How Detailed Should My Customer Journey Map be?

To answer this, let’s take a closer look at the different levels of details and how to work with them:

Level 1 is the highest level describing if the customer is in the phase “before”, “during” or “after” the service or experience. Make sure to always have these higher categories in your end-to-end-map.

Level 2 is describing the activities or situations during each phase. For instance during the phase “Before” you might have the activity “researching different alternatives” or “signing up”. There are usually 4-10 activities/situations per phase in a map. To make any sense, all customer activities should be mapped on this level, but not all of it needs to be described deeper.

The purpose of mapping level 2 is to get a good overview of where in general the customer experience is failing or where you have business challenges that need to be solved. Insights on this level can help strategic decisions on where you should focus.

Level 3 describes the activities in the above lane in more detailed steps, for instance: “sign up” may consist of the steps: “check if time fits my calendar”, “log in” or “call grandmother if she can take care of the kids at 2 pm next wednesday”

Level 4 in the map describes the steps in level 3 in further detail. For instance: “Log in” may consist of “Click on the mail invite”, “type in username and password”, “redirected”, “get new information”.

If a certain area in your end-to-end-map is defined as important, you can drill down into the level 3 steps in that certain area. But if there are several areas in the map where the customer experience needs to be improved, it’s better to link to specific journey maps that represent those areas. And these maps should have a detail level 3 and 4. In Custellence it’s very easy to create an eco system of connected journey maps like this.