Running a journey management pilot is often framed as a quick win. But in reality, its success depends on a foundational decision that is easy to overlook: which customer journey to choose.
The right choice allows teams to demonstrate impact, build momentum, and lay the groundwork for long-term change.
The wrong choice, on the other hand, can stall progress before it starts. The journey might target a problem that cannot be meaningfully addressed, or overcomplicate the pilot with organizational resistance.
Based on our experience (and learning the hard way where pilots tend to fail) this article offers a practical approach to choosing a journey that sets you up for success.
Let us show you a situation we’ve seen more than once.
A CX team wants to experiment with journey management to work more cross-functionally and show how a customer journey approach can drive results. Leadership is supportive and even suggests a domain to focus on. Enthusiastically, the team gets started.
But once the journey is selected, the friction begins. Other teams are too busy or not aligned. The topic doesn’t fit with current strategic priorities. Sometimes, it turns out the problem is already being worked on. Or worse, the data shows it only affects a small number of customers so impact is minimal. Suddenly, collaboration stalls. There’s no room on the backlog. The energy fades.
The CX team might still go through the motions: map the journey, run some workshops. But without ownership, resources, or relevance, no improvements are implemented. And without implementation, there’s no impact to show.
How to choose the right journey for your pilot
There are three common approaches to selecting a customer journey for your pilot project. Each has its own strengths, and each works best under different conditions.
1. The pain-based approach
Pick this approach when there’s a clear issue in the organization that everyone talks about, but no one is tackling yet.
Example: leadership keeps getting forwarded emails from angry customers who are stuck in a broken process, but no team is formally responsible for fixing it.
2. The strategy-based approach
Pick this approach when the strategy is being set, and you can agree to take ownership of a priority area.
Example: the organization wants to retain more young customers. You agree to focus the pilot on the journeys that matter most to that group.
3. The data-driven approach
Pick this approach if you can get access to customer and operational data quickly. It is the fastest way to both select the right journey and define the right problem.
Example: the data shows that most payment issues are linked to Klarna users. That insight immediately narrows the scope and sharpens the focus of your pilot.
We’ve run successful pilots using all three methods.
The key is to carefully assess which approach fits your organization best. If you have access to reliable data, a data-driven method can move fast. If you need leadership buy-in, starting from strategy might get you further. And if there’s an obvious pain point that no one owns yet, solving it can build early momentum.
But no matter which path you choose, selecting the pilot journey shouldn’t take months. A pilot is meant to move quickly, visibly, and with focus.
Once the journey is selected, you’re not done. The next question is whether your organization is in a position to act on it. That depends on a few critical factors like ownership, capacity, and access that can either enable or block your progress.
We’ve captured those in a simple checklist.
Checklist: is this journey fit for a pilot?
If the journey passes these checks, you’re in a strong position to start. You’ll have the focus, support, and access needed to deliver something measurable and show what journey management can really do.
Don’t let your (next) pilot fail
Pilots don’t fail because teams lack effort. They fail because the wrong journey was chosen: too small, too complex, or not ready for action.
The real shortcut to impact is making one good decision upfront. Choose the right journey, with the right conditions, and everything else gets easier.
Get this right, and you can:
- Prove real business and customer impact
- Build momentum across teams
- Set the foundation to scale journey management
We’re excited to hear about your next pilot.
👉 download the checklist
Or Book a call to discuss how we might help you implement this into your work.
