The ideal multichannel org chart

The new chief customer officer

For marketing to function fully in its new role that blends science with art, retail executive level management needs basically to think across all channels, too. The “C” level (chief executive, chiefs of finance, operating, and merchandising) now needs to include the new role of the chief customer officer — an executive who has experience beyond advertising and sales promotion.

Although advertising/sales promotion remains important, that expertise is now combined with database marketing, customer analytics, primary and secondary market research, and proprietary credit card marketing, to name a few of the skills critical for this new role.

Today's chief customer officer needs to be fluent in many marketing languages: mass media (radio, TV, newspapers, GRPs); direct marketing (marketing databases, control groups, testing, ROI, CPM, NCOA, modeling, etc.); Internet and e-commerce (SEO, PPC, navigation, e-mail, opt in/opt out, privacy, spam, Google).

And today's chief customer officer must function as a tactical facilitator, drawing information and skills from C-level counterparts, to build bridges across silos and place the customer and customer information in the center of the enterprise.

In a CCO-led multichannel world, all channels are on parity, with the customer in the driver's seat. Although chief customer officers respect traditional retail operating silos, they know how to partner with them in building and maintaining the database.

The new chief customer officers recognize the need to educate the other C-level areas on the new value of cross-channel customer information. They remain in charge of the traditional four Ps — product, price, promotion and placement — but customer information has now acquired a dominant position.

Chief customer officers work to develop programs that impact the company's bottom line, which is now supported by customer-specific information. In today's multichannel retail world, the C-level suite recognizes the CCO as the expert on all customers, regardless of channel.

Customer info is king

In this new organizational structure, most of the channel-specific position titles remain under marketing, but all look at customer data and behavior first, and then adapt creative, messaging, policies, media, analytics, etc., to accommodate each channel with the company brand remaining paramount.

The results collected are monitored via specific channel, but are also shared and interpreted across channel into a multidimensional view of the customer. This information is eventually rolled up to provide additional strategic tools to the “C” suite.

The new realities of retailing present many challenges. The retail industry is moving away from presenting what the retailer says the customer should buy and where she wants to shop to hearing what the customer wants and responding to those needs.

Top management may have been slow to recognize the new role of marketing, especially since retail has been hard hit by other challenges in recent years. But with customers now assuming more control in the retailing equation, you need to create an organization that addresses decision-making from a customer perspective.

Francey Smith (francey@franceysmith.com) is president of retail marketing consultancy Francey Smith & Associates.