THE ASK

The Office of Customer Management (OCM) within a large auto manufacturer wanted to define a strategy to manage customer communication touchpoints in order to optimize communication effectiveness and strengthen customers' connection to their brand.

Main Objectives

• Deepen the OCM's understanding of customers' touchpoint interactions, preferences, and needs to guide enterprise customer communications strategy and roadmap

• Research and document the end-end customer journeys for each applicable business segment covering the vehicle ownership lifecycle

• Create current state journey maps to identify the key moments that mater, interactions, touchpoints, pain points, and opportunites for improvement and innovation

• Create future state journeys which reimagines the customer buying experience and their vehicle ownership journey

CURRENT CHALLENGES

Touchpoint candence is determined by each line of business without awareness of similar communications deployed by other LOB, dealers or marketing campaigns

Lacking insight into customer's preferences for certain key communication touchpoints during their shopping experience vs their vehicle ownership journey

Limited understanding of customer needs, wants and "moment of truth" experiences across the end-to-end vehicle ownership lifecycle

Undefined enterprise strategic communications program to align customer touchpoints and reduce redundant communications across the Lines of Business

Project Approach

Conduct activities to frame and shape the customer touchpoint journey map which provides and end to end customer journey with actionable outcomes to improve strategic communications with customers and their brand experience. 

ALIGN

Conduct stakeholder interviews (n=12) with business lines to understand breadth of current communications, cadence challenges, success metrics and align on project expectations

Review existing communication samples, brand and voice styleguides, business line specific touchpoint maps and calendars 

Prepare for qualitative and quantitative research activities in collaboration with third party research vendor and cross-departmental leaders  

RESEARCH

Define baseline journey map by gathering insights through:
- moderated message boards (n=53)*
- customer focus groups (n=24)*
Sessions conducted with customers categorized by stages of vehicle ownership

Conduct customer workshops  (n=27) to gather qualitative feedback on baseline journey maps

Gather quatitative data through an online survey (n=1,795) to confirm insights and feedback gathered from customer workshops, message boards and focus group activities 

EXPLORE

Define the journey map framework which will illustrate the customer touchpoint experience mapped against qual + quant data gathered from the research

Explore and document future state vehicle ownership experience based on current state journey map

Review draft of journey maps with lines of business teams (7) to gather feedback in order to ensure the maps clearly communicated the insights and actionable opportunities

DEFINE

Define synthesised themes of the customer touchpoint experience based on the research

Identify and integrate metrics which measure the impact of current communications across omni-channel touchpoints of the customers vehicle ownership journey

Develop and present final touchpoint journey maps, insights and recommendations report to executives

* These activities were conducted by a third party vendor. We observed and analyzed the data from these research activities to define the touchpoint journey map framework.

Customer Journey Workshops

Based on the insights gathered from the moderated message boards and customer focus groups, we developed an inital touchpoint journey map of the end to end vehicle shopping and ownership experience. These maps were used in customer workshops to confirm the steps in each stage of the journey and identify touchpoints of most vs least value and effect to customers.

Methodology

• 27 participants recruited for journey mapping workshops
• Each workshop consisted of 4 to 7 participants, from a specific stage in the vehicle ownership journey
• Every step in the journey map allowed a participant to indicate (within their respective assigned participant ID) whether they had or had not completed that step
• Participants were also provided with limited voting stickers to indicate whether they were annoyed, disappointed or delighted by the touchpoint within that step.
• Towards the end of each workshop we conducted a roundtable allowing customers to share their stories behind their votes and why they did or did not complete a step in the journey.

Outcomes

• Confirmed most frequent and important steps in each stage of the journey
• Deepend our understanding of customers' perspective of their vehicle shopping and ownership journey
• Identified touchpoints of most vs least valuable and effective to customers
• Learn why customers consider certain touchpoints least valuable and effective
• Reduce list of impactful touchpoints from 200+ to 85 based on customers touchpoint rating and interaction feedback in the workshops

Online Survey

Conducted a survey to gather quantitative customer feedback on communication touchpoint preferences, needs, and interactions. The data from the survey was triangulated with qualitative research gathered from the message boards, focus group and customer journey map workshops. Complilation of qual and quant research data, increased stakeholder confidence in the touchpoint insights and actionable opportunities

Methodology

• An online survey was emailed to existing customers
  (primary vehicle owners)
  
• Survey was available to customers for 10 business days
• 1,795 customers completed the 20 min online survey
  
• Respondants were incentivized by a sweepstakes drawing for one of four $200 Visa gift cards which they were automatically entered into upon completion of the survey

Outcomes

• Identified four themes which formed the framework for strategically grouping opportunites for improvement, customer touchpoint sentiment and ratings

• Customer rating and sentiment data analysis provided insights into ranking of most vs least valued and effective touchpoint within each vehicle ownership stage

• Identified baseline metrics of current customer touchpoint experiences to enable continous measurement of the touchpoints as strategic initiatives are implemented
  

Ranking of most valued and effective touchpoints desired in a single app (3+ yr vehicle owner)

CX Touchpoint Journey Maps

The visualization of the the customer touchpoint journey map illustrated the customers phases of their journey from research through purchase into actual vehicle ownership.
Customer sentiment provided by average rating of each touchpoint with actual customer quotes deepen the client's understanding of their customer's experience.
Line of Business were displayed for each touchpoint to identify ownship which allowed each LOB to quickly scan and understand where their communications were or were not adding value.

Through iterative reviews of the touchpoint journey maps with the project sponsors and lines of businesses we were able to refine the opportunities for improvement and supporting content. Our final Journey maps were printed out and displayed in a shared lounge area to socialize the maps and increase awarenss of the strategic direction of the customer communications throughout the organization..

Insights Executive Report

Synthesis of insights and actionable outcomes were pulled into an executive summary to be presented to C-Level executives.

CX touchpoint journey map overview

Simplifed map highlighted key customer needs within each stage of their journey.

Each key finding had supporting details within the report to provide context and actionable recommendations for the touchpoint improvement

OUTCOMES

Indentified 60+ actionable recommendations covering end-to-end touchpoint experience

Stakeholder alignment on the first formalized ‘Outside-in’ perspective at the organization

Evidence based support for investment in specific customer experience touchpoints

Benchmark data for participation and satisfaction with 85 touchpoints along the end-to-end customer lifecycle

Increased awareness of customer need for a single unified mobile app and single unified website

Client immediately switched from automatic to opt-in on loyalty program –within 3 weeks of report