Working on a Customer Journey from design to execution requires a structured and strategic approach. The design process can be divided into two main approaches: static and dynamic.
The first four phases are analytical and deliberate, focusing on observing, mapping, and understanding current interactions. This diagnostic stage identifies key pain points and gathers essential data.
The last four phases are more action-oriented, addressing issues, implementing improvements, and refining processes. Here, the company shifts from describing the current state to actively transforming the customer experience, continuously evaluating and iterating.
What is the static and dynamic approach to the customer journey?
The customer journey combines two approaches. The static approach maps and analyzes the present: defining goals, collecting data, mapping the journey, and pinpointing critical touchpoints. The dynamic approach then drives change: designing solutions, executing, monitoring, and iterating. Analysis first, transformation second.
Customer Journey: The 4 Phases of the Static Approach
This combination of static analysis and dynamic action ensures a comprehensive approach that not only helps understand the present but also builds the future of customer experience. Let’s break it down…
1. Defining Goals and Scope
- What to do: Identify the purpose of the customer journey work. For example: Do we want to reduce the time needed to resolve complaints? Improve technical support for customers requiring specific product guidance?
- Example: A medical devices company notices purchasing managers face weeks-long delays in receiving clear invoices. They decide to simplify this process as the main objective. Or consider a tennis academy seeking to enhance registration for youth tournaments, as parents find the current process confusing.
- Focus on expectations: Purchasing managers expect timely, error-free invoices. Any delay or mistake creates frustration. Similarly, parents expect an intuitive and quick process for registering their children, without hassle or wasted time.
2. Data Collection and Understanding the Customer
- What to do: Research what customers think, feel, and expect at every interaction. This involves direct interviews, surveys, and analysis of existing data.
- Example: Concert attendees value timely, clear notifications about schedule or venue changes. They might also appreciate knowing the location and offerings of refreshment stands (in larger venues) and receiving recommendations about the best times to avoid crowds—now that’s a winning solution!
- Focus on expectations: Customers expect immediate, clear responses to their questions, as their time is limited and valuable.
3. Mapping the Customer Journey
- What to do: Create a visual map of the stages a customer goes through to achieve their goals, such as filing a complaint or scheduling technical maintenance.
- Example: A map reveals that customers must go through four departments to get technical assistance, something they find confusing. In the pet care sector, a customer looking to enroll their dog in a health plan may face multiple steps, like choosing a plan, filling out forms, and confirming registration.
- Focus on expectations: Customers expect a smooth, frictionless experience regardless of the company’s internal divisions, just as they expect clear steps and trust in the care provided to their pet.
4. Critical Touchpoint Analysis
- What to do: Identify touchpoints where customers feel frustrated or where interactions fail (or exceed) expectations. Does it meet customer expectations? Does it exceed expectations, or fall short?
- Example: Gyms often lack transparency around membership cancellation processes. Beyond legitimate retention efforts, users expect clear information about the procedures and channels for cancellation.
- Focus on expectations: Providing easy access to this information reduces friction, allowing the process to be completed (retaining a customer is one thing, but holding them captive against their will is another).
Customer Journey: The 4 Phases of the Dynamic Approach
From this point forward, we shift to a dynamic approach, working through four key steps.
5. Designing Solutions
- What to do: Develop specific improvements to address the identified critical points, implement technologies or tools to simplify processes and train teams to optimize customer service.
- Example: Create a self-service portal where customers can instantly download invoices in PDF format or file claims with automated tracking.
- Focus on expectations: Do these solutions align with the customer’s mental framework, which demands autonomy and speed?
6. Execution
- What to do: Implement the solutions and train the responsible teams.
- Example (pet care sector): Launch a live chat feature on a veterinary clinic’s website to answer questions about vaccinations and basic care.
- Focus on expectations: Providing agile and clear responses builds undeniable trust and security for the customer. Any improvement enhances customer satisfaction… remember, unmet expectations can open the door to competitors.
7. Monitoring and Evaluation
- What to do: Measure the outcomes of the implemented changes using key metrics such as Net Promoter Score (NPS), problem resolution time, or customer satisfaction (CSAT).
- Example (sports sector): A football club introduces a digital membership and measures increased subscriber retention after simplifying the renewal process.
- Focus on expectations: Ensure the experience is straightforward and aligned with user needs by consistently objectifying the customer’s perceived experience. This underscores the need for tools like NPS. Continuously gathering feedback is essential for adjustments and to keep the proposal aligned with customer expectations.
8. Iteration and Continuous Improvement
The customer journey is not static. Customer needs and expectations evolve, making it essential to review and update the journey regularly. Measuring the impact of improvements with tools like CSAT or NPS is highly recommended. It is also necessary to incorporate new technologies or approaches based on lessons learned.
The map below covers all eight phases of the process, distinguishing the static approach (observation and analysis) from the dynamic one (design and action). Click on each phase to explore its content.
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Identify the purpose of the Customer Journey work: what problem are we solving? Reducing complaint resolution times, improving technical support, simplifying the sign-up process?
A medical device company discovers that purchasing managers wait weeks to receive accurate invoices and decides to focus on streamlining that process. A tennis academy wants to simplify tournament registration for parents who find the current process confusing.
Customers expect speed and accuracy. Any delay opens the door to frustration — and to the competition.
Research what the customer thinks, feels and expects at each interaction. Interviews, surveys and analysis of existing data are the key tools.
Concert attendees value timely, clear notifications about schedule or venue changes. Adding information about food options, crowd levels or the best time to arrive can become a meaningful differentiator.
The customer expects immediate, clear answers. Their time is limited and valuable — every friction point in the information flow erodes trust.
Visually represent the stages the customer goes through to achieve their goals, identifying each touchpoint and the internal divisions involved along the way.
A map reveals that customers must navigate four separate departments to get technical support. In the petcare sector, signing up for a pet health plan involves choosing a plan, filling out a form and confirming registration as separate steps.
The customer expects a smooth, frictionless experience — regardless of how the company is organised internally.
Identify the touchpoints where the customer experiences frustration, or where interactions fall below (or exceed) their expectations.
Gyms often lack transparency around cancellation processes. Beyond legitimate retention efforts, customers need clear information about how and where they can exercise their right to leave.
There is a clear difference between retaining a customer and holding them captive. Reducing friction around information builds long-term trust.
Design specific improvements to address the critical touchpoints identified: implement technologies that simplify processes and train teams to optimise customer service.
Deploy a self-service portal where customers can download PDF invoices in real time or submit complaints with automated tracking.
Do the solutions meet the customer's mental model — one that values autonomy and speed? The answer to that question should drive every design decision.
Implement the designed solutions and train the teams responsible for operating the new processes.
A veterinary clinic introduces a live chat feature on its website to answer questions about vaccines and basic care, eliminating unnecessary calls and reducing waiting times.
Responding quickly and clearly builds confidence. Any unmet expectation is an open door to the competition.
Measure the results of implemented changes using key metrics: NPS, issue resolution time, customer satisfaction and conversion rates at each stage.
A football club introduces a digital membership and measures the increase in season ticket renewal rates after simplifying the renewal process, linking the improvement directly to the journey change.
Metrics must connect to the customer's original expectations. If the goal was speed, resolution time is the priority metric — not ticket volume.
Use monitoring insights to refine implemented solutions, close newly detected gaps and update the journey map as customer behaviour evolves.
An e-commerce platform detects through NPS that the returns process is still perceived as slow and redesigns the reverse logistics flow based on feedback accumulated across previous iterations.
Customer expectations are not static. Continuous improvement is not a destination — it is the mechanism that keeps the journey relevant over time.
Conclusion
Understanding and optimizing the Customer Journey is a powerful way to improve how businesses interact with their customers. By carefully balancing a static analysis of what currently exists with a dynamic approach focused on transformation, companies could create impactful experiences that not only meet but also exceed customer expectations.
These efforts are not merely about technology or tools. Instead, they are about empathy, precision, and adaptability in responding to customer needs.
Collaboration is key: Working on the customer journey requires teamwork across departments like marketing, sales, customer service, and operations.
The focus must always remain on the customer, but it’s surprisingly easy for the analysis to be skewed by biases and pre-existing beliefs.
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