This article will appear on 360 Magazine but is published here first to provide value to the CXPA community.
Congratulations on appointing (or becoming) your company’s first chief customer officer! You have joined the ranks of the many, many firms who are not only demonstrating their commitment to customer experience design by adding another member of the C-suite but — most likely — will issue a press release about it.
That’s where I come in. As a journalist, I’m scanning the PR wires every day looking for breaking news from companies and announcements that might become the impetus for a story.
I don’t actually write press releases myself (even as part of my content marketing practice) but I read enough of them that I can tell what will attract interest and what will be ignored.
And unfortunately, the vast majority of chief customer officer press releases are unlikely to become headline news.
There’s almost a formula to these announcements:
- After identifying who their first chief customer officer will be, there’s a brief bio paragraph that suggests the person in question has about 20-plus years of experience . . . in something. I’ve never seen one where the chief customer officer has any specific CX training or has earned their CCXP.
- There are canned quotes which were obviously written by a corporate communications person in which the new chief customer officer talks about how excited they are to be given this great opportunity, and sometimes one from the CEO that comes down to, “See? We’re really taking this CX stuff seriously!”
- The usual boilerplate about the company and sometimes a PR contact, who can rest assured they will not be contacted — at least about this particular press release.
The cookie-cutter nature of these press releases is a shame, given that appointing a chief customer officer is such a key milestone in any organization’s CX journey.
Simply announcing a new hire suggests that the company is throwing a body at their CX problem, rather than telling a story about a transformation that may already be well underway.
If you’re taking on a new chief customer officer job somewhere, or if you’re part of a team that’s going to be announcing one, here are some ideas on how to make the press release something journalists (and the rest of the world) will value:
Demonstrate impact, not just experience:
Did you new chief customer officer previously work at a company where they lead sales, marketing or customer service teams? Great, but so what? Lots of people hold down jobs, even senior ones, without accomplishing much.
Give at least one significant achievement that suggests they can take an organization from A to B. Perhaps they drove a boost in revenue (because they made the purchasing experience better).
Maybe they reduced the volume of calls that came into the contact centre, or drove higher CSAT through their use of social media channels.
These details are probably in the public domain anyway (such as on the person’s LinkedIn profile) so show you’ve brought on a real winner.
Explain what they’ll do, and with whom they’ll do it:
Oh, so your new chief customer officer will “lead programs to help (the company’s) customers reach their unique business objectives through the strategic use of (the company’s products)?” That’s taken verbatim from a specific company’s press release, but it could really be almost any company’s press release. It says nothing.
Imagine the difference when a company announces the new chief customer officer will analyze voice of the customer data and translate it into action in order to reduce common errors in the company’s flagship product.
Think about what it says when it’s clear the chief customer officer will have a dedicated team, or that groups like customer success or customer service now report into them.
Make sure your chief customer officer doesn’t appear to be just another figurehead at the top of the org chart.
Share their vision of customer centricity:
Instead of the canned quote, why not opt for something genuine? Have the chief customer officer talk about what they want to see, do and feel when they’re engaging with their favourite brands.
Tell a short story (even if it’s about a bad experience) that explains why they’re motivated and driven to pursue CX as a career.
Even a few words about what they hope to learn from customers would make their appointment more compelling and meaningful.
The fact is, most press releases gather the digital equivalent of dust once they’ve been sent out into the world. That’s probably because, in this case, the appointment of a chief customer officer is treated as a “story” in and of itself. Remember that it’s really just the beginning of a new chapter in your company’s CX story. And make sure you hook your audience from the start.