{dirlink 2|9} (NYSE: ALA; Paris: CGEP:PA) announced that Alan Mottram was taking over as its Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) yesterday, replacing Ron Spithill, who's retiring next month (see Alcatel Appoints New CMO ).

Er, Ron Spitwho?, you may ask.

Spithill, it seems, has been retiring for some time. He's been head of Alcatel's marketing operations since September 2003, but the only time he's achieved the dizzying heights of a Light Reading mention was on his arrival and departure (see Alcatel Appoints Execs). The combination of "Ron Spithill" and "Alcatel" on Google generates 499 hits -- a pinprick compared to supermodel Kate Moss's 2.8 million today, and only half the 996-hit-score achieved by his replacement-in-waiting, Alan Mottram, currently president of Alcatel's fixed solutions activities.

To put things into perspective, Light Reading has repeated the Light Reading and Google search exercise on other CMOs of top telecom companies. Check out the results:

Table 1: So Search Me! The Telecom CMO Hits Chart

{dirlink 2|63}'s (NYSE/Toronto: NT) Clent Richardson's 1200 tops the chart even though he only joined Nortel in April 2004 and was appointed CMO last September. He was even setting an example that other CMOs might follow by being out and about in person this week, shepherding his CEO in London! (See Nortel CEO: We Blew It on DSL.) At the other end of the scale is... no, not Alcatel's Spithill but {dirlink 2|94}'s (NYSE: LU) John P. Giere, with just 132 Google hits. The least said the better on that one.

Martin Harriman of {dirlink 2|50} (Nasdaq: MRCIY; London: MONI) deserves a special mention for his use of free PR; he left the field standing when it came to search results on Light Reading, scoring 20 compared to everybody else's 2, 3, or 4.

By the way, {dirlink 12|20} (Nasdaq: JNPR) isn't in the table because it isn't clear who's replaced Christine Heckart since she jumped ship in June this year (see VP Jumps From Juniper). But just for comparison, Googling Heckart and Juniper stumps up a disappointing 252 hits, while she scores a hearty 12 on the Light Reading search engine.

— Ray Le Maistre, International News Editor, Light Reading