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The purpose of this study is to provide in-depth knowledge on customer-facing technology and customer experience in the grocery retail sector, including how the value-added potential of customer-facing technologies may be enhanced.

The analysis is based on 30 in-depth interviews with “early adopters” of customer-facing digital retail technologies in the Norwegian grocery sector. Theoretically, the study draws on notions of the customer journey and customer experience.

The study contributes to deepening insights concerning how digital retail technology is used and may be geared to further increase value for customers, specifically how retailers may use data on customers and products to personalize digital retail technology offerings and gain a competitive advantage. The findings underline how customer value is context-dependent and show that while grocery retail customers primarily emphasize utilitarian benefits related to customer-facing technologies, hedonic benefits are valuable biproducts. Moreover, the study showcases how personalization is key in addressing customers’ needs and wants, and may serve to increase the overall value of customer-facing technologies for customers and retailers.

The study’s sector-specific focus on technology in use contributes to enhance knowledge on how digital retail technologies can be leveraged to the benefit of customers and retailers, including customers’ sector-specific needs and wants.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework based on customer journeys for a structured portrayal of service delivery from the customer’s point of view. The paper also introduces customer journey analysis (CJA) for empirical investigation of individual service experiences in a multichannel environment.

The paper presents case studies for onboarding new customers on broadband services. CJA starts with modeling of the service process in terms of touchpoints. The individual customer journeys are reconstructed through methodological triangulation of interviews, diary studies, and process tracking.

The paper provides empirical insights into individual customer journeys. Four types of deviations during service delivery are identified: occurrence of ad hoc touchpoints, irregularities in the sequence of logically connected touchpoints, occurrence of failures in touchpoints, and missing touchpoints. CJA seems effective in revealing problematic and incoherent service delivery that may result in unfavorable customer experiences.

For a service company, the proposed framework may serve as a unifying language to ease cross-departmental communication and approach service quality in a systematic way. CJA discloses the gap between the planned and actual service delivery and can be used as a tool for service improvement.

The framework provides concepts, definitions, and a visual notation to structure and manage services in terms of customer journeys. CJA is a novel method for empirical studies of the service delivery process and the associated customer experience.

Customer journeys have become an increasingly important topic in service management and design. The purpose of this paper is to review customer journey terminology and approaches within the research literature prior to 2013, mainly from the fields of design, management, and marketing.

The study was conducted as a systematic literature review. Searches in Google Scholar, Scopus, Web of Knowledge, ACM Digital Library, and ScienceDirect identified 45 papers for the analysis. The papers were analyzed with respect to customer journey terminology and approaches, the relation to customer experience, the referenced background, and the use of visualizations.

Across the reviewed literature, customer journeys are described not only as a means to take the viewpoint of the customer, but also to reach insight into their experiences. A rich and at times incoherent customer journey terminology is analyzed and discussed, as are two emerging customer journey approaches: customer journey mapping (analysis of a service process “as is”) and customer journey proposition (generative activities leading toward a possible service “to be”).

The review is limited to analyzing and making claims on research papers that explicitly apply the term customer journey. In most of the reviewed papers, customer journeys are not the main object of interest but are discussed as one of several topics.

A nuanced discussion of customer journey terminology and approaches is provided, supporting the practical application of a customer journey perspective.

The review contributes a needed common basis for future customer journey research and practice.