Planet Home Lending Taps Jim McDonald As Chief Marketing Officer

Planet Home Lending, a national lender, servicer and private client sub-servicer, has named Jim McDonald as chief marketing officer (CMO). McDonald manages Planet Home Lending’s marketing and customer experience initiatives.

“Jim has a terrific combination of industry, technology, and digital marketing expertise acquired from positions in the mortgage industry and with well-known consumer brands, including Match.com and Verizon,” said Michael Dubeck, CEO and president of Planet Financial Group, LLC. “He’ll create modern, customer-focused marketing for our multiple business channels.”

McDonald believes customer experience is key not just for Planet Home Lending’s home loan, renovation, and servicing divisions, but also for its correspondent, residential transition lending, and private client sub-servicing business lines.

“I believe that product and marketing are at different ends of the same spectrum and the customer experience is the glue that holds them together,” McDonald said. “Planet has great products and services. It also has great leadership, passionate employees, and a strong business model, which makes my job of building the brand much easier. My primary objective is to tell the Planet story, via its great customer experience, to as many people as possible.”

McDonald is also a Business Learning Center instructor at the Southern Methodist University Cox School of Business, where he routinely lectures on the topic of the Experience Economy. A popular speaker, he has been featured at HousingWire, Customer Experience Leadership Forum, Search Engine Strategies and AdTech events.

Prior to joining Planet Home Lending, McDonald consulted on marketing strategies and SaaS products for companies inside and outside the mortgage industry. Before that, McDonald was the CMO at Pacific Union Financial, where he led the marketing and new customer acquisition teams. An industry veteran of more than 15 years, McDonald focuses primarily on branding, digital marketing, marketing automation, video, online reputation management, search engine optimization (SEO) and customer experience.