Marketers and fortune tellers have a lot in frequent. Stick with us for a second right here. They each take bits of details about prospects—who they’re, what merchandise they like, what content material they’re consuming—to information them on a journey trying into their very own future.
Ok, perhaps that’s a little bit of a stretch, however when entrepreneurs are within the lifecycle mapping course of, there is a component of prediction primarily based on a logical development by means of occasions. Human nature is ever-changing, but it surely’s not so spontaneous that entrepreneurs can’t plan out lifecycle phases properly upfront.
Predictions aren’t at all times fulfilled although. Sometimes, the shopper makes a resolution that goes towards the prescribed lifecycle.
What then?
The Map vs. the Journey
The distinction between the shopper lifecycle map and the shopper journey lies within the perspective. Customer lifecycle maps are set by advertising and gross sales groups to present the best path for purchasers to work together with the model.
The buyer journey, alternatively, comes from the shopper’s actions and interactions with the model. Put one other manner, it’s how your model and merchandise match into the shopper’s life.
Understanding this vital shift in perspective permits you to discover the frequent floor to construct the best buyer expertise.
“But how?!” you scream into the void.
Charting the Path to Personalization
By now, you’re probably accustomed to the Core 4 pillars of personalization:
- User Segmentation
- Lifecycle Mapping
- Workflow Building
- Dynamic Content
In September, we acquired you began on the trail to personalization with the Personalization Playbook on User Segmentation. We additionally gave you a useful device to check your personalization preparedness with our Personalization Maturity Model.
Now, we’re excited to take the subsequent step with an in-depth have a look at the subsequent pillar: Lifecycle Mapping.
Introducing Our Lifecycle Mapping Personalization Playbook
In our Personalization Playbook on Lifecycle Mapping, we set the stage by defining what precisely lifecycle mapping is and the way it is best to start approaching your lifecycle advertising methods. From there, we spotlight the 4 key steps you want to take to create the best buyer journey in your model.
Download the total playbook right here, and hold studying for a sneak preview of what’s in retailer!
The Four Steps to Creating a Customer Journey
While entrepreneurs can definitely depend on tried-and-true buyer analysis strategies like personas or Jobs-to-Be-Done to create their buyer map, one other methodology you should utilize adapts Donald Miller’s framework from his best-selling guide, Building a StoryBrand.
The framework accommodates 4 steps, which embrace:
- Define the character
- Search for the battle
- Position your model because the “guide with a plan”
- Call the shopper to motion
To make it straightforward for you to comply with alongside, we’ll be utilizing the persona of a 30-year-old feminine buyer contemplating the acquisition of a health subscription service from Fiit, an Iterable buyer. Let’s name her Alli.
Step 1: Define the Customer
To begin the method of constructing a buyer journey map, decide who it’s that you simply’re attempting to attain.
While it’s tempting to concentrate on consumer segments like gender, lifecycle stage or the final time they visited your web site, now’s the time to construct out a person buyer profile, utilizing workouts like persona building or our 4 steps to constructing your model’s good viewers to information you thru the method.
Once you’ve decided who that particular person buyer is, then you should utilize it to construct a story round their present desires and wishes, because it relates to your model’s services or products.
So within the case of Alli, our 30-year-old feminine buyer, she has no challenge with paying for a boutique fitness center membership, as she likes the number of group exercises they provide. However, she’s been lacking the routine of going to the fitness center and figuring out with others because the COVID-19 pandemic started.
What we described above is what writer Donald Miller refers to as a story hole, which is an unanswered query or need that a model can fulfill for the person buyer. He states that story gaps are vital as a result of:
“When we don’t open a story gap in our customers’ minds, they have no motivation to engage us because there is no question that demands resolution. Defining something our customer wants and featuring it in [your brand’s] marketing materials will open a gap.”
Of course, what your particular person buyer wishes could also be completely different from our instance, however whatever the completely different desires and desires of your prospects, the aim is to shrink the story hole for a extra outlined path ahead.
This is simply a sneak peek of what’s within the full playbook. Download to study the opposite 3 steps you want to take to combine the shopper journey along with your model’s lifecycle map and see how Iterable prospects have used these ways to adapt to altering instances.
Lifecycle Mapping Brought to Life
A buyer’s journey doesn’t at all times run the gamut from consumer enroll throughout the tip of their time along with your model. Countless mini journeys happen all through a buyer’s lifetime of interactions along with your merchandise and advertising.
It’s not so simple as shifting from discovery and consciousness to buy. Sometimes customers will begin with the acquisition! Customers discover other ways to enter your lifecycle at varied phases, so it’s vital to have a technique and mini journey arrange for each risk.
In this fast video, Iterable options marketing consultant Katie Barends illustrates how to body your considering when mapping your lifecycle journey to account for these mini journeys and completely different entry factors. Katie walks you thru a framework to use when figuring out these entry factors and she or he demonstrates how to put this into motion at present with Iterable.
Lifecycle mapping is integral to constructing long-term relationships with prospects. By accounting for the varied methods by which prospects can work together along with your model, you’re establishing a extra customized expertise that caters to their wants, desires and preferences.
Download the total playbook to learn the way to construct a buyer journey that engages and retains your viewers for all times.
