Irene Yam: “I’ve Found The Perfect Way to Run a Virtual CAB”

Getting customers to show up to a virtual CAB is the easy part. Getting them to actually engage? That's where most teams lose the room.Irene Yam, author of Build a World-Class Customer Advisory Board and longtime customer advocacy leader, has spent years making virtual CABs feel less like a webinar and more like a real conversation. And Thomas J. Patti, a veteran CAB customer advisor, is bringing the customer perspective.They're breaking it all down with us at The Outpost.In this episode, Irene shares her playbook for building virtual advisory boards that are smaller, more focused, and built for honest dialogue over long presentations. She walks through how to co-build agendas with customers, create real trust, and make the meeting itself feel worth showing up for.Tom explains what separates the CABs that actually stand out, why executive access only matters when it's used well, and how follow-through is often the difference between a session people remember and one they forget by Friday.This one's for the customer marketers who want their CABs to feel more like a working relationship, and less like another meeting on the calendar.