Director of eCommerce?

There are several developments that give us great excitement about the rise of eCommerce visibility inside of retail organizations. Clearly retailers are making decisions that positively impact how eCommerce investments are prioritized. When prioritizing capital and operational spend retailers are speaking with their money in the form of eCommerce technology and business investments. No longer are eCommerce investments the result of what is "left over" after stores technology investments are made. Some of the most successful retail organizations understand that eCommerce investments are part of a customer-facing application strategy investment and as such must be made holistically. Read any annual report from a major retailer and you will find some type of reference to revenue from eCommerce or multi-channel operations and their strategic value to the overall business.

I think that one development in particular however is the greatest signal for the growing importance of eCommerce to retail organizations: The ever-changing role of Director of eCommerce.

While organizations may call them different things, most retail organizations have a Director of eCommerce role. At the most basic level, this person is responsible for day-to-day operations of eCommerce technology and business assets. In its early stages, this role began as a strictly operational role. The Director was responsible for making sure the site was running and in some cases, that he or she hit their budget. This role represented a very tactical level of responsibilities ("keep the lights on"), typically rolling up to an IT cost center budget. This role often had no direct reports and most importantly, little opportunity to innovate, drive strategy, or impact the business in any significant way.

Times have changed! The Director of eCommerce in many organizations today has been elevated in importance, stature, and responsibility. eCommerce Directors that I work with today run increasingly complex teams and increasingly complex technology. I talk with eCommerce Directors who focus on innovation, customer experience, and cross-channel strategy. They represent a business that has broad impact to the long term plans of their overall retail business. For retailers that have embraced the impact of the Web to their overall multi-channel strategies, many view the eCommerce Director as a key executive who can drive a major impact to overall customer experience.

The face of the Director of eCommerce has changed as well. In some organizations he or she is a technologist. They have ascended to their role based on their experience with the key technologies underpinning the solution area as well as the unique challenges of their own infrastructure. In other organizations the Director of eCommerce is a marketing person, first and foremost. They approach eCommerce as an extension of a marketing strategy.