The Marketing Audit Nobody Talks About (But Every Business Owner Needs to Do)

Here's something most business owners have never actually done: traced the complete journey their customers take from the very first moment they discover the business to the point where they're telling everyone they know about it.

Not assumed it exists. Not hoped it's working. Actually mapped it out, stage by stage, and looked honestly at what's there—and what's not.

Because here's the truth: your customer is on a journey right now whether you've designed it or not. People are discovering you, forming impressions, making decisions, and having experiences that will determine whether they buy, whether they stay, and whether they send other people your way. The only question is whether any of that is happening intentionally or just by accident.

For most businesses, it's mostly accident. And that gap between what you hope is happening and what's actually happening for your customer? That's where the revenue is disappearing.

In this episode, I'm walking you through how to design your customer journey intentionally—and if you're already in business, how to audit what you've already got so you can find the gaps, plug the leaks, and create an experience that turns first-time buyers into lifelong fans.

Your customer is on a journey right now. This episode helps you make sure it's one worth taking.

Transcript

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Hey. Welcome to the new School of Marketing podcast. I'm Bianca McKenzie, and this is the place where we break down marketing strategies that actually work without the overwhelm.

Before we dive in, I want to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land I live and work on, the Palawa people of Lutruwita. I pay my respects to elders past and present, and I acknowledge the deep connection they have to this land, culture and community.

Let's dive in and make marketing work for you.

If you've never sat down and deliberately mapped out the journey that your customers take, from the very first moment that they discover you to the point where they're telling everyone you know they know about you, then this episode is going to be one of the most valuable things you do for your business this year.

And if you're already in business, I want to acknowledge something up front.

This process is both exciting and a little confronting.

Because when you actually trace the journey that your customers are taking right now, you'll find gaps. You know, moments where people are falling through the cracks, steps that don't exist but should touch points that are confusing or missing entirely. And that's okay.

That's okay.

Finding them is exactly the point.

Today we're talking about how to craft your customer journey intentionally.

Not like assume that it exists, not hope that it's working, but actually sitting down and designing it.

Or if you're already in business, I want you to audit what you've already got and where the leaks are.

Because here's the truth.

Most businesses don't have a customer journey.

They have a collection of disconnected marketing activities that they hope somehow adds up to a customer journey.

And that gap between what they hope is happening and what's actually happening for that customer, that's where the revenue is disappearing.

Now, let's start with what we actually mean by a customer journey, because I think it gets talked about in a quite abstract way that doesn't always translate into something that you can work with practically.

Your customer journey is the complete experience that a person has with your business from the very first moment that they become aware that you exist all the way through to becoming not just a customer, but an enthusiastic advocate who sends Other people your way.

It's not just your sales funnel.

It's not just your email sequence.

It's everything.

Every touch point, every interaction, every experience.

The ones that you've designed intentionally and the ones that are just happening by default because you haven't thought about them yet.

And here's why this matters so much.

Your customer is on a journey, whether you've designed it or not.

Right now, people are discovering your business, forming impressions, making decisions, having experiences.

And all of that is creating a relationship with your brand that will either move them forward. Forward or stop them in their tracks.

The only question is whether that journey has been thoughtfully designed or whether it's happening accidentally.

And most businesses are in the accidentally happening category.

And that's not a criticism.

It's just a reality of building something while also running it.

You're focusing on delivering your work, serving your clients, keeping everything moving.

So. So stepping back to look at the whole journey from the outside.

It's something that rarely happens naturally, but when you do, changes everything.

Before we get into the audit process, let me walk you through the stages of a complete customer journey, because I want you to have a clear map in your head before we start looking at your own business.

So stage one is awareness.

This is the moment when someone first becomes aware that you exist. You know, they see your posts, maybe they hear your podcast, get referred by a friend, find you through a Google search, or, you know, stumble across your content somewhere online.

They don't know much about you yet.

They might not even register consciously that they've just discovered a business.

They're just aware.

And the question at this stage is, how are people finding you?

And is it happening consistently and intentionally, or is it happening only by chance?

The second stage is interest.

You know, something about you catches their attention enough that they want to know more.

Maybe they follow you on social media, maybe they read a few blog posts, maybe they listen to a couple of podcast episodes. They're not buying yet.

They're evaluating.

They're deciding whether you're actually worth their continued attention.

So the question here is, when someone finds you, is there enough to keep them there?

Is it obvious what you do, who you help, and why they should care?

Then the next stage is consideration.

This is where they're genuinely thinking about whether what you offer might be right for them.

They're reading your sales page, they're looking at your testimonials, maybe downloading your lead magnet.

They're basically in research mode, you know, comparing options, weighing up, you know, whether the investment is worth it.

And the question at this stage is, are you giving them what they need to make a confident decision?

Are you addressing their concerns?

Are you demonstrating the value and the transformation that they can expect?

And then stage four is conversion.

This is where they say, yes, they buy the course, they join the membership, they book the service.

This is the moment that most businesses focus all their energy on and then they immediately move on from it.

Conversion is not the finish line.

It's the beginning of the most important part of your journey.

So the question here is how smooth and confident feeling is the purchase process and what happens immediately after they buy.

And then stage five is experience.

And this is everything that happens once they are a customer. You know, the onboarding, the delivery, the support, the community, the results they get.

This is the stage that determines whether they stay, you know, whether they buy again and whether they tell other people.

We talked a lot about this in last week's episode. You know, it was all about customer service as a marketing tool.

So go back to that episode if you haven't tuned into that yet.

The question here is, what is the actual experience of being your customer?

And is it designed to create loyalty and results?

And then stage six is loyalty and advocacy.

And this is the stage most businesses never deliberately design for. And it's the most powerful one. It's where a customer becomes a fan, where they buy everything you release. Like, refer everyone they know.

They voluntarily talk about your business in, like, spaces that you don't even have access to.

Advocacy doesn't happen automatically just because someone had a good experience.

It happens when someone has an experience so good, so surprising, so aligned with who they are and what they needed, that they can't help but share it.

And you actually can design for it. You can. Most businesses just don't, but you can.

So I know most marketing talk tends to be about the four stages. You know, awareness, interest, consideration, conversion.

And it leaves out stage five and six, which are experience and loyalty and advocacy.

Right, so now let's talk about how to actually do this if you're already in business, because the process is slightly different from designing a journey from scratch.

If you're already in business, you already have a customer journey. It exists.

It's probably not as intentional as you'd like it to be.

So what we're doing is I'm building from zero. It's tracing what already exists, and then it identify where it needs work.

And I want you to think of this as like a marketing audit. And I really encourage you to actually do this exercise, not just listen to this episode and think, yeah, yeah, that's.

You know, it's a good idea.

I actually want you to set aside a few hours, get a piece of paper or open a document and actually map it out, because the gaps that you'll find will be worth so much more than the time you spend finding them.

So before you do anything else, I want you to try to experience your business the way a new customer would.

Google yourself, find your social media profiles, read your bio as if you've never seen it before.

You know, click the link in your bio, read your lead magnet landing page, sign up for your own email list, and see what happens.

I actually do this every single time. I create a new automation.

And it sounds really simple, but it's remarkable how many business owners have never actually done this.

Like, you're so close to your own business that you stop seeing your business the way a stranger does.

But a stranger is your potential customer, and what they experience in those first few moments determines whether they stay or go.

So go through it all. Is it actually working? Like, as in technical, you know, are all the steps actually working? Is it triggering all those kind of things? But also read it as if you don't know your business.

And as you walk through it, ask yourself, honestly, is it clear?

And then really step back, like, as if you don't know anything about it. I'm actually loving this process at the moment because if you've listened back to, I don't know, a few episodes back, I shared that I started a job again. And I really love doing this because I am so new to the space. Like, I've never worked in a high school before.

So I'm asking a lot of questions because a lot of it is not clear.

Like, there's a lot of jargon. There's a lot of.

Like, in a way, we are putting out content that it's. It's almost like we expect people to have a certain knowledge, but do they? So it's really interesting. I'm like, I'm asking a lot of questions about this, but I want you to do this about your business.

So is it clear? Is it compelling? Does it make sense and not just, you know, for you? And if you really struggle with this, get someone to do this who is not in your space who does not know a whole lot of things about your business.

Also, does it feel warm and inviting? Or is it just cold, clinical, and confusing?

You know, where did you feel uncertain about what to do next?

Where did it feel clunky or disconnected?

So write down Everything you notice, like everything.

The things that work well and the things that don't.

And remember that you're looking at your business through fresh eyes.

Just literally pretend that you know nothing, because that perspective is really valuable.

Now take each stage of the journey and map out what actually exists in your business right now.

Not what you intend to be there, just what is actually there. That's all I want you to do first.

So for awareness, how are people currently discovering you? Is it social media, word of mouth, search, podcast? Write it down and be honest about whether these channels are currently active and intentional, or whether it's sporadic and accidental.

For the second stage, for interest, when someone finds you, what do they find?

You know, do they find a complete, compelling social media profile, a website that clearly explains what you do, a body of content that demonstrates your expertise, or a half finished website, or some, you know, something that needs updating,

A social feed that hasn't been posted on in three weeks, A bio that isn't quite right, like, what is it? And I don't want you to feel guilty about any of this.

I just want you to be factual.

This is not about, you know, what you should have done, blah, blah, blah.

It's just about the facts. Once we've got this in place, then we can start working on it.

For stage three consideration, what do you have in place to help people decide?

Do you have a lead magnet?

Do you have a discovery call process, you know, testimonials, case studies, a clear and well written sales page?

Or are you hoping people just, you know, figure it out? Again, no judgment here. We're getting all the facts, just a fact finding mission for conversion.

How do people actually buy from you? You know, is it a smooth process? Is it simple?

Does it work on a mobile? Does it feel secure and confidence inspiring? Or is it clunky? Is it confusing, harder than it should be?

And I love this part.

I'm always looking at how can we make it easier.

You don't want to give people too many steps.

You also want to give people options.

Remember, we're not actually fixing things, anything here. We're just looking at, you know, what's there. That's all we're writing down.

Okay, for the next stage, for experience, what happens after they buy?

Map out everything, you know, the confirmation email, the onboarding sequence, the first week, the first month, what does a customer experience when they actually purchase from you, and how intentional is any of it?

And then for advocacy, and this is what a lot of people often don't have. So you might not actually have anything here. But for advocacy, what do you currently do to create advocates?

Do you ask for testimonials?

Do you have a referral process?

Do you create moments that are worth sharing?

Or does the journey just, you know, end when the product is delivered?

Again, don't want you to feel guilty. I just want you to write down the facts. I need you to identify the gaps.

Once you've mapped out what exists, you're going to be able to start seeing the gaps.

You know, places where the journey breaks down or just stops.

Places where a customer would be left wondering what to do next.

Places where the experience drops off or, you know, becomes less intentional.

Maybe your awareness part is strong, but your interest part part is weak.

People find you, but your profile or your website doesn't give them enough to stay.

You know, maybe your consideration stage is missing entirely. Like, you know, there's no lead magnet, no nurture sequence, nothing to sort of warm people up to help them buy.

Maybe your conversion is fine, but maybe your experience stage is almost non existent. You know, you sell well, but onboarding is an afterthought.

Maybe your experience is great, but you've never once designed for advocacy.

You deliver the results, but you don't ask for testimonials. You don't, you know, create referral moments. You don't give people a way to share their experience with others.

Every gap you find is a revenue leak.

And plugging one gap can have more impact on your business than you know, any new marketing tactic could add.

But again, I don't want you to feel guilty, like really, when we go into this process, you are stepping outside of your business. I love doing this for other businesses because I am not close to the business. I do not feel guilty about finding these gaps.

But it can be hard to do this in your own business.

Now the next thing is prioritize what to fix.

And here's the important thing, you don't fix everything at once.

You look at your map and you find the stage that's most broken. You know, the one where the most people are falling through and you start there.

And in my experience, the stages that are most commonly neglected and in this order, are experience and advocacy, then consideration, and then interest.

Most businesses put the most energy into awareness and conversion and they let the rest happen by default.

But fixing the experience stage, you know, improving what happens after someone buys, it's going to often have a faster and more significant impact on your revenue than anything you do at the awareness stage because it affects retention, it affects repeat purchases. And word of mouth all at once.

It's the most, in a way, most leveraged place to work.

You've already convinced these people to be with you.

Now you're just plugging the leaks.

Now, once you've ordered it, what exists and identified your gaps, the next step is designing what should be there.

And I want to talk about how to approach this, because I think the tendency is to jump straight to tactics. You know, what tools you should use, what my email should say, what my onboarding should look like.

But before tactics, you need a feeling.

You need to know how you want your customer to feel at each stage of the journey, because the tactics will change, you know, the tools that can evolve.

But the feeling that you're designing for should be consistent and it should be intentional throughout the whole journey.

So at awareness, you often want people to feel curious, intrigued, like they found something worth exploring.

At interest, you want people to feel seen, like you understand exactly what they're dealing with and that you have something relevant to offer.

At consideration, you want people to feel confident, like they have enough information to make a good decision and the risk feels low.

And then at conversion, you want people to feel excited, like, you know, like they've made a really good decision and they can't wait to get started.

At the experience level, you want people to feel supported, valued, capable, like they're getting real results and they're not doing it alone.

And at the advocacy level, you want people to feel proud, like. Like being part of your community is like something that's worth talking about, like recommending you to others is genuinely doing their friends a favour.

And when you design backwards from these feelings, when every tactical decision is made in service of creating a specific emotional experience, at each stage, your customer journey stops being like a funnel, and it becomes something really human.

And that's what people remember, that's what they will talk about.

So within the customer journey, there are certain moments that carry more weight than others.

Moments where the experience you create has an outsized impact on how someone feels about your business.

And I want to highlight a few of these because they're worth designing with particular care.

The first one is the first impression.

So whether it's your Instagram profile, your homepage, like website, your lead magnet, your landing page, whatever, is most likely the first thing that a new person sees.

This moment happens in seconds, and it shapes everything that follows.

It needs to be clear, it needs to be warm, and it needs to be immediately relevant to the person you're trying to reach.

The next one is the Post purchase moment.

The 24 to 48 hours after someone buys from you for the first time. This is when the buyer's remorse can set in, when the excitement can fade,

especially if it's not nurtured, and when the tone for the entire customer relationship is established. So a warm, clear, genuinely delightful onboarding experience in that 24 to 48 hour window. It creates loyalty that lasts.

The next one is the first win.

You know the moment your customer gets their first tangible result from what you've sold them.

This might be, I don't know, completing the first module and having a breakthrough or getting their first piece of feedback on something they created using your framework, or having their first call with you and feeling genuinely seen.

So help them get to this moment as quickly as possible and then acknowledge it. The first win creates belief that more wins are possible. And belief is what keeps people in.

The next one is the problem moment when something goes wrong, when they're confused, frustrated, disappointed.

How you handle this moment, you know, with speed, warmth and care.

That will do more for your relationship with that customer than almost anything else.

So I want you to design for this, have a process, make sure that it's like that. You don't leave anything to chance.

The next one is the natural exit point.

And this is for memberships especially.

There's usually like a natural moment when people consider leaving and it's often around the three month mark. You know, when the initial excitement has worn off and they're assessing whether the value is still there.

Knowing when this moment comes allows you to design proactively for it. You know, a check in a win, a re engagement, something that reconnects them to the value before they've like mentally already left.

One last thing I want to say about your customer journey map.

It's not something you do once and put in a drawer.

It's a living document that should be revisited regularly, like I would say every quarter, because your business changes, it evolves. Your office change, your customers change.

Every time you launch something new, add a stage to your journey map. Every time you get feedback, whether it's, you know, a glowing testimonial or a cancellation, look at your map and, and ask where that feedback is pointing.

Every time you notice a pattern in your business, you know, why do people come to you? Why do they stay? Why do they leave?

Update the map.

Your customer journey map is one of the most valuable strategic documents in your business because it gives you a view of your business from the outside, from your customer's perspective, which is the only perspective that actually matters when it comes to marketing.

So there you have it. How to craft your customer journey intentionally and how to audit what's already happening in your business so you can find the gaps and fix them.

So I want you to do something this week. You know, I always leave you with a task.

I want you to walk your own customer journey, Google yourself, find your own business the way a stranger would follow the path from discovery to purchase and see what you find, take notes, be honest,

and then identify the one stage that needs the most work and commit to improving it this month.

Again, do not feel guilty at any of these stages when you go through this. If this is really hard for you, engage a professional. Get someone else to do an audit like most marketers, including myself, do marketing audits to see where the gaps are. And we don't feel guilty because it's not our business.

So I want you to do it though, because you'll learn so much from it.

I don't want you to change everything. I just. Just want you to choose one, like find the biggest leak and plug it first.

That's it.

And if you'd like to do this with support, you know, mapping your customer journey, identifying the gaps, building a marketing plan around fixing them, that's exactly the kind of work we do inside the marketing Momentum membership. It's not just theory, it's practical, it's personalised, and it's done alongside a community of business owners doing the same work.

I will pop the link about the membership in the show notes so you can find out more.

And that's it. Thank you so much for tuning into the new School of Marketing podcast. Now remember, the most powerful thing you can do for your marketing, it's not finding more people.

It's designing a better journey for the people that are already finding you.

I'm Bianca McKenzie and I'll catch you next week. Until then, keep making marketing work for you.