John Abraham leads our Net Promoter^® business unit at Satmetrix. His group is responsible for best practice exchange, conferences, training & certification, and online services for companies using Net Promoter to drive improvements in customer loyalty. Satmetrix created Net Promoter with customer loyalty expert Fred Reichheld, and the company now hosts the official Net Promoter community web site at www.netpromoter.com. Prior to joining Satmetrix, John was with Risk Management Solutions (RMS), a leading risk management software and consulting firm, where he was responsible for marketing, training services, knowledge management, and customer loyalty programs. Prior to RMS, he worked as a management and systems consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton and Accenture. John has an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Morphing the research world with that of academia creates something of a feral two-headed ogre. Nils’ work on both sides of the research and academic spheres seeks to bring innovation and novel thinking to brand management approaches and to find new sales areas and functional direction for multinational brands. These brands encompass Fortune 100 companies in various industries, ranging from consumer goods to health care services. And the mission is always clear. It is to make brands and products more desirable. Nils is a Professor in Social Media Marketing and received a PhD in Marketing and in Psychology from the University of Hamburg. He is Associate Editor for practicing marketers of the Association of Consumer Research and is a Committee Member of INFORMS, the international scientific society.

Marc is Head of the Enterprise Solutions Group in Europe. He is a 17 year veteran of Abbott Laboratories. Marc has an extensive Finance background which culminated in Commercial Controller of the Abbott Diagnostics Division. In 2006 Marc moved into Marketing where he was Director of Area Marketing until his last promotion. During this time he served in the Abbott Diagnostics and Abbott Molecular Diagnostic businesses. Marc has worked and lived in Canada, Germany and the United States.

Laura is an acknowledged expert in applying the Net Promoter discipline to operational decisions. She has extensive experience working with companies in the areas of customer experience management, feedback design, employee opinion surveys, organizational development, quality, and compensation. In addition to her operational experience, Laura has conducted and published more than thirty studies on Net Promoter, customer loyalty, and word of mouth marketing, including her seminal research on NPS linkage with customer repurchase and referral behavior. Laura has also published on Inter-Rater Reliability and Validity in Behavioral Research Methods in Computers, and participated in the survey-specific portion of the Malcolm Baldrige Award. Prior to joining Satmetrix, Laura worked in the consulting industry, specializing in statistical and psychological tools for measuring customer satisfaction and employee performance. Laura holds a PhD in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from Rice University and a BS degree in Psychology from Duke University.

Since joining Satmetrix three years ago, Alison has worked with major clients across several industries to develop global customer experience strategies and implement operational customer feedback systems and processes. Prior to Satmetrix, Alison’s experience in customer management spans 12 years on both the client and agency side. She has worked with global companies in a wide range of markets including telecom, financial, automotive, entertainment, FMCG and not-for-profit. Her roles have covered account management, marketing, and operational implementation for marketing, communications and contact-centre focused initiatives and programmes. Alison has a BA (Hons) degree from Goldsmiths College, University of London and also holds the IDM Diploma of Direct Marketing.

Christophe De Vusser is a partner with Bain & Company, based in Brussels with 10 years of experience in consulting. Over the years, he has mainly worked on growth & marketing strategy and transformation & turnaround programs. He assists clients in diverse industries, primarily in Consumer Goods and Private Equity (PE). More specifically, Christophe has built an extensive expertise in implementing NPS based sales acceleration strategies in a variety of PE owned companies, covering B2B, B2C and B2B2C models, both in developed countries and in emerging markets. Prior to Bain, Christophe worked for Procter & Gamble in Brussels and Geneva.

Deborah is the CMO of Satmetrix, the leading provider of Net Promoter solutions to help organizations improve customer loyalty and drive growth. She brings over 25 years of experience in marketing, sales, and strategic business development of technology solutions and consulting services. As a previous Satmetrix client, Deborah has first-hand experience on how to deploy Net Promoter programs in a global organization. At BearingPoint (formerly KPMG Consulting) she led a global account program that integrated the voice of the customer into the strategic account management processes. Working with Satmetrix clients, she continues to observe the best practices companies apply to putting customer data into action across the organization. She is a frequent speaker on the topics of Net Promoter, Word of Mouth, Social Media, Customer Loyalty, and today’s marketing challenges and opportunities. She is also a master class Net Promoter certification instructor. Prior Satmetrix, Deborah held leadership positions in sales and marketing at both small and large organizations. In 2000, Consulting Magazine named her one of the top consultants of the year for her efforts in building a strategic partnership between KPMG and Cisco Systems that generated a $1B investment.

As the Director of Customer Experience for Dell worldwide based out of the UK, Gary runs the Global Customer Experience Team, responsible for the development, planning and consistent implementation of Voice of the Customer programs covering all countries, segments and functions. Across a global workforce of nearly 100,000 Dell employees, the team acts as partners to the respective Leadership Teams regarding all customer experience improvement initiatives. Passionate about customer experience, Gary and his team have nurtured the evolution of Dell’s Customer Experience program to focus on delighting customers as measured by the Net Promoter Score in the early part of 2009. Gary has over 12 years of experience at Dell, having held a variety of positions including head of their UK and Ireland Call Centre Operations in Dublin. Prior to his current role at Dell, Gary was UK Director of Operations, supporting the Global, Corporate, Public and Medium Business segments. Before joining Dell in 1998, Gary worked extensively in the Finance and Banking sectors across the UK.

My role in O2 UK is to make sure we really understand our customers, what’s important to them, and the opportunities we have to differentiate our brand and turn our customers into fans. We then use this insight to develop and drive our Marketing Strategy and Plans, as well as our company-wide Customer Experience Plans. I started my career as a consultant with PricewaterhouseCoopers in their Telecoms Strategy practice, before joining O2 (then BT Wireless) in 2000. At O2 I moved through various roles in Corporate Strategy, Marketing strategy and Brand Strategy before taking up my current position in 2006.

In these roles, Elizabeth’s responsibilities include global employee communications strategy and employee engagement programmes as well as serving as a strategic communications advisor to the senior leadership team. Before joining Travelport (previously Galileo and Cendant), she was director, Marketing & Leisure Sales Europe, for Hertz, with pan-European responsibility for brand building including all above & below the line advertising. She also has held the position of Head of Advertising and Marketing at The Walt Disney Company, with responsibility for launching Disneyland Paris in the UK and managing the partnership marketing deals with Nestlé, Coke and McDonalds.

Alan is responsible for the development and implementation of Lean and NPS^® across The Weir Group PLC engineering and services organisation, with over 60 operations world-wide. Alan’s background is in designed and built-to-order low volume, high value capital equipment service and engineering industries. He has led, coached, and mentored hundreds of improvements across all business functions and processes in a number of world-class private and public organisations. Alan believes passionately in Customer Experience. His main interest is effective change of mind-set to achieve and sustain required behaviour and results.

Steve joined Colt in May 2009. His responsibilities include the design, build and operation of Colt’s network and the customer experience from service provision through to service assurance. Prior to Colt, Steve joined Verizon Business in 1995, and held a number of positions including Vice President, International Operations and Technology from January 2006. In this role he oversaw the plan, design, build, operation, service provision, and assurance of the company’s network and customer services for Verizon in Europe. Before joining Verizon Business, Steve was at BT, where he was involved with its correspondent business as well as the company’s global network expansion. Always working in the international arena, Steve has 20 years experience in the telecom industry, and an honours degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from the University of Leeds.

Glenn has held several Chief Officer and Director positions across marketing and business development functions with some of the world’s leading brands such as Dell, IBM, BT, Sage, and Investec. Concentrating on his passion and enthusiasm for the ultimate customer experience, Glenn established iBuzcon, a network of high calibre independent consultants specialising in adding value to their clients though customer loyalty measurement and management. A Net Promoter® Certified Associate and Net Promoter® Loyalty Partner, Glenn has been an evangelist for many years.

Melanie has spent the past 10 years in the customer loyalty space, both on client and supplier side. She has extensive experience helping large multinationals execute customer and employee loyalty programmes that deliver strategic insight to top management as well as tactical feedback to the front line. Melanie’s experience spans industries such as hospitality, finance, travel and tourism and manufacturing. Melanie is a classically trained researcher who has recently ‘converted’ to the Net Promoter philosophy, and is a firm believer that the discipline can help businesses improve their operational performance and deepen customer relationships. Melanie has a post graduate diploma in Social Statistics from Swinburne University in Melbourne, Australia.

Until very recently Tim was the head of the Marketing Strategy Office at Sony Europe with the mission to build organisational capacity in customer centric marketing. He led Sony’s Net Promoter Programme and remains passionate about using customer insight to drive both operational excellence and cultural change. After joining Sony in 1999, Tim initially worked in the area of marketing communications. His professional life began in advertising after graduating from Cambridge. He also has an MBA from the Open University. He is married with two teenage children who are, of course, far more technically competent than he is.

Naomi leads the consulting offering for Satmetrix clients in EMEA. She has 13 years’ experience in advising blue chip companies on how to become more customer centric and drive value from better customer relationships. Prior to joining Satmetrix, Naomi established and led Accenture’s loyalty consulting practice and is a published thought leader and conference speaker. Naomi has overseen a diverse range of business improvement programmes ranging from embedding strategic segmentation to establishing a single view of customer as a foundation for understanding and improving the customer experience. She holds a Bachelor of Science (Hons) degree in Computer Sciences from the University of Ulster.

Since 2007, Alexandra has worked in the Bühler AG headquarters in Switzerland. As operational project manager for customer loyalty management, she is responsible for the coordination and support of the implementation of the project in the division, business units and regions. Before joining Bühler AG, she worked in marketing and sales for a Suisse IT company developing management systems, business intelligence cockpits and geomarketing solutions. Alexandra completed her studies in business administration in Germany and Australia.

Maersk Line is the largest containerized shipping company in the world. As Head of Customer Intelligence at Maersk, Gert holds a Master’s Degree in Relational Marketing and an Executive MBA in Strategy. Before working with Maersk Line, Gert worked as a scientist within psychometric, teaching statistics, and worked extensively with customer loyalty in the Telco business. He has also been a business consultant for several years. Gert is also the author of Business Analytics, which will be published in June 2010 by SAS press.

Karen Lindquist is a management talent development professional. Currently Director of Research and Development at Management Centre Europe in Brussels, Belgium, Karen develops MCE’s approaches to customer focus, strategy alignment and implementation, change, and talent development. She is also active in researching global trends and their impacts for business. Karen earned her MBA from Henley Management College in the UK, specializing in knowledge management and innovation. Her field research and master’s thesis were on the topic of measuring the impact of management development on firm performance. Karen is American and grew up in the United States but has spent half her life in Europe, having lived in the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Germany and Switzerland. She speaks English, French and Spanish.

Belron^®, operating as Autoglass^®, Carglass^® and Safelite AutoGlass^® (amongst others), is the world’s leading vehicle glass repair and replacement company with operations in 32 countries and nearly 25,000 employees. Gary has been with Belron^® for 16 years and was appointed Chief Executive Officer in 2000. During his time with the company, Gary has held a number of roles where he’s been responsible for the growth and development of key areas of the business. Before being appointed as CEO, Gary was responsible for the European operations of Belron^®, and prior to that he was Managing Director of the UK business, Autoglass^®. Gary has an MBA from the London Business School.

Crispin is a recognised authority in harnessing the power of Net Promoter® and Word-of-Mouth as part of an integrated sales, marketing and loyalty strategy. Crispin has over 25 years experience delivering communications solutions for businesses and brands, and is the creator of the award-winning communications planning and management regime – ValueFlow – that won his company, Kaizo, the accolade of the UK’s Innovative Company of the Year in 2003. He led his company (Kaizo) to be the fastest growing PR Company in the UK in 1991, the #2 performer over a decade in 1997, and the #5 best PR firm to work for in the UK. He is a Net Promoter® Certified Associate, a former Chairman of the Public Relations Consultants Association (PRCA), a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR), a Freeman of the Guild of PR Practitioners, a founding Fellow of the PRCA and Chairman of the European region of the Worldcom PR Group.

Frank is a Marketing Services industry leader with expertise in Integrated Relationship Marketing gained while in the employ of Global Marketing Agencies including Carlson Marketing Worldwide and Havas Advertising. By helping clients identify who their most profitable customers are, Frank uses this information to develop and implement practical strategies to target new customers (acquisition), increase the value of current customers and look at ways to keep customers longer (reduce churn). Frank has worked across many sectors including Financial Services (Consumer Banking), Travel and Leisure, Retail and IT. He developed and implemented a Relationship Marketing Program for Goldfish; worked with Etihad Airlines on their award winning “guest” recognition programme and supported Shell with the launch of their premium brand V-Power members club.

Arti began his career as a pencil salesman in 1995, moved on to a lottery business, continued at a beverage factory, and later a web company. In 2001, he began work as a marketing manager for Eesti Telefon (renamed Elion in 2003) – the largest telecommunications company in Estonia. Since 2004 he led Elion’s marketing team, being responsible for product management, electronic channels, customer insights, marketing and communications. Arti holds a degree in marketing and is currently finishing his MBA at Henley Business School.

Richard Owen is President and CEO of Satmetrix, responsible for all aspects of strategy and day-to-day operations. Prior to joining our team, he was Chairman and CEO of NASDAQ-traded AvantGo, Inc., the leading provider of Enterprise Mobility Solutions to Fortune 1000 companies. AvantGo was successfully sold to Sybase, Inc. Before running AvantGo, Richard spent eight years at Dell Computer Corporation in various executive positions, most recently as vice president of Dell Online Worldwide. He was responsible for all aspects of Dell's Internet strategy and online business revenues on a worldwide basis—building Dell's online business to cover 50 percent of the company's sales volume. Richard began his career as a consultant for KPMG Management Consultants, where he worked for European high-technology manufacturers in the EMEA region on marketing strategy and business development, including Hewlett Packard and Apple. Richard holds a Bachelor's degree from Nottingham University in England and a Master's degree from MIT Sloan School of Management.

Fred Reichheld is a Bain & Company Fellow and Founder of Bain’s Loyalty practice, which helps clients achieve superior results through improvements in customer, employee, partner, and investor loyalty. His pioneering work has quantified the linkage between loyalty, profits, and growth. In the June 2003 edition of Consulting Magazine, Fred was included on their list of the world’s top 25 consultants. The “high priest” of loyalty, according to The Economist and the man who “put loyalty economics on the map,” according to The New York Times, Fred is the author of three books and eight Harvard Business Review articles on the subject.

Bettina has over 15 years of managerial experience in Marketing, Sales and International Market Development in the areas of B2B and consulting. Since 2006, she has worked in the Bühler AG headquarters, running the global marketing and market development together with the sales regions and product management with the Business Units. Before joining Buhler AG, from 2003 to 2006 Bettina was Head of International Marketing and Market Development for CLAAS. Prior to that she held a leading position for sales and marketing EMEA at a global telecommunications infrastructure and solution company. Before moving into the telco business she worked for seven years at a leading consulting company, where her last position there was Divisional Manager focusing on the B2B, Telco and automotive industries. Bettina studied International Business with university degrees in business from Germany and France and holds an MBA from Henley UK.

Jura currently leads the European Transactional NPS^® program at eBay International AG. He joined eBay in 2005 and was responsible for European Customer Satisfaction and Quality before taking on the responsibility to implement the Transactional NPS^® program. As part of a global team, he turns the voice of the customer into actionable information that drives positive change to the customer experience. Jura is a native German, but has previously lived in the US and works in a truly international environment. He holds a Masters Degree in Political Science as well as being a Net Promoter^® certified.

Paul works with major clients helping them to establish and design outstanding customer experience management programmes. He has particular focus on the role that operational customer feedback systems play in enabling programme success. Over a 12 year career his track record includes working with many of Europe’s leading companies and in addition to Net Promoter and customer loyalty expertise he has extensive experience in customer relationship management and customer analytics. Paul has BA (Hons) from the University of Manchester.

Robyn has an extensive customer relationship, partner, marketing, PR and program management background that she is currently applying to drive improvements in Customer Experience globally at Symantec in the Consumer Business Unit (Norton). Recent improvements have increased Symantec’s overall Net Promoter Score from 26.7 in December 2008 to 38.2 in December 2009. Robyn has worked at Symantec for 10 years. Based in Northern California, she has lived and worked on three continents and four countries – South Africa, the U.K., the Netherlands and the United States.

Alan founded Xperience Associates in 2006 to provide consulting services that help organizations to define, measure and improve the holistic experience they deliver to their customers or through B2B partners. Alan has advised some of the worlds largest corporations, including Nokia, Shell International and Aviva Insurance Group. Alan has spent almost two decades creating and hardwiring customer experience programmes. He has stood in client shoes in country, region and global management positions. At Compaq Alan was Customer Advocacy Manager for Europe, Middle East and Africa based in Munich. With Hewlett Packard, Alan led customer experience insight for the Global Enterprise business, SMB and the Public Sector. After a short period of consulting, Alan headed Global Customer Service Assurance at Shell International. Alan is a regular contributor at conferences and in-company events. He holds a Masters degree from the Cranfield Institute. Xperience Associates is a certified Net Promoter® Loyalty Partner.

Shaun has been a catalyst in expanding management focus from the tactical issues of customer service to the wider strategic issue of customer experience. He has developed some of the latest thinking around this subject, helping organisations world-wide create a compelling customer experience that achieves brand differentiation and customer loyalty. He is co-author of three acclaimed books. His first, Uncommon Practice examines those companies that create exceptional customer experiences. His second, Managing the Customer Experience - Turning Customers Into Advocates, reveals how leaders can build this kind of competitive advantage for their own organisations. Shaun’s latest book See, Feel, Think, Do – the power of instinct in business explores how highly successful business leaders use the power of instinct to achieve results.

David Speakman was the original pioneer of the travel agents working from home concept. He founded Travel Counsellors, which was the first - and is also the largest - travel home-working company in the world, in 1994. At that time he had already been in the travel industry for 15 years, operating a chain of retail travel agents in North West England. David was inspired by a book by American trend guru Faith Popcorn which predicted a rise in the number of people shopping and working from home. This gave him the idea for a new kind of travel agency: one where people would book their holidays from the comfort of their own home. Even better, the new company would have low overheads because all its agents would also work from home and their income would be commission based. Since those early days Travel Counsellors has enjoyed phenomenal success. While the rest of the industry battles against the internet, it continues to enjoy phenomenal growth due to its emphasis on service, rather than price. It now has over 1,000 agents in the UK and overseas. Under David’s stewardship the company continues to be one of the biggest innovators in the travel industry. In 2003 the company was presented with the Queen’s Award for Enterprise, the UK’s highest business accolade. David is also an ardent champion of the customer. It was his vision that saw TravelCounsellors UK launch a Financial Trust to guarantee all client money in 2004 and he has spoken at a number of high profile seminars on customer service. Recognition of his high standing in the travel industry came in 2006 when he was one of the first recipients of the prestigious travel industry Lifetime Achievement Awards. He has also been given the honour of induction into The British Travel Industry Hall of Fame 2008 in recognition of his innovations and achievements within the travel industry.

Ball Packaging Europe is the European subsidiary of the US Ball Corporation, one of the leading packaging companies worldwide. Their key business is beverage cans, supplying the EMEA Market. Gerlof has worked for Ball Packaging Europe more than 13 years, and two years ago began his role as Director, Customer Relationship Management. Prior to that, Gerlof managed the European Customer Service organisation for 10 years, where he gained a strong understanding of customers’ needs. In that role Gerlof developed Ball Packaging Europe’s CRM system with the philosophy that customers should be managed on profitability and satisfaction, and that managing customers on these two aspects requires reliable data.

As the current head of worldwide social media activities of Lufthansa, Torsten previously managed the strategy and business development of Lufthansa Miles & More – Europe’s leading frequent flyer program. During this time he also conducted fundamental research with world wide focus groups about the future of customer loyalty, which lead him ultimately to the foundations of social media. Customer engagement became a new pillar of customer loyalty for Miles & More and for the understanding of today’s customers at Lufthansa. Torsten’s background in business and economics - in combination with sociology as part of his Ph.D. - helped him to fundamentally understand the essence of social media and future trends. During his time as executive assistant to Dr. August Oetker, proprietor of Germany’s most well-known family business, he developed a profound understanding of focusing on customer needs. With his affinity with internet and mobile devices all this comes to a perfect match for him in today’s challenges of social media.