Understanding the Customer Journey in Real Organisations with Neil Wilkins
How customer journeys work in practice, and how marketers can connect touch-points, experience and performance
Reflection: Think of a recent purchase or service experience. What were the key moments that shaped your view of that organisation?
Why this matters
Customer journeys are rarely tidy in real organisations
People move across channels, devices, departments and moments of need
McKinsey notes that customer experience is about everything an organisation does to put customers first, managing journeys and serving needs across interactions.
Key point: Marketing is not just communication placed along a funnel. It is part of a wider lived experience.
Session aims
By the end of this session, you should be able to:
Understand what a customer journey is in practice
Map a simple journey using real touch-points
Recognise where marketing influences customer experience
Identify pain points and moments that matter
Link journey insight to better marketing decisions
What a customer journey is
A visualisation of the process a person goes through in order to accomplish a goal.
In simple terms, a customer journey is what:
The customer is trying to do;
Steps they take;
Touch-points they encounter;
They think and feel
; Helps or hinders progress
Reflection: Are you currently looking at the journey from the customer’s point of view, or the organisation’s process view?
Journey theory in simple form
A practical journey lens often includes:
Stages –
Actions –
Touch-points –
Thoughts and feelings
– Pain points
– Moments of truth
The journey mapping starts with actions in sequence and is then enriched with thoughts and emotions to create a narrative.
Key point: A journey is not just what the company sends. It is what the customer experiences.
The difference between funnel and journey
A funnel is mainly the organisation’s view of movement towards conversion
A journey is the customer’s view of trying to achieve something
Funnels are useful for measurement
Journeys are useful for understanding experience
Key point: In real organisations, both matter. Marketers need the commercial discipline of the funnel and the empathy of the journey
“A journey map is a visualisation of the process that a person goes through in order to accomplish a goal.” Nielsen Norman Group.
Why this matters: The goal is central and good journey work begins with what the customer is trying to achieve, not what the business wants to push
Real organisations are cross-functional
Customer journeys often cut across:
Marketing –
Sales
– Customer service –
Operations
– Digital teams
– Physical locations
– Third-party platforms
Key point: The customer sees one journey, even when the organisation is split into many teams.
Touch-points in practice
Touch-points are any points of contact between customer and organisation
Examples include: Search results; Social posts; Website pages; Email messages; Phone calls; Sales conversations; Reviews; In-store experience; Onboarding emails; Invoices; Customer support
Reflection: Which touch- points in your organisation are clearly owned, and which tend to fall between teams?
Moments that matter
Not every touchpoint carries equal weight
. Some moments shape trust, confidence or frustration much more strongly
Examples:
First enquiry response
; Checkout or application form;
Delivery or onboarding
; Complaint handling
; Renewal or repeat purchase moment
McKinsey’s work on omnichannel experience stresses the importance of creating compelling journeys across channels rather than treating each interaction in isolation.
Key point: One weak moment can damage a strong campaign.
A practical model: stages of a journey
A simple journey structure:
Need recognition
– Research –
Consideration –
Decision
– Purchase or sign-up –
Onboarding or first use –
Support or service
– Loyalty or advocacy
Reflection: Where is marketing most active in this journey, and where is it less visible but still influential?
Case example: Retail
A customer wants new running shoes
Journey example:
Sees a social ad –
Searches for reviews
– Visits website –
Checks stock and delivery
– Buys on mobile
– Receives confirmation email
– Gets delivery updates –
Leaves review
Marketing role:
Creative message;
Retargeting
; Product page content
; Email reassurance
; Post-purchase follow-up
Customer experience lesson: The campaign may work, but a poor mobile checkout or unclear delivery promise can still lose the sale
Case example: Higher Education
A prospective student wants to apply for a course
Journey example:
Searches online
– Finds course page
– Downloads prospectus
– Attends open day
– Asks questions
– Submits application –
Receives updates
– Joins and enrols
Marketing role:
Search visibility;
Content clarity
; Event communications
; Email nurturing
; Expectation setting
Customer experience lesson: Marketing is not just about attracting the enquiry. It also shapes confidence throughout the decision process
Case example: B2B
A buyer is looking for a new software or industrial solution
Journey example:
Problem emerges internally –
Research begins –
Supplier shortlist created
– Demo requested –
Internal stakeholders consulted –
Commercial proposal reviewed
– Decision made –
Onboarding begins
Marketing role:
Thought leadership;
Case studies;
Website proof points
; Email nurture;
Sales enablement content
Key point: In B2B, journeys are often longer, involve multiple stakeholders, and depend heavily on reassurance and proof
Case example: Healthcare or Service Sector
A patient or client wants support quickly
Journey example:
Searches symptoms or services
– Reads reviews
– Checks availability
– Calls or books online –
Attends appointment
– Receives follow-up
– Returns if experience was good
Customer experience lesson:
Trust, clarity and speed often matter more than clever promotion
Reflection: What matters most in high-trust categories like healthcare, education or finance?
Journey mapping in practice
A basic journey map can include five columns:
Stage –
Customer action
– Touchpoint
– Thought or feeling
– Opportunity to improve
Nielsen Norman Group notes that journey maps combine storytelling and visualisation to help teams understand and address customer needs.
Key point: A useful journey map should help a team act, not just decorate a workshop wall.
From journey map to service blueprint
Journey maps show the customer experience
Service blueprints add what the organisation must do behind the scenes
Nielsen Norman Group describes service blueprints as diagrams showing the relationships between people, processes and evidence tied to touch-points in a customer journey.
This helps apprentices understand why:
A customer issue is often a process issue;
Customer experience is not owned by marketing alone;
Internal collaboration matters
Common journey problems in real organisations
Typical issues include: Inconsistent messaging across channels
; Slow follow-up
; Poor handover between marketing and sales
; Too many steps
; Weak mobile experience
; Confusing information;
Lack of ownership;
Good campaigns undermined by poor service delivery
McKinsey’s omnichannel work highlights the need to streamline journeys across channels because complexity and fragmentation damage experience.
How marketing links to customer experience
Marketing influences experience through:
Expectation setting;
Tone of voice;
Content clarity;
Channel choice
; Personalisation;
Timing;
Trust signals;
Follow-up and reassurance
Adobe’s customer journey analytics materials reflect how organisations increasingly analyse cross-channel data to understand full journeys rather than single-channel activity.
Key point: Marketing activity should support the journey the customer is actually taking, not just the campaign plan the organisation prefers.
Practical tips
Start with one real customer goal
– Map what actually happens, not what should happen –
Use evidence from websites, emails, calls, reviews and colleagues –
Look for friction, delay and confusion
– Notice emotional moments as well as actions –
Ask who owns each touchpoint
– Identify one or two improvements that marketing can influence first
Reflection: If you mapped one journey this week, which one would teach you the most?
Key takeaways
Customer journeys in real organisations are messy, cross-functional and shaped by many touch-points –
Marketing plays an important role, but not the only role –
The more clearly you can map the real journey, the better you can improve experience, communication and commercial results
Reflection: What is one part of your customer journey that would benefit most from being properly mapped?
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