The Four Types of UX Mapping

Designing and developing a product usually involves a big team of people with different backgrounds and experiences who must be on the same page about the project goals, the user needs and behaviors, and the component processes involved. This common understanding is often built with visualizations. Mappings make sense of and describes various aspects and processes associated with a product.

There are four types of mapping; Empathy Mapping, Customer Journey Mapping, Experience Mapping, and Service Blueprinting. Empathy Maps help team members understand the user’s mindset, while Customer Journey Maps focus on a specific interaction with a product or service. Experience Maps generalize the concept of customer-journey maps across user types and products. Finally, service blueprints are counterparts to customer journey maps, but focused on the employees instead.

Mapping can be used amongst your team, organization, or partners to communicate an understanding of your user or service. This artifact can also become the basis for decision making as the team moves foward. The process can save a lot of time to make your team understand the project and also help make an easy design process.

See an example of a Customer Journey Map below: