The Retail Week Customer Experience conference will explore how retailers can connect with their digitally savvy customers.

The Retail Week Customer Experience conference will explore how retailers can connect with their digitally savvy customers.

The adage that the customer is king has never been more relevant than in today’s digital world. With consumers able to connect instantly with brands through multiple touchpoints and share their experiences in real time, the pressure to deliver a seamless and faultless customer experience is huge.

This can seem like a daunting prospect but thankfully help is at hand. With a stellar roll-call of speakers representing some of the country’s leading retail brands, the Retail Week Customer Experience conference has all the information you need to ensure you deliver a memorable customer experience across all channels.

While other events will typically cover one aspect of the customer experience, this conference will take you on an end-to-end customer journey, tackling all those factors critical to getting your customer experience strategy right – including analysis, engagement and organisational structure – so that no stone is left unturned.

Retail Week Customer Experience in a nutshell

What is it? A one-day event tailored to providing you with knowledge, ideas and inspiration to develop and implement a customer-centric strategy

When is it? Tuesday, October 21

Where is it? 30 Euston Square, London NW1

How much is it? Tickets start at £849, with various packages available. For information on group discounts, contact Nigel Plain on 020 83033 4253 or email nigel.plain@emap.com

Where can I find out more? For the full speaker line-up and agenda download the conference brochure here

Session themes

From how to plan and implement customer experience insight, to how to create a customer-centric organisational structure, delegates will leave the event equipped with the insight and inspiration needed to implement a coherent customer experience strategy.

Each session is designed to explore one of six main themes: customer interaction, customer loyalty, engagement, experience, insight and people. Delegates will learn how to unlock the value of data to better understand the customer without adversely impacting the customer experience. They will hear how the role of the marketing professional continues to evolve, including the rise of customer directors, and how to create the ideal customer-centric organisational structure.

Speakers will present the latest thinking in connecting with today’s digital consumer to create more compelling customer experiences and explain how using the latest technologies can transform your in-store experience.

Breakout sessions will enable delegates to hear industry experts present case studies on subjects such as enhancing the customer experience through effective social media use, building a connection with your consumers, creating a seamless customer experience and the strengths and weaknesses of loyalty card schemes.

Meanwhile, interactive sessions will allow delegates to voice concerns, generate dialogue and find solutions to some of the key challenges in retail today.

Introducing the line-up

Held at 30 Euston Square in London on October 21, the Retail Week Customer Experience programme is put together following extensive research and conversations with senior marketing, customer experience and brand leaders. In order to guarantee the rigour of the programme, proposed content is then reviewed by an advisory board whose members include representatives from John Lewis, Tesco, Harrods, Pets at Home and many more.

The keynote speech will be delivered by Patrick Bousquet-Chavanne, Marks & Spencer executive director, marketing and international. Boasting more than 25 years’ experience in the international branded consumer goods industry, Bousquet-Chavanne will discuss how successful branding is aligned for an engaging customer experience leaning on his own experience of working with some of the world’s most recognisable brands at the likes of cosmetics giant Estée Lauder and spirits company Brown-Forman.

He will share his insight into the key ingredients needed to build a successful brand identity for your store and how you can communicate the value of your brand to your digitally savvy customers and how this in turn translates into delivering an engaging, consistent customer experience.

The schedule for the conference is packed full of retail leaders exploring the most pressing industry issues. Julian Diment, marketing director of the newly merged Dixons Carphone, will offer his opinions on how to engage with today’s digital consumer. Pets At Home commercial director Peter Pritchard will discuss whether loyalty programmes are necessary, while Dene Jones, customer director at Shop Direct, will answer the question ‘is your organisation structured to be customer-centric’. There will also be sessions on global brand building, big data, the customer experience, loyalty and technology.

Other speakers on the day will include Chloe Macintosh, co-founder and creative director of Made.com, the design-led furniture etailer, and Magda Kolesinski, commercial director of Sofa.com, both of whom will present during a session entitled ‘How personal do you want to get with personalisation?’.

With exclusive insights from some of the industry’s leading retail lights, delegates will go away brimming with new ideas about how to connect with consumers.

For any retailer that puts the customer at the heart of their business, Retail Week Customer Experience is one event not to be missed.