CX as Marketing’s Best Tool: Transforming Client Experience into a Growth Engine
Written By: Vincenzo Ciampi, Senior Vice-President of Global Client Experience, iA Financial Group
Today’s consumer is overwhelmed and spoiled by choice and convenience. As digital-first companies increasingly attract consumers, promising great experiences in industries that have traditionally been cumbersome for consumers to navigate — like financial services — legacy brands must reimagine their strategies to prioritize client-centricity. Adapting to this shift is crucial for attracting and retaining today’s evolving consumers.
Clients want to work with companies that make their lives easy and in the modern marketplace they have that option, which is why client experience is emerging as marketing’s most untapped growth tool. And yet, for many organizations, client experience is still misunderstood to be a cost center that handles complaints rather than a robust line of business that drives revenue, enhances client loyalty, and creates competitive advantage.
To thrive in today’s market, client experience and marketing are inextricably linked, and integrating the two can create an engine for growth, loyalty and brand differentiation. Client experience must not be thought about as just a support function, but every touchpoint a client has with your company. The user experience on the website and client portals, the digital marketing and lead generation tools they encounter are all part of it. The real opportunity lies in rethinking marketing and client experience from the ground up, aligning them to maximize impact. By viewing the business through a client lens, companies can augment cross-selling activity and generate significant new revenue streams that are repeatable and long lasting.
From years of experience spanning four industries, I saw companies prioritize product, people, process, and profits ahead of client experience, rarely giving it central importance. So, when I moved into my current role heading up Global Client Experience at iA Financial Group, I knew I wanted to take a holistic approach to transform how we communicate and work with our clients. Instead of merely aligning client experience and marketing, we united them in a single department with shared initiatives, each working as a growth-driving tool for the other. This synergy has been a game-changer, because when you build your marketing, your website, your communications, around the client first, you unlock a powerful way to generate tangible financial returns.
The beauty of integrating client experience and marketing is in the alignment it fosters across the business. When client experience is woven into every touchpoint, it stops being just a talking point and starts becoming a value-add for clients and advisors. Both working groups bring in tools that can benefit the other’s function — marketing bringing in things like client archetypes and segmentation, while client experience brings tangible metrics such as client satisfaction scores and surveys. By combining these two essential business functions to work cohesively, companies can better serve clients in a way that builds brand trust, drives loyalty, and creates lifelong advocates for the brand.
We see client experience as a strategic business priority — when clients feel understood, valued, and engaged, they are far more likely to return, purchase again, and tell others about their positive experiences. This is a marketing asset in the truest sense, building advocacy and loyalty in ways that traditional advertising often can’t.
The key to this transformation is a cultural shift. For client experience to truly drive marketing impact, it has to be woven into the organization’s core mission. Embedding it as part of the company’s ethos and overarching approach starts at the top and without buy-in from leadership and a clear vision of the end goal, efforts to make client experience a true marketing tool often fall flat. It must be viewed as one of the organization’s top priorities, directly influencing culture and guiding every employee’s actions. For us, this meant creating a centralized project team that collaborates with every line of business, constantly aligning itself to evolving priorities.
Today, client experience isn’t just part of a business conversation — it is the conversation. It’s the difference between brands that thrive and those that struggle. For companies ready to lead in their markets, it needs to be more than a department; it needs to be a core strategy, driving marketing initiatives and business outcomes alike. Those who place the client experience at the heart of their business aren’t just following a trend; they’re creating the future of marketing. And as it continues to evolve, those who embrace it as their most powerful marketing tool will be the ones who stand out, grow and thrive.
