Marketoonist: "Customer Journeys to Nowhere" cartoon

Weekly hand-drawn business cartoon from Marketoonist Tom Fishburne

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Tom Fishburne
September 02, 2024

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Customer Journeys to Nowhere

Earlier this year an editorial in the New York Times wondered:

“When did everything become a ‘journey’? Changing our hair, getting divorced, taking spa vacations — they’re not just things we do; they’re ‘journeys.’”

And of course, to marketers, there’s the “customer journey.” The customer journey is a handy metaphor to help us consider all of the interactions and experiences a customer has between point A and point B in buying and engaging with our brand.

But the simplicity of the metaphor can sometimes delude marketers into thinking of customers myopically on a dedicated, linear, transactional path to purchase rather than complex humans who don’t actually think about our brands as much as we think they do.

Two professors, Ahir Gopaldas and Anton Siebert, expanded the simple model of Customer Journeys in a Harvard Business Review article I found interesting:

“Too often [experts] tell companies to routinize customer journeys—to make them as effortless and predictable as possible. Our research shows that this advice is overly simplistic. In fact, following it can sometimes backfire on a company.

“Though some journeys might require little effort (for example, watching movies on Netflix or reordering meals on Seamless), others demand considerable mental or physical exertion (learning a new language on Duolingo or working out on a Peloton bike). Customers value both kinds of experiences.

“Likewise, some journeys tend to be comfortingly familiar (like using Old Spice aftershave or grabbing lunch at Panera Bread), while others are unpredictable, surprising, and exciting (like meeting and chatting with other users of the dating app Bumble or playing World of Warcraft with friends). In many circumstances, customers actually relish the unexpected.”

The two professors used this insight to sketch out four broad archetypes of customer journeys:

  • The Routine: effortless and predictable (think Starbucks Pickup)

  • The Joyride: effortless and unpredictable (think TikTok’s For You page)

  • The Trek: effortful and predictable (think Duolingo)

  • The Odyssey: effortful and unpredictable (think Adobe Creative Cloud)

Some brands may benefit from thinking about multiple types of journeys for different customers at different types. Ultimately, like most models in marketing, it’s not one size fits all.

By the way, this cartoon was partly inspired by my daughter’s friend who is hiking the Appalachian Trial right now (way to go, Camila — trail nickname Slip n’ Slide!)

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Cartoon from the archives

Here’s a related one from 2018.

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-Tom

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About Marketoonist

Marketoonist is the thought bubble of me, Tom Fishburne. I first started drawing cartoons as a student in the Harvard Business School newspaper (not quite as well-known for humor as the Lampoon) and later started this newsletter from a General Mills cubicle in 2002. The cartoons have followed my career ever since. I poke fun at the ever-changing world of marketing and business because I believe that laughing at ourselves can help us do our best work.