It has been my observation that companies that focus on delivering exceptional customer experiences are, generally speaking, more likely to thrive through the ups and downs. I think this is because they not only seek to understand their customer’s expectations, but they genuinely try to create meaningful, long-lasting relationships. There are many tools and techniques for doing this, but in my humble opinion, few are as powerful as the good old customer journey map for understanding and improving the experiences that matter.
However, not all customer journey maps are created equal. To truly capture the nuances of your customer’s experience, investing in an illustrated customer journey map that tells a visual narrative is going to take you a lot further than a digitally generated set of text boxes on a timeline.
This goes beyond simply plotting a customer’s steps from awareness to purchase (although this is a great start!); it’s about capturing their emotions, pain points, motivations, and actions in a way that preserves their voice.
As a visual storytelling and human-centred design expert, I’ve worked with many companies to create journey maps that aren’t just aesthetically pleasing but also strategic, research-driven, and tailored to the business’s specific needs. These illustrated maps give businesses a powerful tool to drive action, innovation, and customer-centric decision-making.
There’s a million different ways to go about putting a customer journey map together, but here’s a little bit about how I go about it:
- Built from real customer research
One core difference between a generic journey map and an effective one is the foundation it’s built on. The best customer journey maps are grounded in real customer research, both qualitative and quantitative. And the insights from the research will guide the design of the map rather than forcing the insights to fit into a set template.
Qualitative data—such as customer interviews, surveys, and direct feedback—give insights into your customers’ emotions, motivations, and pain points. Quantitative data, like website analytics, sales data, and customer behaviour trends, gives us hard numbers to validate those insights.
By combining these two types of data, I can create a holistic view of your customer’s journey, grounded in reality and capturing the true voice of your customer. You don’t want a map that is based on assumptions; it should tell the story of actual customer behaviours and experiences. When teams have access to maps created from real research, they can make informed decisions aligned with customer needs.
- Nurturing the true voice of your customer
A customer journey map isn’t just a tool for visualising steps in a process; it’s a way to capture and nurture the true voice of your customer so it can be heard and appreciated throughout the organisation. Too often, customer feedback gets diluted as it moves through a company’s hierarchy—initial insights can lose their emotional nuance or key pain points get diluted into metrics and data points.
Illustrated journey maps preserve the emotional nuance and contextual understanding as each little picture can be like a movie scene that you can peek into. I always try to capture customers’ thoughts, frustrations, hopes, and expectations in a way that can resonate with everyone in the company, from product teams to customer service representatives. My aim is that these maps become a narrative tool that humanises the customer experience, ensuring that the voice of the customer is heard loud and clear across all departments.
When employees and leaders can literally see a customer’s emotions mapped out in front of them, it becomes much easier to empathise with the customer and make decisions that will improve their experience. This empathy is key to driving innovation, creating customer-focused strategies, and improving customer satisfaction.
- Custom designed for your business needs
Another reason illustrated customer journey maps are so valuable is their customisation. While plenty of generic templates are available for customer journey mapping (and if that is what you have access to, then you should absolutely start there), they can miss the mark when it comes to the unique aspects of your business or your customers.
They can be a bit ‘one-size-fits-all’. I try to create journey maps that are tailored to how your business wants to use them. Reflecting the nuances of your industry, customers, and goals.
For example, if you’re looking to optimise a particular part of the experience, I’ll ensure that your journey map reflects your customers’ emotional highs and lows during this phase. I’ll capture moments when your brand can surprise and delight, highlighting any pain points that lead to dissatisfaction.
This also ensures that the journey map is designed with your intended use in mind. Are you looking to improve product design, enhance customer service, or identify gaps in your growth strategy? By aligning the map’s design with your business goals, we ensure that it becomes a strategic asset that drives your specific objectives.
- Illustrated narrative, not just neat graphic design
The difference between a generic customer journey map and a truly impactful one often comes down to how the journey is visually represented. Illustrated narrative is at the core of the process I use. While many journey maps rely on basic templates with clean icons, grids, and bullet points, an illustrated map tells a story—one that’s visually engaging and human-centred.
Illustration allows me to go beyond traditional charts and graphs’ sterile, “clinical” feel and infuse emotion and context into the map. Whether it’s through hand-drawn sketches or meaningful symbology, illustrations create a sense of immersion and empathy that static graphs just can’t achieve.
This storytelling approach means that the journey map becomes much more than a process flow; it’s a living, breathing story that your team can connect with on a deeper level. Instead of simply reading through the customer touchpoints, employees and leaders can see the ups and downs, the moments of joy and frustration, and the moments that matter most in your customer’s experience.
By capturing this narrative, I ensure that the customer’s journey is not only understood in terms of functional steps but also felt, making it a far more powerful tool for inspiring action.
- Resonating deeply with stakeholders
The true power of an illustrated journey map is its ability to resonate deeply with the people who interact with it. Whether it’s being presented to senior leadership or used in team or project workshops, an illustrated customer journey map engages stakeholders in a way that traditional slides or reports simply can’t.
I always try to make sure that the maps I draw are something everyone can relate to. Transforming the customer journey into something tangible, emotionally engaging, and memorable.
If you’re a business leader looking to improve customer experience, streamline operations, and build a customer-centric culture, now is the time to invest in illustrated customer journey maps. These maps provide more than just a snapshot of your customer’s experience; they offer a roadmap for transformation— grounded in real data but also tailored to your business and visualised in a way that connects on a human level.
As a visual storytelling and human-centred design expert, I specialise in working with companies to create custom, illustrated customer journey maps that drive real impact. Whether you’re just starting to think about mapping your customer journey or you already have some maps but need a fresh, more engaging approach, I can help.
If you’d like to find out more or you’d like to see some examples of maps we’ve made, book in a chat.
