What makes a great eCommerce Specialist

For a business to flourish, it must work closely with an eCommerce specialist who combines strong technical, business, and digital marketing skills with the ability to interpret data and drive measurable results.

The challenge comes in businesses understanding what a great eCommerce specialist looks like.

The most effective way to define this specialist is by breaking the skillsets down into Hard and Soft skills.

1. Hard skills are specific, teachable, and measurable abilities.
2. Soft skills are interpersonal attributes and personal qualities developed through experience.

Both of these are broken down below.

Below is a summary of the hard skills that make up an eCommerce Specialist...

#1. eCommerce Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO):

The proven ability to activate a systematic approach to improving website and checkout flows to boost sales with the same or less traffic.

#2. User Experience Design Planning:

The ability to take business needs and customer-centric data and use this to map out new customer experiences that drive online purching to new levels.

#3. eCommerce Platform Mastery:

This is crucial and not discussed enough. There is a need for deep knowledge of major eCommerce platforms and the ability to customize features for business needs.

All eCommerce platforms, when left untouched, produce underwhelming "vanilla" experiences. The actual value comes when these technologies are massaged in a way that engages with customers.

The key platforms are Shopify, Magento (Adobe) and BigCommerce.

#4. Data analysis:

The ability to interpret customer-centric data sets to stimulate the future of eCommerce channel behaviours to enhance online experiences is a foundational hard skill.

#5. Digital marketing Expertise:

This involves understanding how to leverage proven disciplines and traffic channels to drive highly qualified traffic to a website. This is a mix of SEO, Paid Search, Email Marketing, and Social Media.

#6. Customer relationship management:

Digital marketing skills perfect new customer acquisition activities, and customer relationship management skills activate retention activities.

The two disciplines must work together.

This hard skill is about how to improve CX at every touchpoint to scale strategies for retention and loyalty.

Below are the soft skills that come together to make a great eCommerce specialist. A specialist can have a high degree of hard skills, but if they are not complemented and mixed with these soft skills, they will never contribute to producing business value.

#1. Excellent communication skills:

Clearly explains strategies and results to stakeholders using plain language.

#2. Strategic thinking and business acumen:

Aligns digital tactics with broader goals and understands inventory, sales, and financial fundamentals.

#3. Teamwork and Leadership:

Collaborates with creative, tech, and marketing teams and can guide or educate others on best practice.

#4. Agility and adaptability:

Stays up-to-date with current ecommerce trends, technologies (like AI, mobile commerce), and adapts quickly.

This includes how to engage with the eCommerce Specialist.

#5. Creative problem solving:

Finds innovative solutions for digital challenges such as declining conversion rates or algorithm changes.