To design and deploy services, it’s crucial to have both customer experience journey maps for vision and customer service blueprints for process development.
In a recent post, the team at Cooper dove into the differences between customer experience journey maps and customer service blueprints. Customer experience and customer service often are used interchangeably, but the subtle differences between them are critical developing a cohesive strategy to win the hearts, minds, and ultimately, the loyalty of customers.
You can see the original post from the Cooper team with a full breakdown of what is a service blueprint and how it differentiates from customer experience journey maps. Below are a few excerpts with some key thoughts on its role in winning customer service.
Customer Experience Journey Map vs Customer Service Blueprint
A customer journey map is a detailed visual document that captures the customer experience across touch points, including what the customer is doing, thinking, and/or feeling. A service blueprint is a detailed visual document that captures the service delivery process across touch points, including the back stage and front stage of the service delivery.
To say that another way: Journey maps contain fewer process details, but more information about the customer experience; Service blueprints contain fewer experience details, but more information about the processes that deliver the service. At their most extreme, journey maps are more experience-centric and service blueprints are more process-centric.
The blueprint is best when your goal is:
- to identify process breakdowns and opportunities for process improvements
- to inform an implementation plan for a new service
- to examine service metrics in the context of service delivery processes
- to define a vision for how a service or touch point(s) could become higher or lower touch
The journey map is best when your goal is:
- to identify customer pain points and service gaps
- to design a new service with customer experience at the core
- to examine the customer experience across touch points of a service
- to define a vision for how a service or touch point(s) could change the customer experience
The right tool, at the right place, at the right time
A tool is not a sacred artifact, it’s an implemented for a specific purpose. Some organizations can’t start using the right tools until they have a detailed plan of what those tools should create. For those situations, big picture vision is needed and experience journey maps will help you get there.
Ultimately, the customer experience maps should help you identify your organization’s strategic goals. Service processes are developed through service blueprints that outline the processes and actions that are required in order to achieve the strategic goals of the organizations.