At A Glance

Danie Feld, Director of CX Operations at Open Late Collective, champions a holistic approach to customer experience for e-commerce brands. From crafting SOPs to building dashboards that combine quantitative and qualitative insights, her team ensures CX drives value across entire organizations.

Who is Danie?

Meet Danie Feld, Director of CX Operations at Open Late Collective!

About Open Late Collective

Open Late Collective is more than just a marketing agency – it’s a collaborative powerhouse for E-Commerce brands. Open Late specializes in blending brand strategy, customer experience, and digital marketing to fuel your brand’s growth and success.

Open Late believes that brand building never sleeps, so neither do they. The agency is on a mission to elevate E-Commerce brands by creating cohesive, impactful strategies that connect with your audience and drive sustainable growth.

Danie’s CX Journey

After receiving a degree in Theater/Spanish, Danie was looking for her first post-graduate job. Being good with people and a strong communicator, she applied for a CX position. She feels that many CX leaders had career starts like hers and says, "We understand people and are empathetic, curious, and creative. I think many people in CX have backgrounds in the arts. We start out as agents because we need a job and work our way up because we find the roles are well suited to our strengths"

Danie worked various CX roles at RXBAR and Feastables, and then took a break to earn her master’s degree in counseling. Meanwhile, Jess Cervellon, her colleague at Feastables had ventured off to start Open Late Collective, a CX and retention agency. Recognizing her true passion lay in the exciting world of CX after graduate school, Danie reconnected with Jess and joined the agency as Director of CX Operations in August 2023.

The Team at Open Late Collective

The team at Open Late Collective is small but their skills span across a variety of specializations, including Digital Marketing, CX, Brand Strategy, and Operations. Officially running for over a year now, the agency works with clients fractionally and on a project basis.

The core team is assisted by the team who work on various client projects as needed. “We specifically look for people who are as scrappy as we are,” Danie reveals. “They're open to being flexible, learning new skills, and are ready to jump in wherever their support is needed.”

The CX Philosophy at Open Late Collective

Developing CX and retention related strategies for clients means that Open Late Collective must take a holistic view of customer experience. Recognizing that each brand’s CX needs and goals vary from one project to the next, the agency aims for customization, open communication, and streamlined processes.

Training New Hires and Building SOPs

Whether building a brand’s platform or acting as fractional Head of CX, Open Late Collective enters each brand partnership by creating documentation for training. Utilizing Notion for building SOPs internally, the agency finds the tool useful for working with clients as well. “It’s a single source of truth. It can be updated and act as a comprehensive resource,” Danie explains. Consequently, any brand that the agency works with has the right training materials and is prepared to onboard new hires. “It’s a good practice for existing agents to have documentation, which they can reference in specific situations,” she adds.

A Customized Approach to Strategic Partnerships

“We’re always coming in as a strategic partner,” Danie says, but what that looks like for each client is different. At most, Open Late Collective is helping a new brand build from the ground up by establishing a platform, making connections, and bringing in essential support. Working with an established brand, the agency will oversee fractional Head of CX, carrying out day-to-day management while communicating with leadership about strategy.

CX Team Success Factors

Quantitative Data and Qualitative Data: The Big Picture

The agency monitors a CX Team’s standard stats such as response and resolution times, and ticket counts. Understanding that at face value, numbers reveal little about the complete customer experience, Danie goes on to say, “We’re also really interested in the ‘why’ behind stuff.” Comprehensive dashboards are created for brands that show quantitative data along with anecdotal qualitative data about tickets. “We find that there is just as much, perhaps even more value in looking at ‘why ‘people are contacting these companies,” she notes.

Making CX Data Valuable Across an Entire Brand

As a data-focused agency, Open Late Collective aims to make the resources it offers to brands as valuable as possible. Danie elaborates, “As we learn more about our clients in combination with the tools we are using in general, we want to make sure the ‘voice of the customer’ programs and dashboards we create are bringing value to teams outside of CX. We want it to be a resource for everyone, because we know CX holds important data for the entire company.” 

Essential Tech Stack for a CX Team

Danie begins her essential tech stack list for CX by discussing a customer platform. While some clients use Gorgias, the agency prefers Kustomer for data capabilities. She also notes the importance of order tracking tools and self-service returns platforms in E-Commerce. “The order-returns portals are going to be very useful,” she says. I think to have that level of automation in the customer experience is something everyone wants.”

Looking Ahead: Prioritizing ‘Experience’ in CX

Open Late Collective envisions the future of CX as being more about the overall experience, not just focused solely on support. “We try to instill in the people we work with that it’s not just about how tickets are looking and what people are saying about your tickets. Customer experience is so much more than just what happens in the platform” Danie says. The CX journey also consists of using a company’s website, receiving emails, post-purchase, and beyond. Pushing for an alliance between CX and the rest of the organization, the agency aims to empower CX leaders and teams to know their worth, advocate for themselves, and have a bigger, and more appreciated, role in the company.

AI As an Asset for E-Commerce Brands

Danie views AI as an asset in CX, noting that after some fine-tuning, Open Late Collective has utilized AI tools in its own operations. The landscape of E-Commerce is constantly changing. To keep in step with the speedy service of online retail giants, AI offers smaller brands the opportunity to provide customers with automated support and quick resolution for simple issues. “As long as you can train your AI tools to be accurate and helpful, and not cause problems, I think it’s great,” Danie adds. 

Advice for CX Leaders

Danie’s advice for other CX Leaders is “to learn to advocate for yourself.”  She stresses the importance of speaking up for customers, so their needs are heard by executives while establishing strong lines of communication with the other departments, marketing, operations, R&D, that make up the company. Internally, to be a good leader requires curiosity, which she believes is necessary to discover and learn new tools and identify with the voice of the customer.  “Asking ‘why?’ is really important,” she finishes.