Research suggests that nearly a third of consumers go through three touchpoints with business before purchase, and another third go through four to six. And that might be conservative.

According to a study led by Google, if we count all the possible research and interactions before and after a purchase, touchpoints may be anything from 20 (for candy) to 500 (for flights).

That’s why if you want to use an omnichannel approach effectively and deliver excellent customer experience across all those touchpoints, you need to understand and map the customer journey.

Customer journey mapping is the process of creating a view of all the steps customers go through to buy your products or services. This may extend to after-sales experiences. The process may start with compiling data in documents and spreadsheets, and then visualizing the data with the help of software.

Each one of the customer journey stages is an opportunity for you to stand out from your competitors by providing the right service at the right time.

Here is how to create a customer journey map:

1. Buy stuff
2. Ask the customers
3. Use data
4. Craft personas
5. Visualize the journey

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