The old saying ‘the only constant in life is change’ has never been truer when it comes to how marketers are approaching the customer journey in 2022. The COVID-19 pandemic, which emerged in early 2020, has set a fire under digital acceleration and transformed consumer habits in two short years. Today, 81% of customers are omnichannel shoppers by default, according to 2021 data from YouGov. 

Apps, social media platforms, digitally-connected stores and direct-to-consumer have emerged as major channels for commerce, requiring different approaches to customer journey planning.

The WARC Guide to customer journeys in an omnichannel world, released early February 2022, examines how marketers can equip their businesses to respond to changes in the customer journey over the last two years. The Guide draws from WARC’s recent publications on the topic and focuses on three key themes: new thinking on the customer journey, foundations of customer journey planning, and building consistent omnichannel experiences.

The first chapter focuses on new thinking in customer journey planning. 

• The Hankins Hexagon presents a flexible new model to analyse and optimise the changing path to purchase. 
• Forrester’s approach to ‘journey orchestration’ involves designing experiences as they happen by using data at an individual customer level to analyse behaviour, predict future behaviour, and tweak the customer journey to drive operational efficiency, flexibility and business results. 
• Jin Kim, CEO of US-based Creative Digital Agency, examines the role of shoppable media in shortening the customer journey, which demands a fresh approach to media planning from brands.
• China’s models of ‘new retail’ are permeating a rapid transition that provides best practice inspiration for brands in Western markets, according to Creative Capital China’s Gianvito D’Onghia and Tanguy Laurent.

The second chapter examines the new foundations of customer journey planning.