CustomerThink Names Thought Leaders to Global Advisory Council

BURLINGAME, Calif.; Jan. 16, 2008—CustomerThink, the only global online community for customer-centric business leaders, today announced its 2008 panel of Advisors. It is a panel built for a new world of customer relationships, where customers are shaping the business-client relationship more than ever before.

Recognizing that executives need a high-quality resource with practical information about attracting new customers—and profitably retaining old ones—CustomerThink has named to its 2008 Advisory Council thought leaders, who, because of their unique skill sets; passion about issues; and proven commitment are certain to make the community even more popular in the year ahead.

"For customer-centric business models to thrive, dated thinking about CRM must fall by the wayside. I am incredibly excited about this year's Advisory Council because they understand how key organizational positions—from senior executives to marketing, sales, customer service and IT managers—must unite their independent points of view to put customers at the heart of business," said CustomerThink founder Bob Thompson. "Our mission is to create a shared vision of how best to create a customer-centric enterprise."

Unlike most other online "CRM" communities, CustomerThink consistently attracts an executive-level audience. As one CEO said in a recent member survey, "CustomerThink offers fresh, effective customer-concentric ideas and strategies that stimulate creative strategies to implement in our business."

The majority of CustomerThink's global site visitors are in mid- to upper-level business management positions, from small companies to the global elite. In 2008, through its web site and email newsletters, CustomerThink will reach more than five million people in 200 countries around the world.

Since completely revamping the web site in January 2007, using Web 2.0 principles and a new content strategy, CustomerThink has seen a phenomenal increase in participation. "We gave the CustomerThink community a web site that they could help shape by directly posting content," Thompson said. It paralleled the rise of the Social Web, where people are more active and, as consumers, more vocal about their needs, he said. "Our members have really taken this to heart, in the past year writing more than 500 blog posts, nearly 800 news items and over 1,000 comments."

The new class of Advisors, hailing from North and South America, Asia and Europe, have not only contributed the most formal articles, blog posts and comments to the site but also are set to use their expertise in management for CEOs, marketers, sales, service and IT executives to help business leaders stay ahead of the seismic shift in customer relationships.

The 2008 Advisory Council includes the following Advisors returning from last year:

• Bob Thompson, CustomerThink Corp. (United States), chair
• Jim Barnes, Barnes Marketing Associates (Canada)
• Jeanne Bliss, CustomerBLISS (United States)
• Olga Botero, Grupo Bancolombia (Colombia)
• Silvana Buljan, Smartworxx (Spain)
• Graham Hill, CACI Sophron (Germany)
• Dick Lee, High-Yield Methods (United States)
• Sampson Lee, GCCRM (China)
• Michael Lowenstein, Harris Interactive Loyalty (United States)
• Jodie Monger, Customer Relationship Metrics (United States)
• David Rance, Round (United Kingdom)
• Liz Roche, Hewlett-Packard Co. (United States)
• Howard Schneider, Metzner-Schneider Associates (United States)
• Colin Shaw, Beyond Philosophy (United Kingdom)
• Jim Sterne, Target Marketing of Santa Barbara (United States)
• Barry Trailer, CSO Insights (United States)

New members of the Advisory Council in 2008 are:

• Vandana Ahuja, Jaypee Institute of Information Technology University (India)
• Daryl Choy, WisdomBoom (Hong Kong)
• Mei Lin Fung, Institute of Service Organization Excellence (United States)
• Bob Furniss, Touchpoint Associates (United States)
• Jill Griffin, The Griffin Group (United States)
• Bob Kaden, The Kaden Company (United States)
• Laura Patterson, VisionEdge Marketing, Inc. (United States)
• Denis Pombriant, Beagle Research Group, LLC (United States)
• Andrew Rudin, Outside Technologies, Inc. (United States)
• Scott Santucci, BluePrint Marketing (United States)
• Alan See, Seapine Software (United States)
• John I. Todor, The Whetstone Edge, LLC (United States)

Over the next year, the panel will discuss and collaborate on the key issues that will help drive customer-centric business strategies into boardrooms throughout the world. This year's CustomerThink Retreat will be held in June in Barcelona, Spain. During this global summit of industry leading thinkers, Advisors will develop a set of rationalized models that will help bring clarity to the marketplace.

You can learn more about CustomerThink's 2008 Advisory Council at www.customerthink.com/advisory_council. Each Advisor also has a dynamic home page that lists the author's blogs and articles, along with biographical information.

"I am very impressed with the caliber of this year's panel of Advisors, and I'm delighted to welcome them to our thought leader council," Thompson said. "They will help us continue to help business leaders build and execute more customer-centric strategies that improve top- and bottom-line performance."

About CustomerThink

CustomerThink, the global thought leader in customer-centric business strategy, was founded in 2000 (as CRMGuru.com) by Bob Thompson, CEO of CustomerThink Corp. The site was renamed to CustomerThink in April 2007. CustomerThink's mission is to help business leaders develop and implement customer-centric business strategies. CustomerThink does this by publishing high-quality articles, blogs and discussion; by conducting research on key issues and trends; and by facilitating interactions with a global panel of experts.

Contact:
Bob Thompson
(650) 343-8529
bob@customerthink.com

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