Shawn is the VP of Marketing for PandaDoc overseeing all intertwined marketing efforts to scale the company to its next inflection point. Show getty In many ways, the customer journey — the path to their decision to purchase a product — is as important as the product. You can have a stellar product, but if it’s impossible for a potential customer to find value in it, you’ve failed. In SaaS marketing, we all have this idea in our mind about our customer’s journey and how it’s supposed to play out: Most customers start with a Google search, they spend time researching on your website, they likely read some reviews, and then they sign up for a trial — at which point a sales rep signs them up and gets them onboarded. But even in this very simplified customer journey, there are so many variables to consider between discovery and actually signing up a new customer. Because, as Blake Morgan explained, customer journeys are becoming more complex, it’s important to have a clear and complete picture of all aspects of and touchpoints in their engagement with your company to better understand customer expectations and optimize their experiences. Sure, we have data and can take educated guesses about what should happen throughout a customer’s journey, which we use to create a customer journey map. But you only truly know the journey from your perspective — you know the journey as it was architected. Until you know and understand the customer’s perspective about their experience, you don’t actually know your customer’s journey. One of the best ways to understand your customer’s journey is by stepping into their shoes. Just like that old TV show Undercover Boss, a secret shopper experiment can help you uncover the truths within your organization; it’ll uncover what’s working and what is not, which holes need filling, and which strategies you can scrap. To do this, you should have a single person in your organization go undercover and go through your ideal customer profile’s (ICP’s) step-by-step journey. That could mean creating a fictitious company for them, complete with a website and backstory, and completing and documenting every step of the experience. It doesn’t need to be a long, drawn-out experiment, but you should invest in this process to make sure you can focus on at least a few areas of the customer journey. This strategy will not only show you how to better engage with potential buyers; it’ll also show you how to make your organization stronger. Your customer is what connects your marketing, customer success and sales teams. Accurately mapping their journey will show how a pain point in sales may affect CX down the road or perhaps that you can improve it with simple marketing changes. The following are three ways a secret shopper can assist various departments: Marketing: How To Optimize Messages A secret shopper experience can provide so much insight into your marketing strategy. For one, it can uncover what paths customers take during the discovery stage and how and where you should customize messages to make sure customers are easily finding the solutions they seek. It will also show how to better talk to your customers throughout the buying process. For example, you’ll see firsthand what customers are actually experiencing during their free trial: Are they getting the most out of it, and is your company and product responding to their needs? The answers to these questions can allow you to better customize your nurture tracks to provide more relevant value based on customers’ needs. By targeting your content toward what they need, you can help to move the customer forward in the journey from one stage to the next. Sales: Value-Added Selling A secret shopper can also help to identify the pain points during the sales process. Is your sales team appropriately researching and vetting your marketing-qualified leads? How is information from and about the customer being handed off to various reps throughout the buying process? How easy is it for the customer to express their problems and learn about the solution? It’s industry-standard for SDRs to do some homework on the leads they are engaging with — this not only helps them to vet the quality of the lead but also allows them to learn more about who they are talking to so they can personalize their interactions. In an ideal world, the SDR should uncover the secret shopper at this point. If the secret shopper goes unnoticed, this alone can be a valuable training opportunity for your sales team. Overall, this process can help your sales team identify where things can go wrong so they can better focus on adding value to the customer through the product. Customer Success: Onboarding For Greater Success The customer journey does not end once the customer signs a contract. At that point, it really turns into a customer success journey that shows all the steps a customer takes to achieve their goals with your product. The secret shopper experience should also include an assessment of the customer service function, which provides an amazing opportunity to optimize onboarding and set the customer up for early success. How has your sales rep prepped the onboarding specialist? Does the new customer know what they need to solve their problem successfully? If you’re able to set your customer up for success early, they will not only be more likely to choose to purchase your product; they’ll also be more likely to continue investing in and expanding the services they use, and they could be more likely to advocate for your company to bring in additional revenue through referrals and reviews. The reality is that, when it comes to your customer journey, you don’t know what you don’t know — and one of the best ways to uncover the truth is to go undercover. Forbes Communications Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify? How do I write a mystery shopper review?How do you write a good Mystery Shopper Report?. Stick to the requirements of the task. ... . Give plenty of detail – Show, don't tell! ... . Write in complete sentences. ... . Include the correct names of staff and products. ... . Always proofread before submitting. ... . Conclusion.. What is the mystery shopping process?What does a mystery shopper do?. Visiting retail stores to observe customer service.. Making purchases and compiling receipts.. Following specific shopping instructions given by an employer.. Observing details of the establishment, such as names of employees and cleanliness.. How much do mystery shoppers get paid Australia?How much does a Mystery shopper make in Australia? The average mystery shopper salary in Australia is $87,750 per year or $45 per hour. Entry-level positions start at $58,500 per year, while most experienced workers make up to $249,600 per year. How do you know if a mystery shopper is legit?Also, search online for the company name with the words “review,” “complaint,” or “scam.” Check to see what others are saying about the company before you pursue a job with them. And talk with someone you trust to get their opinion before you take the job. |
