Customer engagement is the buzzword of the year. According to Bluewolf’s 2013-2014 State of Salesforce Review, 60% of business leaders say customer engagement is a top priority, and 84% believe it will surpass productivity as the primary driver of business growth.
In spite of this, many organizations don’t see the role of the customer marketer as one that is strategically necessary to improving customer engagement. Or, they have a customer marketer, but not a well-defined engagement strategy.
This explains why it’s tough to find a comprehensive customer marketer job description. Most simply focus on the tactical, day-to-day tasks of a customer marketer.
That’s why we decided to crowdsource a more inspiring customer marketer job description. We asked our advocates in Influitive VIP—an exclusive community for forward-thinking customer marketers—to share the skills and experience needed for customer marketers to boost engagement, customer advocacy, and (as a result) revenue.
Customer Marketer Job Description
Job overview:
- Customer marketers are pioneers. This position is part of an emerging marketing field that is becoming a strategic necessity at customer-focused companies (especially in B2B) to help brands gain a competitive edge
- Customer marketers delight and engage customers. The customer marketer builds stronger relationships with customers through engaging marketing campaigns. Their mission is to build a community of fanatic brand advocates
- Customer marketers create value. This position directly benefits sales and marketing teams by increasing customer advocacy (including referrals, testimonials, references, etc.), identifying cross-sell and upsell opportunities, and increasing loyalty and retention. Good customer marketers don’t shy away from proving how they drive revenue
- Customer marketers flex their creative muscles. This position requires creative marketing and communication skills to engage and motivate customer advocates
- Customer marketers are human bridges. These personable, outgoing marketers are effective communicators who act as a liaison between customers and the rest of the organization. While they need to be able to work independently, they know the importance of collaborating with other departments to create an incredible customer experience and reach business goals
Personal qualities:
- Strong passion for serving and understanding customers
- Interpersonal skills to help them nurture customer relationships and work with cross-functional teams
- Incredibly creative marketing and communication skills
- Strong analytical skills to determine marketing effectiveness and ROI of customer engagement efforts
- Strategic thinker that can see beyond the day-to-day grind to help reach marketing and sales goals, create a stronger brand, and improve the customer experience
Knowledge & previous experience:
- Education: Bachelor’s degree with emphasis on communications, marketing, and business
- Previous Customer Service, Customer Success, or Account Management experience
- Technical knowledge of the latest digital marketing tools and channels, including Customer Relationship Management platforms and marketing automation platforms
- Experience creating and executing marketing campaigns and programs that drive customer engagement
- Ability to write effective copy is a necessity; graphic design capabilities a plus
- Familiarity with B2B marketing, lead generation, and sales process space
Strategic responsibilities:
- Build rapport with customers to increase renewals, referrals, and cross-sell and upsell opportunities
- Lead and manage customer engagement and communication programs, such as: in-person/virtual events, workshops, annual conferences, awards programs, onboarding and ongoing nurture campaigns
- Connecting with customers to ensure continued education and success throughout the relationship lifecycle
- Identifying key customers that can act as a marketing channel through case studies, speaking opportunities, etc.
- Help marketing and sales meet business objectives through customer advocacy initiatives
Tactical responsibilities:
- Compose and send customer emails
- Manage and maintain engagement and advocacy programs; continually recruit new customer advocates
- Manage a library of up-to-date customer success stories
- Manage annual/biannual/quarterly customer satisfaction surveys to drive change throughout the organization
- Develop a customer lifecycle campaign program and work with marketing operations to implement
- Create special marketing content for account management/customer success to help at-risk customers with training; or target happy customers for upsell, cross-sell, and advocacy opportunities
- Provide product feedback given by advocates to the Product Management team
Growth opportunities:
- Director of Customer Marketing
- Director of Advocate Marketing
- Director of Customer Success/Customer Success Manager
- Customer Acquisition Manager
- CMO
- VP of Marketing
- Audience Segmentation Manager
- Chief Customer Officer
- Chief Digital Officer
