As business owners, it's not uncommon to come across the Customer Journey map, particularly from a marketing perspective. We've all seen the funnel diagrams outlining the different phases: Awareness, Consideration, Conversion, Retention, and Advocacy. But have you considered drilling down a little deeper?  

A Service Blueprint is a great exercise to undertake beyond the Customer Journey. While the Customer Journey Map gives you a sense of what your client experiences, the Service Blueprint offers insights into your operations and challenges faced internally. Mapping out your service helps plan and organise your business resources, from tools, processes and the human touch that support your client’s journey. Service Blueprints are one of the primary mapping tools used in the service design process, to innovate, analyse and improve the service experience. When you’re mapping out your Service Blueprint, always align it with your customer’s journey and their goals.

When creating Service Blueprints for your business, there is scope to develop different blueprints for different outcomes of your service. Mapping out potential variations is a great visual tool to help identify weaknesses and opportunities, as well as an overview of the many relationships within your service process.

The Benefits of a Service Blueprint include: 

1. Visual Representation: It helps all stakeholders visualise the entire service process, allowing for a holistic understanding of all touchpoints and activities. This is particularly helpful for teams and organisations with different departments.

2. Continuous Improvement: By mapping out the service journey, businesses can identify bottlenecks or friction points that may impact the customer experience, as well as staff experience.

3. Align Resources: It assists businesses in understanding where resources are allocated and if adjustments are needed to better serve customers. 

4. Innovation and Improvement: Helps teams brainstorm ways to streamline operations or innovate new service elements. 

5. Training: Provide a clear guide for training new employees about how the service process works. 

The Key Components of a Service Blueprint include: 

In the example above you can see there are key areas and lines that help to cluster important information.

1. Physical Evidence: This refers to the tangible elements that customers interact with during their service journey. For example, the environment in which the service is delivered (like a retail shop or website), tools, or products that are part of the service. 

2. Customer Actions: The steps or activities customers take as they experience a service. This can range from initial inquiry to purchasing, to post-purchase activities. 

3. Frontstage Actions: These are the actions performed by service staff or systems that are visible to the customer. It's the part of the service that the customer interacts with directly. 

4. Backstage Actions: These are the behind-the-scenes actions performed by the service staff or systems, not visible to the customer. They are crucial to supporting the frontstage activities. 

5. Support Processes: These are the activities that support the frontstage and backstage processes but are further removed from the customer's direct view. These might include inventory management, training, or systems backups. 

6. Lines of Interaction/Visibility: 

   • Line of Interaction: Separates customer actions from frontstage activities 

   • Line of Visibility: Divides the frontstage from the backstage activities, representing what the customer can and cannot see. 

   • Line of Internal Interaction: Separates backstage activities from support processes. 

When to create a Service Blueprint:

As soul-led businesses, you may consider using a Service Blueprint when:

1. Multiple team members or departments contribute to one service experience.

2. To map out key processes to ensure client-centricity.

3. When a service is changing or needs to be re-designed.

4. To manage energy output.

How to create a Service Blueprint: 

Service Blueprints can be created in many different ways, flowcharts, sticky notes, whiteboards, or scribbles in a notebook. Depending on how the blueprint is used and shared, there are many digital whiteboards to assist with creating visually appealing designs. Remember to remain in the current state, rather than future-focused. This will help you to identify where the opportunities are for improvement.

1. Initial Setup: When setting up your Service Blueprint, identify the scenario, client persona, goal, and how detailed you need the information to be – zooming in or out. 

2. Customer Actions: Customer actions can be mapped out using existing data, or a previously completed customer journey map. This portion can be quite simple, highlighting touchpoints and corresponding actions. 

3. Frontstage and Backstage Actions: The Frontstage and Backstage sections are the main components of the Service Blueprint mapping. Document each step taken by an employee or technology, drawing from existing data, and don't be afraid to spread this out if needed. Be as detailed as necessary, because it will assist you in identifying any weaknesses within the service. Remember, Frontstage Actions happen in front of the customer, and Backstage Actions are behind the scenes.

4. Support Processes and Evidence: Identify the Support Processes and Evidence to be included in the blueprint. 

Additional information may be added to your blueprint including:

• Timing

• Rules and regulations

• Emotion

• Other Metrics

Once your Service Blueprint has been created, analyse the current process, highlighting any challenges that occur during the service delivery. This is a great opportunity to refine any steps, eliminating and automating where possible. Keep in mind to track your energy management, and emotions throughout the process. This can help identify where you might require more support, or higher human interaction to assist the customer’s journey. 

Not only is a Service Blueprint an architectural diagram for services, but it also offers a detailed, holistic view of how a service operates, making it an invaluable tool for those looking to understand, design, or improve service experiences. 

If this is an area you'd like to explore more with your business, visit my new service, Soul Aligned Systems. I can help you to map out your service experience to improve your systems, processes, and energy management.