True North: Day 2

I have a million things I want to blog about after sitting in on these two days of sessions with clients. I'm not so good at the "live blogging" thing, but a quick recap of Day 2, in the meantime:

We had a great session on how to keep management's attention on the customer and on satisfaction metrics, with insights from Bert DuMars, from Newell Rubbermaid, Jack Dunlavery from Citi Credit Cards, Kevin Ertell from Borders, and Pam Hedman from St. John Health. (If any of you other than Bert have a blog, let me know so I can link to you!). These folks had some great ideas on how to do this . . . my favorite was termed "infiltrating minds," and I'll have to do a separate post on that one!

Next up was a great case study from Bruce Rogers at Forbes on how they used a Usability Audit to fine-tune performance of their luxury travel site. It takes a brave man to let Jennifer Bailey, our lead on usability, air his "usability violations" for the greater good and education. A few people told me this was one of their favorite sessions because they saw how actionable the usability audit can be.

We closed the morning with a great case study from Maryssa Miller at Lacoste, who showed why customer satisfaction is just as important, if not more so, for a luxury brand whose customers may have even higher expectations of the online experience. She showed us how some very, very simple insights into what their customers want and expect has had a big impact.

I told my marketing team this morning--this conference was so great that I think we should do one again next month! They shot me a dirty look for that one, but truly, we all had a really good time and hopefully learned a lot from each other.

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[Vintage go kart]

Newell Rubbermaid is a global marketer of consumer and commercial products that touch millions of people every day where they work, live and play. Our products include some of the most widely recognized brands in the world, with more than 90 percent of U.S. households using at least one of our products and worldwide sales in over 90 countries.

[Squirrel monkeys for sale]

Bruce Rogers is a long-time veteran of Forbes and the publishing industry. In his current position as Chief Brand Officer he manages the Forbes Media Brand Intelligence Group incorporating its CMO.