Former Siebel Executive Brings Sales and Marketing Leadership to Web 2.0 Customer Service Startup
San Francisco, CA (February 18, 2009) Get Satisfaction, the leader in social media-based customer care, announced today that Wendy Lea, a seasoned high-technology investor and entrepreneur, has joined Get Satisfaction as its new CEO.
“Wendy joining Get Satisfaction as CEO is a huge milestone for us,” says founder, CTO and former CEO Thor Muller. “Her enterprise software sales and business background, combined with her online savvy and deep Silicon Valley relationships, make her the right person at the right time in the development of Get Satisfaction. Wendy is the person who is going to take our success to the next level.â€
Wendy brings nearly two decades of software sales and marketing experience to the Get Satisfaction team. She has played a leadership role through the evolution of the software sales and marketing industry, from the enterprise site license to online software-as-a-service.
Ms. Lea co-founded The Sales Consultancy in the U.S., where she developed technology sales, marketing and channel management methodologies that were adopted as global standards by IBM, Hewlett Packard, Cisco, Microsoft, Oracle, and others. Wendy has also served as VP Marketing for OnTarget, and senior vice president of eBusiness Consulting for Siebel.
Since Siebel’s acquisition by Oracle, Wendy has been an active angel investor, board member and strategic advisor to a variety of technology and Internet startups. She also serves as Vice Chair of Silicon Valley’s Forum for Women Entrepreneurs and Executives.
“I am thrilled and honored to join Get Satisfaction as CEO. I love the people and the platform,†said Wendy. “The future of customer care is all about consumer-aware companies finding find creative, compelling and low cost ways to listen, build and develop loyal communities of consumers. That’s what Get Satisfaction’s platform is all about — using social media and community-building technologies to improve consumer voice and retention while lowering the costs of service and support.â€
Get Satisfaction’s Web 2.0 customer service and support platform combines customer management tools with the power of online community to provide a platform that reduces repetitive support costs for companies while ensuring stronger customer loyalty, retention, collaboration, and customer-driven innovation. Since its launch in 2007, the Get Satisfaction platform has been adopted by more than 12,000 companies, and used by 1.5 million consumers a month. Get Satisfaction’s company roster is a who’s who of the world’s top brands, and its consumers are vocal, active and engaged in the customer-company dialog.
“Thor Muller led the company through our initial phase of intense product and customer development,” said co-founder and President Lane Becker. “As a result, there’s a great deal of interest in Get Satisfaction from companies of every size, from high-technology startups to Fortune 500 consumer packaged goods companies. We’re excited to have Wendy Lea’s leadership and sales experience at the table as respond to the increased demand for social media-based customer care.”
Thor Muller will remain with Get Satisfaction as chief technology officer, continuing his focus on technology planning and development.
As of February 2009, Get Satisfaction has received $2.5 million in funding from First Round Capital, O’Reilly Alphatech Ventures, Softtech VC and several angel investors, including Josh Felser and Dave Samuel, founders of Spinner and Grouper; Narendra Rocherolle and Julie Davidson, founders of Webshots and 30 Boxes; and Mitch Kapor, founder of Lotus.
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