TELUS [TSE: T]

Michelle Dion serves as a director of marketing at TELUS. She has spent nearly two decades building her career around how telecommunications providers keep customers engaged after the sale. Dion's career has taken her across customer lifecycle marketing, product commercialisation and retention, giving her experience in every stage of the customer relationship. In her current role, she leads marketing for TELUS' home solutions customer base, with a focus on customer retention and growing long-term household value.

Making Retention a Daily Marketing Discipline

Bringing new customers is only the beginning of telecommunications marketing. Keeping them engaged as their expectations and needs requires continuous attention. Every interaction after the initial sale shapes whether customers stay, expand their services or look elsewhere, making retention a continuous marketing responsibility.

Dion's current role reflects that reality. She leads customer retention and profitability for TELUS' Internet, TV, SmartHome Security and Home Phone business, with responsibility extending beyond campaign execution into the broader customer lifecycle. Her work focuses on maintaining industry-leading churn performance while identifying opportunities to increase household value through customer-centric programs. That requires marketing decisions to remain closely connected with customer experience, commercial objectives and cross-functional execution instead of operating as isolated initiatives.

Using Customer Insight beyond Acquisition

Lifecycle marketing demands a different mindset than customer acquisition. Success depends less on attracting attention and more on understanding evolving customer needs after services have already been adopted.

Throughout several leadership positions at TELUS, Dion has built expertise in this space. While leading Home Solutions base management, she oversaw customer engagement strategies tied to Internet speed upgrades, premium television content, customer referrals and fibre migration programs. She also helped integrate TELUS Rewards into broader lifecycle marketing efforts, creating stronger alignment between loyalty initiatives and commercial performance.

Campaign personalization became another important focus during this period. Rather than relying on broad customer segments, her teams emphasized communications that reflected individual customer behaviors and service needs. That approach illustrates a marketing philosophy built around relevance rather than promotional volume, strengthening customer relationships through better timing and more meaningful engagement.

Using Customer Insights beyond Acquisition 

Marketing leadership also requires translating customer expectations into successful market execution. New products succeed only when customer insights, commercialization plans and organizational alignment move together.

Earlier in her career, Dion led Products and Services Marketing, overseeing the introduction of new home solutions while shaping go-to-market strategies across multiple business functions. Customer research informed product planning, while collaboration across departments helped ensure implementation remained aligned with both customer expectations and business priorities.

Her previous responsibilities in customer loyalty and relationship management further reinforced this perspective. Programs supporting onboarding, relocation and repair experiences contributed to improved customer recommendation scores while strengthening communication around product updates and service enhancements. Across each role, Dion has remained focused on building customer relationships that last instead of chasing short-term marketing wins.

Developing People alongside Performance

People development has followed Dion throughout her career. Whether leading marketing teams or supporting colleagues' career goals, she has approached leadership as something that extends beyond day-to-day business results.

That commitment extends into employee community initiatives. Dion previously served as Regional Co-Chair for Connections, TELUS' resource group supporting women's career development, and continues to contribute through Mama Bear, a national initiative focused on supporting working mothers across the organization. Earlier recognition through the Emerging Leader CHLOE Award and a Leadership Excellence CHLOE nomination further highlights a career marked by steady leadership development.

Her educational background complements that progression. After earning a Bachelor of Commerce in Marketing from the University of Calgary, Dion completed an MBA at Queen's University, where she also received a Certificate in Responsible Leadership and recognition for creativity and innovation.

The thread running through Dion's career is remarkably consistent. She has focused on strengthening customer relationships at every stage of the journey while helping marketing teams think beyond acquisition. That approach continues to shape her work today and reflects the leadership recognized by MarTech Outlook Canada.