Senior Director, Customer Marketing

At F5, we strive to bring a better digital world to life. Our teams empower organizations across the globe to create, secure, and run applications that enhance how we experience our evolving digital world. We are passionate about cybersecurity, from protecting consumers from fraud to enabling companies to focus on innovation. 
 

Everything we do centers around people. That means we obsess over how to make the lives of our customers, and their customers, better. And it means we prioritize a diverse F5 community where each individual can thrive.

F5’s Customer Marketing team plays a critical role in showing the world what’s possible when our customers bet on F5.  This leader will bring together our Advocacy, Retention, and Experiential functions. Through innovative industry and customer events, our flagship AppWorld franchise, communities, and forums, Customer Marketing ensures our customers are celebrated as partners in driving F5 priorities, products, and solutions. The team is rigorous at using every touch point to gather customer insights which inform our company-wide, customer centric approach to the market.

Job Description

We are seeking an experienced Customer Marketing leader with a strong background in experiential marketing to oversee our global advocacy, events, and executive engagement programs. As F5’s Customer Marketing Lead, you will drive the strategy for how we wholistically engage our customers globally across the customer lifecycle.  You will be responsible for developing and implementing engagement strategies with customers through events, case studies, customer videos, customer advisory boards, F5’s Customer Engagement Centers (CEC) in the F5 Tower and around the world, and references for sales and PR. In collaboration with your team, you will work to build a strong rapport with customers to deepen loyalty and engagement with us to turn them into raving F5 fans and advocates.

The right candidate will balance strategic thinking with tactical execution – understanding what the F5 customer journey is and where it should be headed. This role is incredibly cross-functional, requiring regular communication across field marketing, product and corporate marketing, sales and sales enablement, customer success teams, and our executive team. Successful candidates will have a proven track record of evolving and scaling Customer Marketing programs, developing customer champions, and defining and implementing global event strategies.

As a member of the Marketing Leadership Team, reporting directly to the SVP, Worldwide Marketing, you will be instrumental in developing and driving comprehensive marketing plans which support the needs of our customers and F5. This role requires an exceptional ability to lead both horizontally and vertically, a robust executive presence, and strong story telling skills to unite internal partners in your cause.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the global Customer Marketing team – define what success looks like, the programs and events that will get us there, and develop wholistic strategies to unite our Advocacy, Retention, and Experiential functions to engage our customers with globally consistent but locally relevant programs and experiences.
• Shape and lead the global experiential marketing strategy, including F5’s flagship customer event (AppWorld), regional hosted events, sponsored events, customer forums, and other high-impact customer experiences.
• Coach, energize, and empower your team, at all levels. You will engage with empathy, listen, and ask powerful questions to help others grow and raise the bar on team performance. You will communicate our vision with passion to inspire others and encourage team members to seek and embrace feedback and help them move nimbly.
• Drive strategic decision-making for where and how we show up, ensuring efforts are aligned with both brand objectives and business outcomes such as demand generation, and customer loyalty.
• Drive growth of Advocacy and Retention efforts, working closely with your team on customer testimonials (video and written), customer quotes, customer review platform strategies, executive engagement programs, and customer advisory boards (CAB).
• Develop and nurture strong working relationships with executive customers, leading by example for the rest of your team to demonstrate what it takes to develop long-standing, mutually beneficial relationships with key customers.
• Align with Customer Success leadership to execute customer-centric strategies that increase net retention, net promoter scores, and customer lifetime value.
   

Qualifications & Background:
 

• Demonstrated ability to lead a customer marketing teams – strategy balanced with tactical execution is critical here.
• Extensive experience in global experiential marketing, including developi