When businesses talk about becoming more customer-centric and prioritising customer experience (CX), talent and staffing are always key discussion topics.
After all, CX cuts across departments and functions, so it requires organisation-wide training and cultural change. And while much work sits within support, sales, marketing and operations, you still need people overseeing initiatives, driving change and reporting to the board.
This has led to a global boom in CX recruitment, particularly at senior levels. And customer insight technology company Feefo has just done an interesting analysis of the talent market in this area.
London has 5 times more CX vacancies than the global average – and UK professionals are earning more
Feefo evaluated 120,000 CX job listings across 10 countries.
London had 2,668 vacancies compared to the 422 global average. It was closely followed by Seattle at 2,555 and New York at 2,344. But then the figures dropped dramatically, with Toronto in fourth place at 694 and Sydney in fifth place at 388.
More demand for top CX talent – reflected in the higher number of London vacancies – is leading to higher salaries. Feefo found that 33% of UK listings advertised a salary of £50,000 or higher, compared to 25% of US listings.
Businesses are experimenting with CX roles
The vacancies also had a wide variety of job titles, reflecting differing organisational priorities and hierarchies.
In the UK, there was most demand for Customer Experience Managers, followed by Heads of Customer Experience, Digital Customer Experience Managers and Heads of Customer Insight.
This broadly reflects the way money is being spent on CX. Engage Hub research found that when it comes to funding CX improvements, budget allocations generally come from CMOs, CTOs and CIOs. You can see these functions affecting the popular job titles, with insight potentially aligning more with CIOs and digital with CTOs, for example.
Increased CX investment is good news for companies and their customers
27% of businesses are investing in personnel to lead digital transformation programmes, and 28% are upskilling current employees, according to our recent CX survey. And this Feefo study emphasises the global impact CX is having.
After all, companies can no longer think of CX skills as a nice-to-have. Businesses that exceed expectations are reaping the rewards as customers vote with their wallets. Which means it’s an essential element when it comes to competitive advantage and revenue growth, and that you need necessary skills in place to support development.
Learn more in this whitepaper – The Customer-Centric Organisation: How Customer Experience Has Become a Major Focus for Businesses.
