About

Learn More About CX Forums

Our Mission

Our mission is to bring senior-level CX professionals together from a wide variety of disciplines and industries to connect, learn and share what each of us know about the growing customer experience profession.

What is CX Forums?

CX Forums is the next evolution in professional meetings and events for the CX industry created by Mark Michelson, producer of CX Talks.

Fo-rum: noun: “A place where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged.” 

What Kinds of Events?

CX Forums produces a weekly online show called Connext Live! and local in-person, full-day Executive Summit meetings in 10 markets. Our events, both online and local, are designed to showcase topics for senior-level executives. Our presentations feature a wide range of CX disciplines and technologies that contribute to creating great customer experiences.

Who Supports CX Forums?

Our local in-person Executive Summit events are supported by sponsors, attendees and leading CX related associations, such as CXPA, who are involved in planning and promoting CX Forums events. Our free weekly online show, Connext Live!, is totally supported by sponsors.

How CX Forums Started

CX Talks was conceived by Mark Michelson in 2016 as a CXPA event for their annual CX Day. During this 3-hour event, 10 speakers gave 10-minute TED Talks style presentations to an audience of around 100 attendees. The meeting was held at Macquarium in Atlanta.

Following this event, Carlos Pimenta, CEO of Macquarium approached Mark with the idea to bring together various associations in Atlanta who represent different CX disciplines, including Store Design, Technology, UX, CRM, Marketing Research, Mystery Shopping, Call Centers and more. Carlos and Mark invited 18 associations to meet and co-create what became known as CX Talks.

Our format, which was initially built around the idea of TED Talks, features short talks (15-minutes of fame) on a wide range of CX related topics from Design Thinking to VOC. Essentially, we expanded the TED Talks concept into a full-day meeting with networking for business professionals.

From the first event in Atlanta, CX Talks offered a chance to network face-to-face with local CX professionals and learn from leading CX visionaries without having to travel. 

Hundreds of attendees have attended talks on a range of topics, including culture and employee experience, design thinking, content marketing, new technologies, and more. Year over year, CX Talks had expanded its geographic footprint to include Dallas and Chicago. 

With the COVID pandemic derailing our in-person event series, we decided to step back and re-evaluate our brand strategy. 

There are many formats that fulfill our original mission of bringing professionals together for networking and growing their CX Skills. After considering the growing demand for CX content, we decided to divide and conquer to provide more programming opportunities for our attendees. 

Mark will be now be managing the CX Forums brand full-time. The CX Talks brand will continue under Carlos’ stewardship with a focus on Atlanta events and online programming.

Our Future

We are expanding our geographic coverage through online events including webinars, fireside chats, meetups, virtual networking and workshops. Every Wednesday, CX Forums Connext Live! will feature a short presentation (15-20 minutes) and provide at least 30 minutes for guided networking in breakout rooms.

Presentations from our Connext Live! show will be recorded and archived providing short video presentations on a wide range of topics.

When we can safely meet again, we are planning to have Executive Summit events in North America in the following markets:

Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Minneapolis, Nashville, New York City, Philadelphia, Seattle, and Washington DC

We are also interested in expanding internationally to Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa and South America.

If you would like to join us in hosting or participating in our local events in international markets, please contact Mark Michelson mark@cxforums.org or +1-404-308-7173

CX Forums Team

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Mark Michelson

CEO/Producer, CX Forums
Founder/Principal, Threads Marketing Research

Mark Michelson is the CEO/Producer of CX Forums. He is responsible for the day-to-day management of all CX Forums events.

In addition to managing CX Forums, Mark is the principal of Threads Marketing Research, which focuses on customer experience research using online focus groups, mobile ethnography and online surveys.

Mark’s experience as a market researcher includes 35+ years of developing and implementing strategic marketing research studies involving store design, UX, journey mapping, and experience auditing for many of the world’s leading brands in a variety of industries including technology, food service, healthcare, retail and CPG. His work has taken him to 70+ countries and 49 states in the course of his career.

Mark is the founder/co-founder of several international marketing research trade associations including, the Mobile Marketing Research Association (MMRA), the Social Media Research Association (SMRA), The Mystery Shopping Professional’s Association (MSPA) and has served on the board of the Qualitative Research Consultants Association (QRCA) as well as helping to plan and manage events for the Atlanta LNE of the Customer Experience Professional’s Association (CXPA)

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Audrey Birnbaum

Creative Director, CX Forums
Founder, Increase Your Auds, LLC.

Audrey serves as Creative Director for CX Forums.  In addition to the creative space of copy and design, Audrey works with Mark to help execute his vision of CX Forums: Connext Live and CX Forums Executive Symposiums returning in-person in 2021.

Audrey is the founder of Increase Your Auds, a consulting & creative company specializing in bringing ideas, events and company growth to life.

Audrey’s 16 years of thinking-outside-the-box experience includes event production, communications & design, project management, sales management, behavioral science and more.  Producing sold out events for music enthusiasts at private country clubs and 5-Star, 5-Diamond resorts, Audrey knows that the customer experience connection is paramount to success at every level.