Monday, January 10, 2011

 Customer Reference Forum announces the addition of new presenters from the most dynamic customer engagement programs in the world, including Intel, SAP, Xerox, Hitachi Data Systems, Avaya and Webroot. They'll be at the 2011 Summit on Customer Engagement, March 1-2, Santa Clara, CA.  (#2011SCE).

"They're bringing customers right into their organizational processes," says Bill Lee, President of Customer Strategy Group and Customer Reference Forum. "And they're helping to spread word of mouth, build brand, increase demand generation, close deals, co-design and co-innovate, and improve corporate strategy."

New presenters for the Summit include:

- Asim Zaheer, vice president, WW Corporate & Product Marketing at Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), will show how HDS has gone from "best kept secret to top of mind" by deploying its passionate customer advocates to build the firm's brand and market share, while increasing the firm's revenue relative to its market place.

- Intel's Rhett Livengood, director of enterprise customer engagement programs at Intel, will lead a panel of expert practitioners in the art of influencer marketing. They'll discuss how leading firms engage with influencers, develop relationships with them, and turn them into advocates.

- Salim Ali, Global Vice President, Marketing will show how SAP is leveraging communities and social media in new ways to accelerate demand generation and amplify business impact. Attendees will get insights into perspectives on the evolution of enterprise marketing, new community marketing models and details on how it delivers greater reach, deeper relationships and higher conversion rates.

- Thought leader and award winning marketing executive Paul Dunay will show how social media will change customer reference programs. Will social media kill customer references? To the contrary, social media presents tremendous opportunities for customer reference managers — provided their programs make the right changes. Paul is the author of Buzz Marketing for Technology, Facebook Marketing for Dummies, and global managing director of services and social marketing at Avaya.

- Laura Ramos, vice president of industry marketing in North America, will show how Xerox Services uses Web-based video—the most important communication tool in the 21st century—to engage customers much more effectively to drive demand generation, support community building, and support thought leadership for the firm.

- Kerri Shea-Beers, director of marketing at Webroot, will show how she single handedly developed a simple, effective framework of metrics for Webroot's customer reference program, without incurring substantial outlays, that has won the support of both sales and senior management.