Ben Hoffman on Customer v. User Experience

Ensuring the needs of users and customers are met has never been more important to the success of businesses. But wait! what's the difference between a user and a customer? aren't all users customers? or is it all customers are users? and which is more important - user experience or customer experience? Does anybody really care?
Customer experience has recently emerged as a 'new' field and is growing in importance - especially in consumer-focused companies. We'll explore the two experience areas to compare and contrast how they are the same and different but both vitally important.

About our speaker
Ben Hoffman is currently the acting US Chief Customer Officer for Cigna, a global health service company, dedicated to helping the people they serve improve their health, well-being and sense of security. His 25 years in user experience and customer experience have provided him the opportunity to work on a broad variety of initiatives and industries - from auto insurance quoting to health care to railroad yard management. He has extensive experience in leading user and customer experience functions, customer/usability research methods and in starting new user and customer experience functions (having done so over 10 times).
Previously, Ben has worked for Travelers Insurance, The Hartford, Dell Computer and IBM. He holds a BA in Psychology from Moravian College and a Masters in Statistics and Measurement from Rutgers University. He currently resides in Madison, CT.