visualize the experience of a person over time
help to find gaps in CX & explore potential solutions
structured as a series of steps: events, moments, experiences, interactions
usually have various scales to represent different aspects of one experience (different zoom levels)
help make "intangible" experiences visible and facilitate common understanding
can be assumption or research based

Types

Focus

Product-centered — map containing only touchpoints (interactions between customer & product); everything outside the company is hidden; e.g. useful for onboarding mapping; may miss important contextual info
XP-centered — reflects situational context and shows how touchpoints are embedded in overall experience; often the design challenge shifts from "what is the onboarding XP?" to "what is the XP of moving houses, and where does the electricity provider swap fit in?"

Main actor — usually a persona or multiple
Stages — main phases of the actor's experience
Steps — sequence of steps from the actor's perspective
Storyboards — illustrations with sketches, photos
Emotional journey — graphs representing satisfaction at each step (often [-2, +2])
Channels — means of communication involved in each step
Stakeholders — who should be involved in research, prototyping & implementation
Dramatic arc — actor's engagement at each step
'What if?' — what could go wrong at each step
Jobs to be done — what the service helps the actor achieve at each step
Objectives, actions, required resources, artifacts, touchpoints, opportunities, pain points, anxieties

Channel — the method by which a business communicates to customers (app, website, print, etc.)
Touchpoint — any point where a customer observes or interacts with the brand