Intu has appointed Roger Binks, a former Marriott Group Marketing Director, to a newly created role that is dedicated to generating stronger relationships with customers.
Part of the senior executive management team, the new customer experience director role will use consumer insight from intu’s 30 million customers and through the national brand, deliver a customer proposition that shoppers can experience, see and feel when they interact with intu, both on and offline.
Research carried out in 2012 confirmed that a visit to a shopping center is about far more than just shopping, highlighting a massive opportunity for shopping center landlords to deliver more to consumers. Roger will be responsible for overseeing this consumer interaction, including an enhanced national marketing program with UK and overseas partners, a national events program which will demonstrate real points of difference and intu’s new World Class Service initiative.
Roger is no stranger to the importance of putting the customer first, after a career as UK Marketing Director for Marriott and Group Marketing Manager for Dixons. Most recently, Roger worked for Regus Group as Global Vice President of Marketing.
Roger said: "I will be the voice of the customer in our business, getting insight into what they want, what they like and what they don't like. Our customers will be listened to and we will use this knowledge to provide places where they feel a strong sense of belonging. We want our customers to become our guests, they should feel welcome in our shopping centers and be excited by every visit."
The role reports directly into commercial director, Trevor Pereira, who said of the appointment: "Retail change is accelerating and customers are looking for more out of their shopping experience. The creation of this role is integral to the successful delivery of our new brand which focuses on putting customers at the very front of our business model. It’s a virtuous circle – i you’ve got happy customers then you’ll have happy retailers and happy investors.
Source: Intu
