We covered the Demographics and Psychographic data points such as Audience, Acquisition channels like Organic, Paid, Social Media and other traffic sources. Behavior flow like what pages the user visited and for how long. We didn’t get a chance to cover Conversion, but this is an important element if Leads and Sales are important to your business. Ultimately, businesses want to know 3 main points of data about their website. How do visitors find my website? Am I creating effective content? How does this impact my bottom line? Here’s how you can learn more about Google Analytics http://blog.prediqmedia.com/google-analytics/
4) Free Tools
In this last section we provided links to free tools that will help you learn more about pageload speed, website security, site performance issues with Google Search Console and Google My Business for your local search results. https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/feature/testmysite/ https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/ https://www.digicert.com/help/
We hope you found our lesson on Customer Journey to be simple, but powerful. Ultimately, the only way to grow your business is to better understand your customers and prospects so that you can better customize their experiences. If you do that you’ll increase the LTV (lifetime value) of each customer and scale your business along the way. Happy growing!
To schedule a free consultation with one of our Digital Marketing or Online Lead Generation experts, call 561-464-6822. You may also decide to try our Marketing software for Free for 30 days. To sign up fill out the form below. You’ll also receive a Free Website Audit.
If you’re looking to learn more about Digital Marketing and Online Lead Generation, join our team for our weekly Webinar Series.
