Customer Experience 
Customer service has changed a lot in the last 10 years. Driving that change are customer service experts who helped redefine the customer experience.
Look at any industry, and you’ll see a rigorous focus on keeping customers happy. Companies today care about the customer journey and invest in their customer’s success.
This phenomenon is no accident. Business leaders examine customer service stats as growth indicators for their businesses. Revenue, referrals, and retention don’t lie.
It takes more than a customer experience platform to delight customers. Every company now tracks customer happiness more than anyone thought a decade ago. Customer service is no longer a department — it’s an ethos.
These experts have preached customer experience from the mountaintops. We want to shine a light on these advocates for customer service. Follow them on social media for real-time riffs about customer service.
Top 50 Customer Service Experts of the Decade
We’ve chronicled 50 distinguished customer service experts in the world. They’ve made notable contributions to advance the state of customer experience. With their help, they’ve given a louder voice for the customer in boardrooms around the world.
Our list runs the gamut from top executives to consultants with diverse backgrounds.
See who made the list below.
Annette Franz | Founder & CEO at CX Journey
LinkedIn | Twitter
Annette Franz is a renowned author and speaker with 25 years of experience helping companies understand their employees and customers.
Annette is recognized as a top customer service influencer in her field, as she is highly knowledgeable on how to identify what drives satisfaction, engagement, and exceptional customer experiences.
Blake Morgan | Keynote Speaker and Author
LinkedIn | Twitter
Blake Morgan often shares her expertise about the customer experience as she is a keynote speaker and a published author. Her latest book is The Customer of the Future.
She’s known as a customer experience futurist, Blake is also a guest lecturer, and podcast host and hosts a weekly video series on YouTube.
Blake has delivered hundreds of speeches and provides customer experience-related workshops for brands and vendors.
Bob Thompson | Founder/CEO, CustomerThink
LinkedIn | Twitter
Bob Thompson has a total of over 35 years of experience. Bob’s vast knowledge comes from successfully working in various areas.
He has performed customer-facing roles, sales, technical support, customer management consulting, research, online community development, and executive positions.
Bob helps businesses build mutual and powerful relationships.
Colin Shaw | Founder & CEO, Beyond Philosophy LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Colin Shaw is a world thought leader in ‘Customer Experience’ (CX) and an accomplished keynote speaker.
His dedication to the customer experience is how he helps many of the world’s most prestigious organizations move their CX to the next level and get a return on investment.
Colin is a Co-host of a highly successful podcast and a renowned best-selling author. His hard work, determination, and efforts are put towards inspiring organizations to focus on their Customers.
Jeanne Bliss | Founder and CEO, Customer Bliss
LinkedIn | Twitter
Jeanne Bliss has over 35 years of experience as a customer experience professional and is devoted to teaching business leaders how to focus on customer profits. Her previous experience includes serving as the chief customer officer for five U.S. corporations. She has also co-founded the customer experience professionals association (CXPA).
She is the author of four best-selling customer experience books and has written many articles about this topic.
Jeanne provides the necessary tools to unite company efforts in delivering customer experiences that lead to business growth.
Frank Eliason | Consultant, Frank Eliason, LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Frank Eliason made a name for himself as a pioneer in delivering friendly customer service for Comcast. He went toe-to-toe with the cable provider’s most aggressive critics with a refreshing sense of care and fidelity.
Following his successes at Comcast, he headed up social customer service for Citibank. Five years later, he now consults directly with executives needing guidance on customer experience. His experience is at the intersection of customer experience, social media, and corporate communications.
As a customer service expert, Frank shows top leaders how to use the power of customer data, new technologies to drive business results in areas of CX.
Kate Nasser | Speaker, Trainer, Coach, Consultant
LinkedIn | Twitter
Kate Nasser has 30 years of knowledge on how to turn interaction obstacles into professional business success.
She is a speaker, trainer, coach, and consultant who shares her expertise in leadership, morale, teamwork, employee engagement, operational excellence, and high performance.,
Kate works with businesses of all sizes. She connects with leaders and teams to develop their skills and to teach them how to handle any and every customer interaction.
Micah Solomon | Author, Customer Service Consultant, and Speaker
LinkedIn | Twitter
Micah Solomon is an author and keynote speaker. He connects with businesses and professional firms to converse about customer service issues and customer experience.
He is a renowned entrepreneur and business leader. Micah knows customer service inside and out, and his many achievements show he is a genuine expert in the customer experience field.
Shep Hyken | Owner, Shepard Presentations, LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Shep Hyken is a Customer Service Speaker, trainer, presenter, author, and Shepard Presentations, LLC owner.
His many roles are to help companies build loyal relationships with their customers and employees. Steph’s presentations cover customer service, loyalty, and experience.
He has written five books, each centering on the priority of the customer.
Cori Pearce | Director of Marketing, ChurnZero
LinkedIn | Twitter
Cori Pearce is an accomplished marketing professional with over a decade’s worth of experience.
Her expertise lies in broad demand generation experience encompassing marketing automation, lead nurturing, email marketing, content marketing, and events marketing.
Cori possesses the knowledge of how to create engagement programs for new leads and how to nurture them along the buyer’s journey.
Jeannie Walters | CCXP, Speaker, and Trainer, Jeannie Walters
LinkedIn | Twitter
Jeannie Walters is highly knowledgeable about customer experience, and in the last 20 years, she has focused on improving the treatment of customers.
Her expertise in delivering multiple perspectives, including the ones had by patients, is remarkable.
Jeannie trains professionals on how to connect with those they serve emotionally and presents ways to uncover what is stopping organizations from really delivering great experiences.
Ian Golding | Executive Director of Knowledge & Academics, The Customer Institute
LinkedIn | Twitter
Ian Golding is a highly influential freelance Customer Experience consultant who focuses on providing non-biased views of customer centricity.
He is highly knowledgeable in customer experience and in incorporating the latest in best practices from around the globe.
Ian works with leading companies to advise them on advises leading companies on customer experience strategies, measurements, improvements, and employee advocacy techniques and solutions.
Stacy Justino | Director of Customer Happiness, Wistia
LinkedIn
Stacy Justino is a highly experienced operations management professional.
She has a history in the gaming industry and is a strong customer support expert.
Stacy has a Bachelor’s Degree focused on Communication and Media Studies, English Language & Literature, from the University of Washington.
Marsha Collier | President, The Collier Company, Inc
LinkedIn | Twitter
Marsha Collier is an award-winning author, a radio host, and a customer service consultant.
She is highly interested in technology, e-commerce, and customer service, with previous marketing and advertising experience.
Marsha is a top-selling author of over forty books and a trusted customer service influencer. Her work is part of a larger digital strategy package, not only about social but video and the written word, too.
Flavio Martins | EVP of Customer Support and Validation, DigiCert
LinkedIn | Twitter
Flavio Martins is a global leader and an award-winning customer service influencer. His diversified background in customer support, customer experience, technical support, and driving revenue from customer success operations.
He specializes in optimizing customer support and call centers to develop customer-first experience strategies.
Flavio translates problems into solutions and is an expert at leading cross-functional teams in their execution.
Bruce Temkin | CCXP and Head of the XM Institute, Qualtrics
LinkedIn
Bruce Temkin is the head of the Qualtrics XM Institute and works to inspire the world to make quantum improvements in XM.
He is an experienced management and leadership visionary, keynote speaker, strategic adviser, researcher, and co-founder of CXPA.org.
Bruce works with large organizations to dramatically improve business results. He focuses on changing how companies interact with employees, customers, and partners.
Bill Quiseng | Chief Experience Officer, billquiseng.com
LinkedIn | Twitter
Bill Quiseng is experienced in the areas of customer service, engagement, and leadership.
He is a professional speaker and blogger who covers these areas when connecting with organizations.
Bill is a customer service presenter skilled at serving others by providing tips, insights, and inspiration on improving customer service delivery.
Guy Stephens | PDE Trainer, L&K Europe, IBM
LinkedIn
Guy Stephens has filled various roles at IBM since starting with them in 2013. They include PDE Trainer, L&K Europe, L&K Global, Salesforce, and a managing consultant with GBS.
He has over twenty years of working in the digital space and has spent the last ten years focusing on social customer care as both a consultant and trainer.
Martin Hill-Wilson | Blogger, Brainfood Extra
LinkedIn | Twitter
Martin Hill-Wilson is an experienced leader in customer service, customer experience (CX), and artificial intelligence (AI) strategist.
He is a blogger who writes about everything to do with the customer and is an author on social customer service and conference chair.
Martin covers customer service, engagement, listening, social media, business, call center leadership challenges, multi-channel strategy, and customer-centric culture.
Ben Kay | Head of Digital, Brand & Marketing, Thames Water
LinkedIn | Twitter
Ben Kay is a digital strategy professional with a passion for revolutionizing the digital experience.
He is highly knowledgeable in turning complex concepts, business processes, and technology opportunities into actionable and achievable activities.
Ben is an expert across all dimensions of the digital landscape with a relentless dedication to putting customers at the heart of the experience.
Kate Leggett | VP and Principal Analyst, Forrester Research
LinkedIn | Twitter
Kate Leggett is a leading market analyst for CRM and customer service solutions.
She is an experienced high-tech professional with extensive knowledge in the areas of product marketing, product management, and operations.
Kate is dedicated and works diligently to meet customer expectations.
Richard Branson | Founder, Virgin Group
LinkedIn | Twitter
Richard Branson creates entrepreneurial processes to drive positive change in the world, and he is revolutionizing various sectors — mobile telephony, travel, transportation, financial services, leisure, entertainment, health, and wellness.
He is highly dedicated to unite people with business concepts and to turn them into opportunities for a better society.
Richard firmly believes in turning ideas into reality.
Roy Atkinson | Senior Writer/Analyst, UBM Americas – HDI
LinkedIn | Twitter
Roy Atkinson is a service management and support industry analyst, writer, and speaker.
He is one of the top influencers in the service and support industry, and his expertise has been featured in various publications.
Roy shares his knowledge with his contributions to books covering customer service and social media topics.
Chase Clemons | Customer Support, Basecamp
LinkedIn | Twitter
Chase Clemons’ experience includes customer support and critical thinking.
He helps growing businesses solve problems they are faced with daily and not lose sight of what matters.
Chase hosted a weekly podcast that focused on helping companies deliver better support experiences to customers.
Tristan Bishop | Senior Director, Digital Communications Strategy, New Relic, Inc.
LinkedIn | Twitter
Tristan Bishop drives global social strategy and analytics across all communications functions.
He has worked, twenty-plus years on transforming and pioneering multi-function social media methodology for B2B and enterprise software organizations.
Tristan is internationally recognized as a digital influencer in customer service, big data, leadership, and social business.
Becky Carroll | Cognitive and Analytics Program Manager, IBM
LinkedIn | Twitter
Becky Carroll works with IBM’s most valuable customers to help them get the most value from data, analytics, and cognitive/AI.
She is a thought leader, speaker, and author who helps global companies take a customer-centric approach to cloud and digital technology, social media, marketing, and service.
Becky shares her international expertise with speeches that range from keynotes to custom workshops to webcasts.
Matt Dixon | Chief Product & Research Officer, Tethr
LinkedIn | Twitter
Matt Dixon is a Chief Product & Research Officer, author, speaker, and advisor. He is a co-author, frequent contributor, and experienced advisor to senior executives.
Matt is also a frequent contributor to Harvard Business Review, having been published more than twenty times in both HBR’s print and online editions.
Matt offers leaders his expertise in sales, service, and customer experience.
Arie Goldshlager | Founder and Principal Consultant, The Fine Balance Consulting Group
LinkedIn | Twitter
Arie Goldshlager is the owner of an independent consulting practice whose primary focus is on the customer experience.
He is highly knowledgeable about customer strategy, lifecycle management, insight, analytics, and innovation.
Arie developed a blueprint for client value optimization designed to improve the performance of the company’s client acquisition, development, and retention efforts.
Pete Abilla | Vice President of Growth Marketing. ThunderCore
LinkedIn | Twitter
Pete Abilla is a growth marketing leader and marketer. He is an advisor, investor, and ecosystem community builder.
Pete is quoted in academic journals and business school case studies for my work in Queueing Theory, Continuous Improvement, and Innovation.
Ron Shevlin | Director of Research, Cornerstone Advisors
LinkedIn | Twitter
Ron Shevlin is an Industry analyst specializing in financial services and marketing strategy.
He is a thought leader who has been published in various books.
Ron is an expert at taking financial institutions from strategy to execution and in bringing value to financial services clients.
Aimee Lucas | XM Institute, Sr. Principal Analyst, Qualtrics
LinkedIn | Twitter
Aimee Lucas is a customer experience, employee engagement, researcher, advisor, trainer, speaker, and certified customer experience professional
She focuses her efforts on shaping the future of experience management (XM).
Aimee guides clients on how to optimize employee and customer experiences and on how to use best practices to build strong communities of CX/EX/XM specialists.
Lynn Hunsaker | Chief Executive Officer, ClearAction Continuum
LinkedIn | Twitter.
Lynn Hunsaker is a growth-generating, customer-centered management, employee engagement, and customer experience futurist.
She raises performance momentum through marketing operations and culture development methods in closing the brand-customer gap.
Lynn co-founded ClearAction Value Exchange to change the game of marketing and customer experience roles and their impact.
Mike Wittenstein | Founder and Managing Partner, STORYMINERS
LinkedIn | Twitter
Mike Wittenstein is the founder of one of the world’s first strategic storytelling and experience design consultancies.
He helps small- and mid-cap service brand leaders to increase their ability to create value, engage their employees, and deliver better returns.
Mike specializes in working with firms facing to create practical roadmaps, offering workshops, projects, ongoing support, experience design, and strategic storytelling.
Richard Shapiro | Founder and President, The Center For Client Retention
LinkedIn | Twitter
Richard Shapiro is a leading customer service expert focusing on satisfaction and loyalty.
His 28 years of experience have been devoted to researching and compiling the ingredients of customer loyalty.
Richard is an author and expert at identifying what drives repeat business.
Steve Curtin | Customer Enthusiast, Steve Curtin, LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Steve Curtin has 20 years of experience in hotel operations, sales and marketing, training and development, and customer service roles.
He is a thought leader, speaker, presenter, and trainer who is dedicated to serving customers.
Steve has delivered interactive and engaging presentations all around the globe and to more than twenty thousand people.
Dan Gingiss | Chief Experience Officer, The Experience Maker, LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Dan Gingiss is an international keynote speaker, customer experience consultant, author, and podcaster.
He strongly believes remarkable customer experiences can be your best marketing tool. As a customer service expert, his background is influenced by his past roles at large organizations, including Humana, McDonald’s, and Discover. These heavyweights know that customer experience is a competitive advantage.
Dan uses his professional experience to ensure that audiences always leave with clear, actionable takeaways that help improve the experience at their own company.
Adrian Swinscoe | Aspirant punk, Punk CX
LinkedIn | Twitter
Adrian Swinscoe is a customer service expert, advisor, speaker, and masterclass leader.
He helps organizations of all sizes deliver better customer service and customer experiences.
Adrian advises companies on specific customer service issues and helps to build the internal team and leadership capabilities.
Lincoln Murphy | Growth Expert, Sixteen Ventures
LinkedIn | Twitter
Lincoln Murphy uses genuine customer success-driven growth to help companies with customer retention, sales, and advocacy.
He is well-known in the customer success world, and his ability to help people discover what customer success is and how to apply it is second to none.
Lincoln has numerous publications where he shares his expertise on how to help startups grow and provide better customer experiences.
Des Traynor | Co-Founder, Chief Strategy Officer, Intercom
LinkedIn | Twitter
Des Traynor provides an easy-to-use, personal messaging service for businesses and their customers.
He is devoted to improving marketing, sales, and products by offering the easiest way to communicate and reach customers.
Dan is an expert in various areas, including web development, user interface design, and experience.
Nick Mehta | Chief Executive Officer, Gainsight
LinkedIn | Twitter
Nick Mehta is dedicated to building authentic company cultures, recruitment, alignment, and leadership.
He is a motivational and productive leader of technology companies.
Nick helps with launching business strategies and in creating exceptional user experiences.
Jay Baer | Founder, Convince & Convert
LinkedIn | Twitter
Jay Baer is a digital marketing and customer experience advisor who helps iconic brands gain and keep more customers.
Not only is he a content marketing pro, but he also shares his tips as a customer service expert with a focus on social media.
Jay helps brands improve their digital, content, social media, email, and word-of-mouth marketing.
Jeff Toister | President, Toister Performance Solutions
LinkedIn | Twitter
Jeff Toister helps customer service teams unlock their hidden potential.
His services include developing customer service cultures, implementing customer feedback programs, and training employees.
Jeff is a well-known customer service writer, consultant, and trainer.
Dennis Wakabayashi | Vice President of Customer Experience Solutions Delivery at RR Donnelley
LinkedIn | Twitter
Dennis Wakabayashi is a customer-centric leader who continuously inspires diverse stakeholders to foster empathy, collaboration, and growth for brands and customers alike.
His mission is to unite brands and consumers by helping the world’s leading brands deliver Customer Experience solutions across the entire path to purchase, supply chain & logistics.
Dennis Wakabayashi is a Top 10 CX influencer ranked by Klear.com (with over 50k followers), named in the Top 40 over 40 Digital Marketers (alongside Gary Vaynerchuk) by Camapaign.us, and a member of the Adobe Experience League Advisory Council.
David Avrin | Marketing and Customer Experience Keynote Speaker, Visibility International
LinkedIn | Twitter
David Avrin is a business marketing and customer experience keynote speaker.
He consults and works with audiences of entrepreneurs, business owners, and other organizations around the world.
Dan is dedicated to helping companies to clarify and promote a compelling competitive advantage.
Evan Shumeyko | Director of Client Experience Strategy, BNY Mellon
LinkedIn | Twitter
Evan Shumeyko is focused on driving growth across healthcare, financial services, and insurance verticals.
He is an expert in transforming how employees work with customers through multiple digital marketing strategies.
Evan empowers employees with actionable data and user interfaces to help increase customer engagement.
Bob Evans | Founder and Principal, Evans Strategic Communications
LinkedIn | Twitter
Bob Evans shows companies how to tell fantastic stories of customers’ success, business innovation, technological vision, and execution.
He helps companies learn their competitive differentiators through a blend of strategic consultation and training.
Bob has performed executive interviews, keynote presentations, strategic storytelling, and social media campaigns.
Barry Moltz | Getting Small Businesses Unstuck, Shafran Moltz Group, LLC
LinkedIn | Twitter
Barry Moltz helps small businesses get unstuck with his motivational speaking books, expertise, and consulting.
He is the writer of four small business books, a mediator, and a business broker.
Barry is highly knowledgeable about sales, marketing, finance, and customer service.
Hiten Shah | Co-Founder of FYI and Co-Owner of Crazy Egg
LinkedIn | Twitter
Hiten Shah is the co-founder of multiple companies, FYI, Product Habits, Quick Sprout, and Crazy Egg.
He shows product teams what habits they need to grow the business faster. His content marketing software helps bloggers build, share, and improve their content to increase traffic.
Hiten also provides heat mapping tools that designers, marketers, product people, and business owners use to improve the effectiveness of their websites.
Steve Dotto | President, Dotto Tech
LinkedIn | Twitter
Steve Dotto is an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, host, executive producer, social caster, and columnist.
His presentations, talks, and written work are all about tech, social marketing, and productivity.
Steve is an expert at demystifying technology and making it easy. He produces various streaming and written content for the social media and technology world.
Seth Adler | Shopkeeper, Workshop58
LinkedIn | Twitter
Seth Adler is a driving force, developing and institutionalizing the electronic retailing (e-tail) industry, and his large events have become a preeminent forum for internet retailing.
He has many roles, including managing e-tail conferences and premiering events that support businesses in the online space.
Seth is an exceptional editor, moderator, host, and industry leader.
What’s the secret to customer service success?
Succeeding at customer service doesn’t have anything to do with your role or title.
Winning at customer service is all about action to serve the customer.
We recently published over 100 impressive customer service statistics. In it, you’ll get access to emerging trends around customer experience, contact centers, and social media support. Check ‘it’em out:
