A user journey map integrates identifiable steps, from actions, tasks, feelings, to areas of improvements.

How to build a user journey map in UX

Defining user goals, tasks, feelings, and areas of improvement

User journey maps complement user personas and user stories. Like a road map, a user journey map defines the strings of experiences users on their journey to reach their intended goal.

Think of the 3-tiered user definition, persona, user story, journey map, like a book. The persona is your protagonist character, the user story represents your plot, and the journey map is your story outline.

The user persona, the user story, and the user journey map build the 3-tiered user structure for whom we are designing the product.

First, we define the user persona for our project. Then, the user story clarifies the who, what, and why. To complete the set up of our user, we craft the user journey map, outlining the entire sequence of events and interactions the user has while using our product or service.

A user journey map helps the UX design team focus on how a user persona, not we (the design team) thinks and feels as a user throughout the journey.

The 5 principal steps of a user journey map

From goal to opportunities of improvement

The user journey map hits on these 5 key steps: Set goal, actions to take to get there, the tasks required by the actions, the feelings the user has while performing the tasks, and lastly, where are opportunities of improvement.

A user journey map focuses on 5 important questions to ask:

1. What is the user’s goal?

2. What actions are necessary to reach goal?

3. What tasks are required to take on the action?

4. How is the user feeling while performing these action tasks?

5. Where are opportunities of improvement, especially integrating accessibility improvements?

Based on these five key points, we can build the user journey as an easy-to-read map.

The user journey map overview