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How to Hire an eCommerce Director in Australia

26 September 2026 · Updated 1 October 2026

To hire an eCommerce Director in Australia now, decide what AI is meant to do across your online channel before you write the brief, then build the brief around the channel P&L. Screen for people who’ve owned revenue, margin and a trading calendar through at least one peak period, with AI already part of how they trade. Expect to headhunt: there’s no national salary benchmark for the title, and the best candidates are rarely job hunting. A proper search runs 3 to 6 weeks.

AI has changed what an eCommerce Director runs

Product descriptions, on-site search, recommendations, promotional pricing, customer service chat and demand forecasting can all have AI in them now. The eCommerce Director decides which to switch on and has to know whether they’re working. Someone also has to say where a person still signs off before a price or product page goes live, and that’s usually them too.

That sits on an old problem. The seat is usually new to the business, so the brief borrows half from a marketing template and half from a digital one, and describes neither the person who runs a P&L on a trading calendar nor the person who owns brand. If you’re not sure whether the seat is marketing, digital or ecommerce, start there.

In this guide

What does AI fluency look like in an eCommerce Director?

It shows up in trading results they can explain. An eCommerce Director owns a channel with its own revenue target, margin and weekly rhythm. AI fluency here means knowing where AI improves those numbers and where it quietly hurts them.

The candidates worth putting forward can tell you:

  • which parts of the channel they’ve put AI into, and which they kept manual
  • how they measured whether an AI change helped conversion or margin
  • where AI-generated content, pricing or recommendations went wrong, and how they catch it now
  • how they ran a peak period (Black Friday, EOFY, Christmas) with automated tools in the mix

The weaker answer is a list of apps installed on the store. We don’t screen with keyword software for a related reason: the title isn’t standardised, so filtering CVs on “eCommerce Director” misses most of the people who can do the job. Ask what they were accountable for when a quarter missed target. A marketing hire says “we adjusted the campaign.” An ecommerce hire says “we adjusted price, promotion and inventory allocation, and here’s what moved.”

Should you headhunt an eCommerce Director or search a database?

Headhunt it. People who’ve run an ecommerce P&L well are rarely job hunting. An ad mostly adds volume: SEEK’s August 2026 employment report had applications per job ad at peak levels, up 1.7% on a year earlier.

Headhunting starts from who’s doing the job well somewhere else and approaches them directly. We keep no candidate database, so every search starts from the market as it is now, and we run one client, one role at a time.

How much does it cost to hire an eCommerce Director in Australia?

There’s no national benchmark. Robert Walters’ 2026 Australian salary guide covers CMO, Marketing Director, Head of Marketing and Head of Digital in every state, and has no eCommerce Director row. Gybe Consulting’s 2026 guide gives a Brisbane-only Head of eCommerce band of $175K to $230K base, and mrkt Talent’s national retail and ecommerce survey puts Head of eCommerce at $150K to $270K (full sourced table here). Both are directional, and we don’t publish a separate ecommerce band from our own placements.

A brief to rebuild the channel around AI is a bigger job than running a settled one, and should be priced that way.

On fees: ours is 15% of base salary plus super, payable on signed employment contract, plus an engagement fee upfront, which we walk you through on the first call. The detail is in our executive search cost guide.

What does an eCommerce Director brief need before the search starts?

Write it around revenue, margin and the trading calendar. Write it like a marketing hire and you’ll screen for brand instinct, then find the person can’t read a conversion funnel. Write it like a digital hire and you’ll get someone strong on the platform stack who has never owned a P&L.

Then write down what AI is meant to do. “Use AI on the site” isn’t a brief. “Bring product content in-house with AI and test automated promotional pricing” is.

Settle who decides on platform, data and AI tooling: this person, or a CTO, CMO or Chief AI Officer. If a dedicated AI leader is on the cards, read how to hire a Chief AI Officer first.

Who’s hiring matters too. An established digital business replacing its eCommerce Director may find the last one was hired before AI touched the channel. An overseas brand hiring the lead for its Australian store needs to decide whether that person runs local tooling or inherits the global platform.

Headhuntly is based on the Gold Coast, has placed 50+ senior roles over the last five years, and runs this search nationally.

Frequently asked

Is an eCommerce Director the same as a Head of eCommerce? Not necessarily. The title isn’t standardised, so look at what the person is actually accountable for.

Who should an eCommerce Director report to? It depends on how much revenue runs through the channel. Where ecommerce is the majority of revenue, a direct line to the CEO is common. Where it’s one channel among several, reporting into a CMO or Head of Digital is more usual.

How much does an eCommerce Director earn in Australia? There’s no national eCommerce Director benchmark yet. The closest public signals are Gybe Consulting’s Brisbane-only Head of eCommerce band ($175K to $230K base) and mrkt Talent’s national retail and ecommerce figure ($150K to $270K base). Full sourced table here.

How do you test whether an eCommerce Director is genuinely AI-fluent? Ask what they automated, how they measured it, and what they switched off. A list of apps without a trading result attached usually means they haven’t run it.

If you’re not sure whether the seat is a marketing, digital or ecommerce trading role, or what AI should change in the channel, get in touch before the brief goes to search.

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