6 key Consumer Touch Points
The number of touch points retailers will have with consumers / shoppers / customers will depend on several factors (business model, product range, complexity, omni-channel spread, etc.)
Taking a simplified view, consumer journey typically traverses through the following 6 key phases (analogous with the Zero, First & Second moments of truth)
- Product Discovery: The touch point where consumers may require pre-sale knowledge or discovery of the product, typically through online, in-store/person or word of mouth [educational]
- Product Demo / Trials: The touch point where shoppers seek a demonstration / sample / trial of the product prior to purchase decision [experiential]
- Purchase, Payment & Fulfillment: The touch point where shoppers have finalized their purchase decision and proceed to pay & collect their goods [transactional]
- Repeat Purchase & Refills: The touch point (if applicable) where existing customers seek to re-order / re-purchase the same product or potentially re-explore new products from different brands [transactional + educational + potentially experiential]
- Post-Sale Support / Customer Service: The touch point (if applicable) where customers may require post-sale support that could range from simple Q&As through to complex issues [transactional / service]
- Returns, Exchanges & Refunds: The touch point (if applicable) where customers may require assistance with any returns, refunds or exchanges of their product [transactional / service]
As discussed in an earlier post, Amazon’s Go concept store cleverly addresses many time poor shopper’s pain-point by making the entire end-2-end shopper journey completely frictionless (albeit for quick shopping runs)
Other examples include prominent brick-n-mortar retailer’s (Apple, Target, Walmart, Home Depot, etc.) self-checkout solutions, QSR industry‘s (Starbucks, etc.) App-based order, payment & pick-up solutions, and many more
