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Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Digital Merchandiser

💰 $50,000 - $90,000

RetailE-commerceMerchandisingDigital Marketing

🎯 Role Definition

The Digital Merchandiser is responsible for shaping the online product experience to drive discovery, conversion, average order value and customer retention. This role combines product catalog management, content optimization, digital SEO, promotional planning and data-driven experimentation to ensure products are presented accurately and compellingly across web, mobile, and marketplace channels. The Digital Merchandiser partners with Buying, Marketing, Creative, Inventory and Analytics teams to implement merchandising strategies that maximize sales and margin while maintaining brand integrity and SEO best practices.

Key search and SEO keywords: Digital Merchandiser, e‑commerce merchandising, product listings, catalog management, PIM, conversion rate optimization, content optimization, marketplace management, product SEO, A/B testing.


📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

  • E-commerce Coordinator or Assistant Merchandiser transitioning into a focused digital role.
  • Product Content Specialist or Catalog Coordinator with hands‑on PIM experience.
  • Digital Marketing Coordinator with experience in SEO, analytics or paid search.

Advancement To:

  • Senior Digital Merchandiser
  • E‑commerce Merchandising Manager / Head of Merchandising
  • Director of E‑commerce / Head of Online Merchandising
  • Omnichannel Merchandising Lead

Lateral Moves:

  • Marketplace Manager (Amazon, Walmart, eBay)
  • SEO / Content Strategy Lead
  • Product Manager (e‑commerce systems)

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

  • Own end-to-end online product presentation for assigned categories: create, audit and maintain product titles, descriptions, bullets, attributes, metadata, images and videos to improve searchability and conversion across web, mobile and marketplace channels.
  • Develop and execute category-level merchandising strategies that align with commercial objectives (conversion, margin, sell-through) and seasonal promotional calendars; translate strategy into prioritized execution plans and measurable KPIs.
  • Manage product feed and PIM data governance: ensure product attributes, taxonomy, SKUs, GTINs, variants and compliance data are accurate, complete and optimized for channel requirements.
  • Perform ongoing SEO and keyword research for product content, category pages and PLPs/ PDPs; implement on-page optimizations and structured data to improve organic traffic and product discoverability.
  • Configure and manage site search merchandising, including search synonyms, redirects, promoted results and search facets to maximize relevance and revenue from onsite search.
  • Build and launch A/B and multivariate experiments (CRO) on product pages, category pages and promotional creatives; analyze results and make evidence-based content and layout recommendations.
  • Monitor product performance and profitability using analytics tools (Google Analytics, Adobe Analytics, Looker/Tableau); generate weekly and monthly performance reports and translate insights into action items for content, pricing and inventory.
  • Plan and execute promotional merchandising (campaign pages, banners, landing pages) in partnership with Marketing and Creative, ensuring readiness for sales events, seasonality and new product launches.
  • Own digital planograms and product placement logic for category sorting and facet priorities to optimize basket size and conversion funnels.
  • Coordinate with Buying and Inventory teams to reflect availability, replenishment status, and sell-through strategies in online merchandising plans, including out-of-stock handling and substitution logic.
  • Operate channel and marketplace storefronts: maintain category structure, product listings, A+ content/enhanced brand content, and promotional placements on platforms like Amazon, Walmart, and marketplace partners.
  • Partner with Creative to define image quality standards, lifestyle imagery, zoom and video requirements and to prioritize creative resources for high-impact SKUs.
  • Lead product launch readiness: prepare content packs, ensure technical feed readiness, QA images and specs, and set up promotional mechanics for go-live.
  • Maintain pricing and promotional accuracy on product pages, including strike-through pricing, bulk discounts, and coupon mechanics; escalate pricing feed issues to pricing and systems teams.
  • Implement product taxonomy updates and metadata standards across PIM and CMS to improve internal workflows and automated mapping to channel templates.
  • Create and maintain product content templates and best-practice guidelines for copywriters, merchants and third-party vendors to ensure consistent brand voice and SEO optimization.
  • Conduct competitive analysis and market scans to identify content gaps, assortment opportunities and merchandising tactics driving incremental revenue.
  • Troubleshoot content errors, images, variant mapping problems and feed failures; coordinate with engineering and platform teams to resolve bugs and prevent recurrence.
  • Train and mentor junior merchandisers, content coordinators and cross-functional partners on merchandising tools, PIM workflows and KPI-driven decision making.
  • Maintain rigorous QA and release processes for content updates, ensuring changes are tested, documented and monitored post-publish for performance and technical issues.
  • Use SQL or query tools to extract behavioral, conversion and product performance data for hypothesis testing and prioritization of merchandising initiatives.
  • Define and track core merchandising KPIs (conversion rate, click-through rate, add-to-cart, AOV, revenue per visit, margin, returns) and report trends to stakeholders with actionable recommendations.
  • Optimize product attributes and filter/facet logic to reduce bounce rates and improve shopper path-to-purchase on category and search results pages.
  • Lead cross-functional projects that require system integrations (PIM, OMS, CMS, analytics) to improve product data flows and reduce manual content upkeep.
  • Drive continuous improvement by documenting processes, creating playbooks for seasonal merchandising, and implementing automation for repetitive catalog tasks.

Secondary Functions

  • Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory analysis to diagnose sales, assortment or content issues; translate raw data into prioritized action plans.
  • Contribute to the organization's digital merchandising strategy and roadmap, identifying technology investments or process changes that will scale merchandising efficiency.
  • Collaborate with business units to translate commercial objectives into technical requirements for PIM, CMS and marketplace connectors.
  • Participate in sprint planning, agile ceremonies and cross-functional working sessions to align merchandising deliverables with engineering and marketing timelines.
  • Assist in vendor management for external content agencies and marketplace specialists; define SLAs and quality metrics for third-party contributions.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

  • E-commerce platforms: hands-on experience with Shopify Plus, Magento (Adobe Commerce), Salesforce Commerce Cloud, or similar commerce platforms.
  • Product Information Management (PIM): proficiency with PIM tools (InRiver, Salsify, Akeneo) and best practices for attribute modeling and syndication.
  • Catalog & feed management: experience managing product feeds, marketplace connectors (Amazon Seller Central, Vendor Central, Walmart, ChannelAdvisor) and feed optimization.
  • SEO & product copywriting: strong keyword research skills, on-page SEO for product pages, structured data/schema markup familiarity.
  • Analytics & reporting: advanced Excel, Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics, and visualization tools (Looker, Tableau, Power BI) to monitor KPIs and inform merchandising decisions.
  • A/B testing and CRO: experience setting up experiments, interpreting results, and implementing data-driven optimizations (Optimizely, Google Optimize, VWO).
  • Basic front-end familiarity: understanding of HTML, CSS, image optimization and responsive design considerations for product content.
  • SQL or data querying: ability to write basic SQL queries to extract product and behavior data for analysis and testing.
  • Content management systems: experience with CMS workflows, content staging and publishing for commerce sites.
  • Marketplace optimization: knowledge of marketplace SEO, A+ content creation, buy box mechanics and promotional capabilities.

Soft Skills

  • Commercial mindset: data-driven, ROI-focused approach that balances conversion, margin and brand experience.
  • Strong communication: able to present recommendations clearly to cross-functional stakeholders including buyers, marketing and engineering.
  • Project management: organized, able to manage multiple launches and campaigns simultaneously with clear prioritization.
  • Attention to detail: meticulous about data, image quality, variant mapping and content accuracy.
  • Collaboration and influence: works effectively with creative, analytics and supply chain partners to drive results.
  • Curiosity and continuous improvement: stays current on e‑commerce trends, testing methodologies and consumer behavior.
  • Problem-solving: comfortable troubleshooting technical issues and crafting pragmatic solutions under time constraints.
  • Time management: meets tight deadlines for campaigns and flash sales while maintaining quality standards.
  • Adaptability: thrives in fast-paced retail environments with shifting priorities and seasonal peaks.
  • Mentoring and leadership: coaches junior team members and helps scale team capabilities.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree in Marketing, Business, Retail Management, Communications, Data Analytics or related field OR equivalent professional experience in e-commerce merchandising.

Preferred Education:

  • Bachelor’s or Master’s degree in Marketing, E‑commerce, Business Analytics, Digital Media or a related discipline.
  • Certifications in Google Analytics, SEO, or e‑commerce platforms are a plus.

Relevant Fields of Study:

  • Marketing
  • Business Administration / Commerce
  • Data Analytics / Statistics
  • Digital Media / Communications
  • Retail Management
  • Computer Science (for technical / integration-heavy roles)

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range: 2–5+ years in e‑commerce merchandising, product content management, or digital marketing for online retail.

Preferred:

  • 3–5 years managing product content and merchandising for medium-to-large e‑commerce sites or marketplaces.
  • Demonstrated success improving conversion, organic traffic and/or revenue via content, SEO and experimentation.
  • Experience with cross-functional collaboration (Buying, Creative, Analytics, Engineering) and managing catalog/data workflows at scale.