Revealing customer intent: Why contextual knowledge is key to understanding the customer journey

Customers now have the freedom to choose how and when their interactions with a brand start and end.

The availability of a wide range of touchpoints and channels adds convenience and flexibility to the customer experience. However, it also means that brands struggle as they try to predict what customers want.

Today’s customer journey features a convoluted space where motivations and touchpoints intertwine; this has been dubbed by Google as the “messy middle.” A customer’s intent to purchase online may suddenly take a different path with the customer finding themselves investigating a pending order, visiting the brand’s physical store, or calling customer service. These detours are accompanied by specific emotions and behaviors that most brands can’t recognize.

To overcome this challenge, brands must quickly bring customers onto a “happy path” – the best route that leads them to the end of their journey. This means understanding the context at the moment of engagement and figuring out what prompted customers onto their particular journey.

Customer journey management introduces a set of processes that automate, orchestrate, and optimize interactions across all channels in real time. The result is a high-level, cross-channel view of where customers have been, with the insights to know where they will likely go next.  

Read our point of view and learn how to better determine the motivators behind every customer action – and how to respond with a contextually relevant reaction.