The Customer Journey: Understanding Customer Pain Points and Motivations

Begin your customer journey by understanding your customers’ motivations and pain points.

Every step in your journey should reflect your buyer personas and their habits. As your customers move from lead to customer, it’s important to understand their own personal journey. 

A good company understands their customer base, but a great company understands, and even foresees, their customers’ needs.

Providing a smooth customer experience begins here.

What are Customer Pain Points? 

A customer pain point is anything that can be viewed negatively or as a problem. This can be anything that occurs in your customer’s day-to-day life or an issue they need resolved. 

Any point that has ended with an unsatisfying result can be viewed as a pain point for your customers. 

Your customer’s pain points are as unique as they are.  

How Do You Find Pain Points?

Since your customer pain points can range from big or small, it can be tricky to find them. Look into the top three general pain points as you narrow down your research: Monetary, Support, and Process.  

For example:

• Monetary 

  • How much does something cost?

  • Are they getting the most bang for their buck?

  • Are there hidden fees?

• Customer Support

  • Did they receive poor service?

  • Did it take a long time to receive service?

  • Is there a lack of communication?

• Business Process

  • Reduced hours of availability.

  • Data security breaches.

  • Do you offer a variety of payment options?

There are a few great places to look into your prospective and current clients’ pain points. Market research allows you to reach out directly to the client base. You’ll get firsthand information and knowledge that you can turn into part of your business strategy. 

Social listening measures what customers say, good or bad, on social media. You can use social listening to “listen in” on not only what works in your brand but others in your industry. Turn known pain points into actionable changes you can make and control.

Use your greatest asset into your customer’s pain points, your customer support team. Support team feedback gives you direct access to your customer’s pain points regarding your brand, staff, and more. Knowing your customers’ issues with your company allows you to make changes where you need it most. 

Remember, a pain point is anything your customer could consider a source of frustration or unsatisfactory. 

How Do You Fix Pain Points?

You did your research and discovered both your customers’ and prospective customers’ pain points. Use your knowledge of perceived pain points to create actionable changes. 

If the problem is monetary, how can you solve the issue? How can you give the client “more bang for their buck?” 

Is the issue with customer service? Look into your training practices and where the miscommunication lies between your customer goals and their day-to-day habits. 

Are your business processes hindering growth? What changes can you make to improve ease of use and friendliness? 

Do your customers view an issue as being unproductive? What benefits or changes can you make to decrease inconveniences and increase productivity?

The goal is always to present your business as the solution to your customer’s pain points. No matter the issue, you have the answers and ability to solve the problem. 

Fixing Pain Points Plan: 

• Discover Pain Points 

• Create a plan to address and solve the problem

• Plan ways to prevent pain points from happening or reoccurring 

• Build ways to fix pain points into your marketing plan and campaigns

How to Finish/Foil Pain Points?

There is no concrete pain point for all of your customers. Pain points can even be an issue that your clients perceive as a problem. 

Pain points could even be issues that the client feels in their life outside of your company. Or even an unsatisfied solution that occurred with another company in your same industry. 

By addressing the issues that you can proactively, you will continue to show your current and future client bases that your company, product, or service is the best option for them. 

Address the issues head to prevent pain points from reoccurring. By reacting proactively, you’ll be able to fix, find, and finish/foil issues before they happen.

Further Reading: 

Learn More About Buyer Personas:

https://segwik.com/blog/customer-journey/buyer-personas

Learn More About Mapping Your Journey:

https://segwik.com/blog/customer-journey/the-customer-journey-mapping-your-journey