What do you get when you cross a Product Director with a Performance Marketing Director? Answer – a Customer Director…
What does a chief customer officer do?
A Chief Product Officer or Product Director in the digital world (not to be confused with a Product Director in the retail world!) is in charge of the team that builds on-line experiences. A Performance Marketer’s role is to lead people to that on-line (and possibly off-line) experience. In the simplistic marketing model of Acquire/Convert/Retain, the Performance Marketing team will acquire and retain and the Product team will work on conversion. The point of the Chief Customer Officer, or Customer Director, is to have both these areas reporting into a central function to create (and represent) a customer journey perspective. Whilst it may seem axiomatic that the customer should be at the centre of all decision making, it is often the case that as businesses expand and specialisation leads to political siloes and breakdown in common-sense communication. If we see the general move to digital as a solvent that breaks down these siloes, removes insulating layers of management and realigns relationships then the Customer Director is the manifestation of an organisation that is much better aligned to customer wants, needs and behaviours.
What makes a good Customer Director?
A good Customer Director will be able to understand the psychological and economic levers that give a customer a great experience. At the cutting edge of this effort will be AI driven recommendation engines but much of the work will centre around getting the basics right and trying to keep up with the ever-changing digital landscape and expectations of customers.
Caveat – This is a relatively new job title and can mean different things to different people.
How our digital leadership headhunters can help you
If you are looking for a Customer Director to increase the market penetration of your ecommerce enterprise, contact us today. Hannington Tame have years of experience headhunting, recruiting and placing the very best candidates into senior digital and ecommerce roles.
