The International, Bolton, Mass.
November 7
8:00-8:30 Breakfast and networking
8:30-8:45 Welcome
8:45-9:30
The New Vision: Customers for Life
Presenter: Dean Robison, senior vice president/global services, Salesforce.com
In theory, great support leads to long-term, loyal customer relationships. Building long-term loyalty is fairly easy for small companies, but it’s a difficult challenge to make each customer feel loved and listened to on a very large scale. Here’s how a fast-growing, SaaS-oriented market leader handles this problem.
9:30-10:30
How We Did It: Support Plans Based on Customer Feedback
Presenter: Dave Nowlan, product line director, service products, Dialogic
As Dialogic struggled to assimilate a series of acquired companies, its support plans grew increasingly complex. The solution: Ask customers which support features they really valued. Using this feedback, Dialogic created a portfolio of segmented plans that customers (and Dialogic’s sales force) have embraced.
10:30-10:45 Break
10:45-11:45
Support Innovation: International Perspectives
How do overseas customers feel about new “voice of the customer” trends, self-help communities, and social media?
- Leonardo Casado, Product Support Content Manager, Autodesk
- Andrey Nikulin, Head of Education & Web Services, Kaspersky Lab
- Mike Levesque, Technical Support Manager, GT Solar
12:00-1:15 Lunch
1:30-3:00
State of the Art: The New Metrics
Three hands-on experts talk about how they’ve made a transition to outcome-based and customer-centric performance metrics.
- Building a Unified View of Customer Metrics
Presenter: Peter Swaim, Senior Manager, Customer Insights, ACI Worldwide - Fine-Tuning Web Support with A/B Testing
Presenter: Christine Egli, Product Manager, Worldwide Online Support, Mentor Graphics - Winning Internal Buy-In for New Metrics
Presenter: Lance Phillips, Director of Global Support/Americas, Red Hat
3:00-3:15 Break
3:15-5:15
The VOC Innovation Showcase, Part I
Selected by our conference Advisory Board, these eight Innovation Showcase presenters (four today, four tomorrow) have implemented leading-edge concepts in “voice of the customer” support and customer engagement. Each presenter will describe their goals, success metrics, and lessons learned from their company’s approach, followed by an open-mike Q&A with the audience.
- Showcase #1: The “Customer Success Index”
Presenter: Michael Pace, Director of Customer Support, Constant Contact - Showcase #2: Hercules, the Atlassian Support Bot
Presenter: Jeremy Largman, Knowledge Management Project Manager, Atlassia - Showcase #3: Customer-Driven KB Maintenance
Presenter: Leonardo Casado, Product Support Content Manager, Autodesk - Showcase #4: E-Learning Heroes
Presenter: Justin Wilcox, Customer Support Manager, Articulate
5:30-6:30
Sponsors’ Reception
6:30-8:00
Networking Dinner
Join us for a lively gourmet dinner with our speakers in the Fireplace Room at The International. (Reservations required; $60 per person.)
November 8
8:00-8:30 Breakfast and networking
8:30-9:15
Building a Multi-Channel Support Model
Presenter: Julie Larsen, vice president, e-services, EMC
We’re moving rapidly into a world where customers want to engage with support organizations in a sometimes-bewildering mix of channels–Web services, e-mail, community forums, chat, phone, social media, and perhaps others we haven’t even explored. Each of these channels has its own dynamics, yet somehow a support organization has to develop an integrated strategy to serve everyone. Here’s how EMC has tackled this problem.
9:15-9:30 Break
9:30-11:45
The VOC Innovation Showcase, Part II
Selected by our conference Advisory Board, the eight Innovation Showcase presenters have implemented leading-edge concepts in “voice of the customer” support and customer engagement. Each presenter will describe the background, success metrics, and lessons learned from their company’s approach, followed by an open-mike Q&A with the audience.
- Showcase #5: The “Secure Customer Index
Presenter: Karl Sharicz, Manager, Customer Intelligence, Simplex-Grinnell - Showcase #6: The ROI of Team Scoring
Presenter: Peter Holt, Director of Technical Support, Progress Software - Showcase #7: Clouds Within Clouds
Presenter: Summer Maynard, Senior Manager, Support Product Management, Red Hat - Showcase #8: The “Single Source of Truth” Playbook
Presenter: Sandy Perkins, AVP, Customer Support and Customer Center of Excellence, Trizetto Group
12:00-3:00 Lunch & Breakouts
We’ll wrap up the conference with a working lunch to discuss customer engagement best practices. We’ll collect ideas for specific discussion topics on the First Wednesday LinkedIn forum before the conference and we’ll also have an onsite suggestion box Nov. 7 for more ideas. The most popular topics will become the focus of breakout sessions over lunch with speakers and showcase presenters. Then we’ll reconvene in a plenary session and have each group present their recommendations for improving customer engagement activities.
[Program subject to change]
