Zillow Hires Nike's Former Chief Designer to Newly Created CDO Role, Is It Planning Something New?

Zillow has announced the appointment of Jenny Arden to the newly-created position of Chief Design Officer.

Arden's new role will see her take on the responsibility of "delivering seamless, connected and customer-centric experiences" across all of Zillow's divisions and may hail a new direction for a company that was dramatically forced out of iBuying a couple of months ago.

Arden has an impressive CV having previously been in charge of design at sports equipment manufacturer Nike and in charge of customer experience at ride-hailing app Lyft. Before that, she had spent 4 years at both Google and Airbnb.

Since its iBuying business went down in flames and effectively cut the company's share price in half, there has been a lot of speculation as to the Seattle based outfit's next move. Zillow has been going down the path towards an 'end-to-end' product for many years and along with some recent noise around the resurrection of an old patent application, Arden's appointment has set industry tongues wagging.

Zillow COO Jeremy Wacksman confirmed that Arden will help build “Zillow 2.0.” while, commenting on her new role, Zillow's new CDO gave a nod to the company's vision to create a truly end-to-end real estate experience:

“By elevating design, Zillow can have an even greater impact on the customers who come to the platform every day to dream and shop, and eventually move with the help of Zillow.”

With CoStar inching further into residential real estate and Realtor.com looking revitalised and splashing the cash for celebrity rappers in its new TV commercial spots, now seems like the ideal time for Zillow to strike back with a new product announcement...