Customer Advisory Boards: Jumpstart Your Customer Experience Model

Designing a customer experience model that works, and finding a lever to get traction at a strategic level provides both challenge and opportunity for marketing leaders.

In a recent interviews conducted by Farland Group with leading Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) and Chief Information Officers (CIOs), we found that more than 85 percent of their companies struggle to bring their engagement strategies to life. We have found with B2B companies one of the most effective tools to push the envelope on your customer experience model and specifically to create a deliberate customer listening strategy is the Customer Advisory Board.

How Customer Advisory Boards Jumpstart your Customer Experience

Leadership: Customer Advisory Boards Start at the Top

Customer Advisory Boards, by design are led from the top and require executive commitment and involvement to make them successful.  This has several implications.  Most importantly, it signals the importance of your strategic customers to your company. And signals to the company that customer experience is worthy of executive attention and resources.  This filters across other customer efforts and becomes embedded in the culture over time.

Conversation: A Systematic Channel for Listening.

From your clients’ lips to your ears – CABs provide one of the most effective channels available for listening to your most senior strategic clients, which is a core prerequisite to an innovative client experience model.  The rigor around a well-executed CAB builds the conduit for conversation, and the trust to make it insightful, strategic and action-oriented.  The peer discussions that ensue in the course of the meetings increase the benefits of listening exponentially.

Roadmap: To What Matters Most To Your Customers

Customers who engage with you over time through a CAB will give you all of the insight you need to understand not only what is important to them now, but how to shape your company and your strategic direction to enhance and enrich their experience going forward.

The principles behind a successful CAB – including co-creation, active listening and taking action on advice – provide a blueprint for how to enhance and strengthen your other customer experience activities.  As you start to get results from your strategic advisors, you will have fuel to drive change with others using the same principles.

If you want to jumpstart your customer experience program in a way that gains attention and moves the needle with your most strategic customers, consider a Client Advisory Board.

For more information on building a Client Advisory Board, see our other posts on this blog, including the top five tricks and how to know you are ready for one.

Related Stories

Set Your Customer Advisory Council Up for Success: Recruit Your Internal Team First

Posted on 06.22.2023 by in Customer Advisory Boards

When launching a Customer Advisory Council significant thought and attention goes into recruiting members – what criteria to use, whom to invite, and ensuring the mix is on target. However, the same care is not always taken when putting together  

Continue Reading »

Customer Advisory Boards: How Difficult Conversations Drive Change

Posted on 04.27.2023 by in Customer Advisory Boards

One of my first jobs out of university was working in the headquarters office of a local business with several locations. In this role, I worked closely with the customer service representatives, and we received feedback, questions, and  

Continue Reading »

Putting the Peer in Client Engagement

Posted on 03.6.2023 by in Customer Advisory Boards, Featured, Understanding the C-Suite

In this era of social connectedness, opinions and input from peers are of paramount importance to driving buying decisions and the adoption of new enterprise products and services. In working with executive engagement programs, the power of peer  

Continue Reading »

Ramping up Customer Advisory Council Recruiting

Posted on 01.31.2023 by in Customer Advisory Boards, Featured

When the end of a calendar year closes, hand in hand come a number of retirements and role changes in the C-suite, which has an impact on Customer Advisory Council membership. While a number of open seats on your  

Continue Reading »


Customer Advisory Boards

Customer Advisory Boards are powerful engines of engagement, insight, and business transformation. Make the most of yours.

Meeting Facilitation: Virtual and In-Person Boards » Taking Your Customer Advisory Board Meetings Virtual »

Learn More »

Engagement Strategy

Like any good relationship, customer engagement is a long-term, reciprocal effort. When done well, meaningful engagement leads to better business results, faster.

Engage Your Customers to Help You Stop Pitching » Getting to a Customer Engagement Mindset »

Learn More »

Understanding the C-Suite

Building C-level programs that are meaningful and bring value to you as well as to your c-suite customers is challenging. Veiled sales pitches won’t win the day with this audience. Deliver what executives want: ideas, inspiration, innovation, influence.

Building a C-Suite Client Experience Strategy » Do you Know What Your Customers Value? »

Learn More »