Who is Sarah Hatter?

Meet Sarah Hatter, Founder of ElevateCX!

About ElevateCX

ElevateCX is a customer experience community that gets together virtually, via Slack, and through periodic physical gatherings to discuss the CX industry. Community members share thoughts and job listings, but they also meet virtually to develop relationships and celebrate mutual interests. 

Sarah’s Journey

Sarah has been working in customer experience (CX) since 2003, specializing in web-based CX. She started her career in the early days of internet startups and, by 2006, had joined one of the first cloud-based subscription startups. As the only non-technical employee on the team, Sarah handled all customer support, drawing on her prior experience in call centers and hospitality. "There are definitely personality types that are drawn to this kind of work," she explains, emphasizing the importance of customer education through resources like knowledge bases and videos.

In 2011, Sarah left the startup world to found her own consultancy, CoSupport, and authored the Customer Support Handbook. At that time, she notes, customer support wasn’t widely recognized as an area for innovation. "There wasn’t any training for it... the Disney Institute was probably the only way you could learn great modern theories about customer support."

Recognizing a lack of resources, Sarah launched ElevateCX in 2012, a conference series that brings together CX professionals from across industries. The event, now in its 46th iteration, hosts around 200 CX leaders from sectors like D2C e-commerce and tech.

Sarah’s Career Evolution

Reflecting on her career, Sarah notes that when she wrote Customer Support Handbook, the landscape for customer experience was vastly different. "I was usually the only person talking about customer experience, and often the only female speaker on stage," she recalls. She was working to convince CEOs and startup founders about the importance of offering basic customer-friendly services, like free returns, free shipping, and timely apologies for downtime. "Even 10 years ago, we were still trying to drill it into people's minds how important that was," she says. Today, these practices are widely accepted as fundamental to a good customer experience.

Sarah’s passion for transforming the customer journey extended beyond just replying to emails. For her, it was about creating a seamless experience across all touchpoints, from marketing to the purchase process and ongoing customer support. Her goal was to spread these ideas so effectively that her own consultancy would become obsolete.

 "To see it not only catch on but also to be in a place where I could say, 'my job is to put myself out of business,' has been really awesome," she says, proud of the progress the industry has made. Now, she finds inspiration in the emerging leaders entering the CX space with fresh ideas and perspectives.

The Development of CX in E-Commerce

According to Sarah, the CX industry, especially in eCommerce and D2C, is in a unique position right now. "They’re standing on the shoulders of giants," she explains, noting how E-Commerce companies have learned from the mistakes of both tech startups and legacy brands. These businesses can now focus on customer experience without repeating past errors. "Customers already have well-established expectations, so brands aren’t risking alienating them with missteps like price hikes."

What excites Sarah most is how streamlined the technical side of things has become. Setting up platforms like Shopify or TikTok is no longer difficult, allowing companies to prioritize making every customer interaction flawless. "The best support is no support," she says, emphasizing that when brands perfect the customer journey, customers can seamlessly buy, track, and return—leaving them satisfied and eager to return. "That’s a really cool space to be in right now."

CX’s Big Job

Sarah emphasizes that a company’s customer experience (CX) team is its nucleus, especially for eCommerce brands. "If you’re not treating the CX team as the core, whether it’s the director of CX, support, or outsourced teams, you’re missing the mark," she says.

 Sarah points out that the technology has finally caught up with the industry’s needs, with platforms like Gorgias and Zendesk providing the tools necessary for efficient reporting. "Everyone in the company should be looking to the CX team for insights," she adds, stressing the importance of collaboration across departments.

AI’s Role in CX

Sarah argues that while AI is making a significant impact on CX, this trend is primarily driven by CEOs and investors and will likely burn out within 6 to 18 months, as the perceived cost-saving benefits are undercut by diminished performance. "People want a trusted source, and that’s usually a human being," she says. Despite the push for AI, customers consistently request human interaction—often typing "talk to a person" in chatbots.

Sarah believes AI won’t replace customer experience teams entirely. "The successful brands will be the ones first in line to say, 'Okay, we’re going back to people.'" She foresees a shift where companies refocus on human connections after realizing the limitations of AI in customer support.