Journey Mapping 101

nngroup.com/articles/journey-mapping-101

Summary: A journey map is a visualization of the process that a person goes through in
order to accomplish a goal.

Journey maps are a common UX tool. They come in all shapes, sizes, and formats.
Depending on the context, they can be used in a variety of ways. This article covers the
basics: what a journey map is (and is not), related terminology, common variations, and how
we can use journey maps.

Additional articles are available, discussing when to create customer journey maps, the 5-
step process, and journey mapping in real life.

Definition of a Journey Map

Definition: A journey map is a visualization of the process that a person goes through in
order to accomplish a goal.

In its most basic form, journey mapping starts by compiling a series of user actions into a
timeline. Next, the timeline is fleshed out with user thoughts and emotions in order to
create a narrative. This narrative is condensed and polished, ultimately leading to a
visualization.

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Most journey maps follow a similar format: at the top, a specific user, a specific scenario, and
corresponding expectations or goals in the middle, high-level phases that are comprised of user
actions, thoughts, and emotions; at the bottom, the takeaways: opportunities, insights, and
internal ownership.

The terms ‘user journey map’ and ‘customer journey map’ can be used interchangeably.
Both reference a visualization of a person using your product or service. While the argument
can be made that the term ‘customer’ does a disservice to the method (because, especially
for certain business-to-business products, not all of end users are technically customers, i.e.,
product buyers), alignment on what you call the map is far less important than alignment on
the content within the map.

Key Components of a Journey Map

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Journey maps come in all shapes and sizes. Regardless of how they look, journey maps have
the following 5 key elements in common:

1. Actor

The actor is the persona or user who experiences the journey. The actor is who the journey
map is about — a point of view. Actors usually align with personas and their actions in the
map are rooted in data.

Provide one point of view per map in order to build a strong, clear narrative. For example, a
university might choose either a student or a faculty member as actor — each would result
in different journeys. (To capture both viewpoints, the university will need to build two
separate maps, one for each of the two user types.)

2. Scenario + Expectations

The scenario describes the situation that the journey map addresses and is associated with
an actor’s goal or need and specific expectations. For example, one scenario could be
switching mobile plans to save money, and expectations for it include to easily find all the
information needed to make a decision.

Scenarios can be real (for existing products and services) or anticipated — for products that
are yet in the design stage.

Journey maps are best for scenarios that involve a sequence of events (such as shopping or
taking a trip), describe a process (thus involve a set of transitions over time), or might involve
multiple channels.

3. Journey Phases

Journey phases are the different high-level stages in the journey. They provide organization
for the rest of the information in the journey map (actions, thoughts, and emotions). The
stages will vary from scenario to scenario; each organization will usually have data to help it
determine what these phases are for a given scenario. Here are some examples:

For an ecommerce scenario (like buying Bluetooth speakers), the stages can be
discover, try, buy, use, seek support.
For a big (or luxury) purchases (like test driving and buying a car), the stages can be
engagement, education, research, evaluation, justification.
For a business-to-business scenario (like rolling out an internal tool), the stages could
be purchase, adoption, retention, expansion, advocacy.

4. Actions, Mindsets, and Emotions

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These are behaviors, thoughts, and feelings the actor has throughout the journey and that
are mapped within each of the journey phases.

Actions are the actual behaviors and steps taken by users. This component is not meant to
be a granular step-by-step log of every discrete interaction. Rather, it is a narrative of the
steps the actor takes during that phase.

Mindsets correspond to users’ thoughts, questions, motivations, and information needs at

different stages in the journey. Ideally, these are customer verbatims from research.

Emotions are plotted as single line across the journey phases, literally signaling the
emotional “ups” and “downs” of the experience. Think of this line as a contextual layer of
emotion that tells us where the user is delighted versus frustrated.

5. Opportunities

Opportunities (along with additional context such as ownership and metrics) are insights
gained from mapping; they speak to how the user experience can be optimized. Insights
and opportunities help the team draw knowledge from the map:

What needs to be done with this knowledge?

Who owns what change?

Where are the biggest opportunities?

How are we going to measure improvements we implement?

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An example of a simplistic, high-level customer-journey map depicting how the persona “Jumping
Jamie” switches her mobile plan. While all comprehensive journey maps should include key
components, what the map chooses to prioritize can (and should) depend on the goal of the
journey-mapping initiative. (For your convenience, we provide a journey-map template that you
can use.)

Journey-Map Variations
There are several concepts closely related and thus easily confused with journey maps.

It is important to note that this section is only meant to help your personal understanding
and clarification of these terms. It is not advised to debate or attempt to shift a whole
organization’s language to abide by the definitions stated here. Instead, use these
definitions to guide you towards aspects of another method that your team has not
previously considered.
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Journey Map vs. Experience Map

Think of an experience map as a parent to a journey map. A journey map has a specific actor
(a singular customer or user of a product) and specific scenario (of a product or service),
while an experience map is broader on both accounts — a generic human undergoing a
general human experience.

The experience map is agnostic of a specific business or product. It’s used for understanding
a general human behavior; in contrast, a customer journey map is specific and focused on a
particular business or product.

For example, imagine the world before the ridesharing market existed (Uber, Lyft, Bird, or
Limebike, to name a few). If we were to create an experience map of how a person gets
from one place to another, the map would likely include walking, biking, driving, riding with
a friend, public transportation, or calling a taxi. Using that experience map we could the
isolate pain points: unknown fares, bad weather, unpredictable timing, paying in cash, and
so on. Using these pain points, we would then create a future journey map for specific
product: how does a particular type of user call a car using the Lyft app?

Journey Map vs. Service Blueprint

If journey maps are the children to experience maps, then service blueprints are the
grandchildren. They visualize the relationships between different service components (such
as people or processes) at various touchpoints in a specific customer journey.

Think of service blueprints as a part two to customer journey maps. They are extensions of
journey maps, but instead of being focused on the user (and taking the user’s viewpoint),
they are focused on the business (and take its perspective).

For the Lyft scenario above, we would take the journey map and expand it with what Lyft
does internally to support that customer journey. The blueprint could include matching the
user to a driver, contacting the driver, calculating fares, and so on.

Journey Map vs. User Story Map

User stories are used in Agile to plan features or functionalities. Each feature is condensed
down to a deliberately brief description from a user’s point of view; the description focuses
on what the user wants to do, and how that feature will help. The typical format of a user
story is a single sentence: “As a [type of user], I want to [goal], so that [benefit].” For
example, “As a checking account holder, I want to deposit checks with my mobile device, so
that I don’t have to go to the bank.”

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A user story map is a visual version of a user story. For example, take the user story above
(“As a checking account holder, I want to deposit checks with my mobile device, so that I
don’t have to go to the bank.”) and imagine writing out the different steps that the team
plans for the user to take when using that functionality. These steps could be: logging in,
beginning deposit, taking picture of check, and entering transaction details. For each step,
we can document required features: enabling camera access, scanning check and auto
filling numbers, and authorizing signature. In a user story map, these features are written
on sticky notes, then arranged based on the product release that each functionality will be
added to.

While, at a glance, a user story map may look like a journey map, journey maps are meant
for discovery and understanding (think big picture), while user story maps are for planning
and implementation (think little picture).

Although a journey map and user story map may contain some of the same pieces, they are
used at different points of the process. For example, imagine our journey map for Lyft
indicated that a pain point appeared when the user was in a large group. To address it, the
team may introduce a multicar-call option. We could create a user story map to break this
feature (multicar call) into smaller pieces, so a product-development team could plan
release cycles and corresponding tasks.

Why Use Journey Maps

The benefits of journey maps (and most other UX mappings) are two-fold. First, the process
of creating a map forces conversation and an aligned mental model for the whole team.
Fragmented understanding is a widespread problem in organizations because success
metrics are siloed; it is no one’s responsibility to look at the entire experience from the
user’s standpoint. This shared vision is a critical goal of journey mapping, because, without
it, agreement on how to improve customer experience would never take place.

Second, the shared artifact resulting from the mapping can be used to communicate an
understanding of your user or service to all involved. Journey maps are effective
mechanisms for conveying information in a way that is memorable, concise, and that
creates a shared vision. The maps can also become the basis for decision making as the
team moves forward.

Conclusion
Journey mapping is a process that provides a holistic view of the customer experience by
uncovering moments of both frustration and delight throughout a series of interactions.
Done successfully, it reveals opportunities to address customers’ pain points, alleviate
fragmentation, and, ultimately, create a better experience for your users.

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Learn more about journey mapping in our course Journey Mapping to Understand
Customer Needs.

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