Bob Williams

eCommerce solutions ownership – customer focused results

November 1st, 2010 | Leave a comment | Tags: , , ,

An important role in an eCommerce operation is responsibility for solutions ownership and the results delivered to senior management and other stakeholders. It’s a senior role that focuses on the macro level results that  define the success and viability of the eCommerce team. In addition to the traditional financial and market metrics, the solutions owner must deliver customer focused results. It’s the customer focus that provides the building blocks for the traditional results and helps to set an eCommerce team apart from it’s competitors.

Traditional financial results

A solutions owner is responsible for profitable results with positive contribution margins. The contribution margin of a product is defined as the revenue …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

eCommerce operation mind map

October 29th, 2010 | Leave a comment | Tags: ,

Statistically speaking, the posts I’ve written about the organizational aspects of an eCommerce operation get more views on the Merchant Stand than any other posts. It’s telling me that people are interested in ideas for how they can structure an eCommerce team and what areas of responsibility they should cover. I think the greater interest is that people are looking for ideas and ways that their teams can operate more efficiently to be more agile. I plan to explore more thoughts around organizational layout in an eCommerce operation in future posts. To help with that, and to invite others in the community to discuss this with me, I’ve captured my …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

Three golden nuggets for eCommerce financial metrics management

July 30th, 2010 | Leave a comment | Tags: , ,

The ultimate goal of financial metrics in your eCommerce operation is to provide a measurement against revenue and profits required to sustain and grow your business. Choosing which financial metrics to measure can be a tricky endeavor. You want to make sure to capture relevant data that define your business and to use your time wisely. Common areas of measurement include revenue, average cart purchase, up-sell ratio, retail dollars, number of items in the cart, cost to operate, adword spend,and delivery dollars.

But what is financial metrics management really about and how should you structure this part of your eCommerce operation?

Use financial metrics that define the success of your …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

Defining an eCommerce Operation – Demand Management

December 10th, 2009 | One comment | Tags: , ,

UPDATE 10/27/10 – I posted a mind map of my eCommerce Operation on mindmeister that replaces the original map at the bottom of this post. This includes the latest updates to my organizational thoughts on an eCommerce team.

It’s been a few months since I wrote about the building blocks of an eCommerce operation. Previously I wrote about the areas of solution ownership, content management, and product management. In this post I’ll list some of the key elements from the demand management area. I have three more areas on my master eCommerce operation plan, so you this is post 4 of 7 on this topic.

As with any type of product …Continue reading >>

Bob Williams

Defining an eCommerce Operation – Content Management

June 24th, 2009 | 2 comments | Tags: , , , ,

UPDATE 10/27/10 – I posted a mind map of my eCommerce Operation on mindmeister that replaces the original map contained in this post. This includes the latest updates to my organizational thoughts on an eCommerce team.

This is the second post in a series about defining components of an eCommerce organization.  The first post explored elements of solution ownership. Today I’ll look at the area of content management. An important aspect of any eCommerce site is that the content of the site must be up-to-date and it must be correct. Prospects and customers rely on the content management owners to keep the store front ready for shopping.

There are four …Continue reading >>

 
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