Do you know the difference between customer mapping and customer journey mapping? Though similar, these terms represent two different processes. If you’re in field sales, understanding these differences is important, which is why we wrote this post.
Keep reading to learn what customer mapping and customer journey mapping are, how they differ from each other, how customer mapping will benefit your field sales team, and why SPOTIO is the only customer mapping tool you need.
What is Customer Mapping?
Customer mapping is the process of creating a visual representation of a company’s territories, leads, and current customers on a map.
Decades ago, door-to-door or outside salespeople would draw territories on paper maps and mark the locations of potential leads. These days, most field sales reps use sales mapping software create and manage territories.
Either way, customer mapping is essential to the success of your sales team, which we’ll talk more about soon. First, we need to clarify the differences between the terms “customer mapping” and “customer journey mapping.”
Customer Mapping vs. Customer Journey Mapping
As mentioned above, customer mapping is the process of marking territories, as well as potential and current customers on a visual map.
Customer journey mapping, on the other hand, is the process of mapping every interaction a potential customer has with a company before they make a purchase. The best customer journey maps describe sentiment and pain points, too, which helps sales reps understand leads.
A B2B customer journey, for example, might look like this:
Source: Delighted
As you can see, customer mapping and customer journey mapping are different. The first deals with a lead or customer’s physical location. The second deals with a hypothetical journey that leads must go on to become customers.
How Customer Mapping Can Benefit Field Sales Teams?
For years, field sellers had to use tools that were designed for inside sales teams. Now, field reps have access to customer mapping software, which is made for their specific needs.
Here are five ways that customer mapping software will benefit your team:
Stop leads falling through the cracks
It’s easy to forget about certain leads when you have dozens of them in your pipeline. Customer mapping ensures this doesn’t happen.
Image: SPOTIO’s visual representation of CRM data — prospects, leads and customers — on a digital map
It’s pretty simple: You add leads to the map, field reps look at the map to plan their sales routes for the day, then see all of the leads in their pipeline, which will make them think, “Oh, yeah, I need to contact these people.”
Modern customer mapping software goes a step further. Not only will your field reps be able to see their leads on a handy digital map, they’ll also get notifications when it’s time to re-engage with specific leads. Win!
Identify hidden sales opportunities
How do your field reps know which leads to focus on? If your team uses customer mapping software, they simply look at their customer map.
Tools like SPOTIO allow reps to color-code their customer maps based on any data point they want: pipeline stage, result of last visit, etc. This means that reps can look at their sales maps and easily determine which leads are most valuable. They can then focus on these leads and increase conversion rates.
We’ll talk more about SPOTIO in the next section, so stay tuned!
Increase referrals from existing customers
Did you know that referral leads have a 16% higher lifetime value than other types of leads? Or that referrals have a 37% higher retention rate?
Good news: Customer mapping can help you secure more of these valuable leads. Here are two easy ways to make it happen:
- Have your field reps identify current customers on their customer map. Then ask them to pinpoint nearby prospects. Now, when your reps visit these prospects, they can say something like, “John Doe from next door really loves our services. We think you might, too.” The simple fact that this prospect’s neighbor is a customer will increase the likelihood of them converting.
- Ask your field reps to approach current customers and request referrals in the area. You can even authorize your reps to give incentives if you want. Either way, you’re bound to get new referral leads.
Plan smarter sales routes
Unlike inside sellers, field sales reps travel from prospect to prospect for in-person meetings. This allows them to connect with prospects on a deeper level, build trust with them in less time, and, ultimately, close bigger deals.
There’s one problem: It can take a lot of time to travel to prospects, which tends to hurt productivity metrics for field sales reps.
Customer mapping will help your reps plan smarter routes between prospects so that they can spend more time selling and less time behind the wheel. All they have to do is look at their customer maps, decide which prospects and/or customers they’ll visit that day, and design the most efficient route between them.
Even better, tools like SPOTIO will automatically plan the most direct routes between visits, giving field reps even more time to sell, sell, sell.
Increase revenue
All of these benefits equal more revenue for your company.
If you can prevent leads from falling through the cracks and generate more referrals, your reps will have more people to talk to. And if you can decrease your reps’ windshield time, they’ll have more time to talk to people.
Improve Your Customer Mapping With SPOTIO
So now you know that customer mapping is important for field sales teams.
The question is, how do you actually do it? You could give your reps a paper map and a Sharpie, and say, “Good luck!” Or you could use SPOTIO. We’re biased, but we guarantee the latter option is preferable.
Once you get access to the SPOTIO platform, you’ll be able to:
Easily Create and Manage Territories
How do you cut territories? If you’re like many other field sales managers, you use CRM software. It works, but let’s be honest, it’s not the ideal tool for the job.
SPOTIO lets you cut and maintain territories at a granular level. You could parse territories by specific neighborhoods, for example, rather than by ZIP Code, city, or county (something traditional CRM solutions can’t do).
This level of functionality helps sales managers prevent sales rep overlap and identify gaps in territory coverage.
Visualize CRM Data on Your Maps
Your CRM software is full of important data. SPOTIO makes this data accessible and actionable for field reps by allowing them to visualize it on a digital map and see where their leads, opportunities, and customers are. They can then use this information to plan efficient sales routes with the click of a button.
Distinguish Between Leads, Opportunities, and Customers
Speaking of leads, opportunities, and customers, SPOTIO makes it easy for field reps to see the difference between them.
Each person and/or company in your CRM database becomes a pin in SPOTIO and placed on a digital map. You can then color-code pins to represent different pieces of information. For example, you can make all of your leads yellow, your opportunities red, and your customers blue.
You can also color-code and organize pins based on other data points, such as the result of the last visit or the amount of time since your last visit. It’s your map — organize it the way you want!
Customize Map Views
Field reps can also customize their SPOTIO map views to their preferences. Here are the settings available inside of our platform:
- Satellite Mapping: Access a satellite view of your map to visualize the scale and size of your territory in the real world.
- Territory details: View specific territories on your map, as well as the assignments and activities associated with each, so that you can easily manage them.
- Leads: As mentioned earlier, with SPOTIO you can see all of your leads, opportunities, and customers so that you know whom to contact and when.
- Hailtrace: Integrate SPOTIO with your Hail Trace account to view storm maps in your area so reps can be prepared.
- GPS Trails: Monitor your reps in real-time. Where are they and what are they doing? SPOTIO will tell you. (You can also turn off this feature).
Get real-time insights
Finally, SPOTIO will give you the data you need, when you need it.
Use our customer mapping features to spot trends. Then zoom in for a closer look and view real-time metrics for each of your reps. Metrics include leads created, leads won, win rate, estimated revenue, and leads by stages.
Move to different territories on the SPOTIO map, and your metrics will automatically update for the chosen area!
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SPOTIO is the sales engagement platform specifically for field sales teams. With our solution, you’ll gain access to all of the customer mapping capabilities described in this post, as well as task automation, multichannel communication, territory management, and lead generation features.
Sign up for a free demo of SPOTIO today to see it in action and decide if it’s the right tool for your field sales team. We’re confident it will be!
