Tracking the Customer Journey: How and Why You Should be Doing it.

Most companies track individual communications with their potential customers, but not many track the path those customers take. The journey your customers go through from first contact to a completed sale holds valuable information that could help your marketing and sales.?

Capturing this data in a way that?your entire team can easily access is essential to getting the most out of your customer’s journey. In this article, we will explore what exactly a customer journey is, how and why you should be tracking it, and how your business can best leverage this information.?

What is the customer journey??

A journey is the act of travelling from one place to another, and the customer journey is no different. It is how your customers and leads “travel” through your communications. Did they start by signing up for a newsletter, then attend a webinar before finally making a purchase through a follow-up email? Or did they attend a trade show and talk with your team, then call in to schedule a meeting with sales? ?

The customer journey is more than the individual touchpoints, but the aggregate path they take. Understanding this journey in its entirety allows you to gain a deeper understanding of your customer interactions and behaviors and evolve your business to meet rising customer needs.?

Get deeper insights into deals.

One of the greatest benefits of tracking journeys through your CRM is that you can know more than just if a deal was won or lost, you also know why. You can see exactly where things started to shift one way or the other, what factors contributed to that outcome, and what you can do differently in the future. One important metric that isn’t often tracked is a customer’s first touch source: how they first discovered you.??

From a tactical standpoint, you may want to interact with customers differently based on how they found you. For example, the person who?signed up for a newsletter might warrant a more introductory message than the person who had a lengthy talk with your team at a trade show.?

From the strategic side, it can help you determine if certain channels are performing how you want. Are you closing enough deals through trade shows? If not, is there something you could be doing differently, or is it worth continuing to do at all? These types of questions can be answered when your CRM is set up to give you the correct information. Insights are more than just knowing the answers, it is the ability to act on that knowledge effectively.?

Be more versatile.

Having more insights into your customer relationships comes with increased versatility in your sales and marketing. Being able to track how, when, and why people are interacting with your communications in real-time allows businesses to identify if things are going wrong quickly and adapt accordingly. Without accurate insights, every decision you make may as well be guesswork.?

But to be truly versatile, just having the insights isn’t enough. You need to train your team on what these insights mean and plan how to use them. Finding a partner that will not only help set up your systems but build out a roadmap for your team and prepare them for any challenges they may face is crucial. With new insights into how your customers are interacting with your communications, you can work together to build a lead management plan that can respond differently to different types of customers based on their journey to ensure they get the right message at the right time.?

Keep customers engaged.?

A journey-based lead management?plan not only benefits your customers, but your team as well. There may be hundreds of leads at different stages of the journey, each with their own preferences, needs, and pain points. When your team has access to every communication and a timeline of the opportunity in front of them, they can quickly assess the situation, craft a personalized message, and ensure that no lead goes cold.?

But even the best plans will fail if you don’t have the proper tools to back it up. None of this is possible if you are not/are unable to track the right info.?

Some often-overlooked metrics in the customer journey that can provide valuable insights are:?

• Time to First Response: The time it takes for your team to respond to a customer’s initial inquiry.?

• Lead Velocity: The speed at which leads move through your sales pipeline.?

• Referral Source: Where your referrals are coming from (e.g., existing customers, partners).?

• Post-Purchase Engagement: How often customers engage with your brand after making a purchase.?

There are countless other data points that may be important for your business. There is no “one size fits all” solution. Depending on the industry, products/services, and the way you do business, different metrics will hold different values. To get any positive impact, you will need to sit down with your team and someone who can configure your technology to discuss what information would make their jobs easier, how that information can be captured, and how it will be used to benefit the business.?

Leverage the power of modern CRM systems.?

With the advancements in technology and data analytics, CRM systems have evolved from simple contact management tools to powerful platforms that can help you track and optimize every aspect of your customer journey. One of the most popular and versatile CRM systems is Microsoft’s Dynamics 365, which offers a range of solutions for different industries and business functions. A modern CRM like Dynamics 365 can help you:?

• Capture and store customer data from multiple sources, such as web forms, emails, SMS, and social media.?
• Analyze and visualize customer data using dashboards, reports, and artificial intelligence, to gain insights into customer behavior, preferences, needs, and satisfaction.?
• Automate and streamline your sales processes, such as lead qualification, opportunity management,?and order fulfillment.?
• Personalize and tailor your communications and offers to each customer, based on their profile, history, and stage in the journey.?
• Improve your team's performance by setting goals, tracking activities, measuring results, and providing targeted coaching and feedback.?

With proper planning, training, and management of your CRM system, you can unlock the full potential of your customer data and use it to drive more sales while also fostering a more adaptable business environment.?

If you’d like to find out how your business could be getting better insights from your technology, schedule a free CRM review with InfoGrow today to discover your options.?

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