With more e-commerce roles landing on my desk recently, I’ve been having this conversation a lot.
A lot of e-commerce candidates walk into interviews feeling confident about their experience, but still leave unsure how they came across. They did the job, they know the platform, yet something didn’t quite land.
The short answer is this. Most e-commerce interviews are not really about whether you can do the work. They are about whether you understand how the work makes money.
That’s where many people slip up.
Start with how the business actually trades
Before you even think about interview answers, get clear on how this business sells online.
Are they heavily promotional or more full price driven. Are they DTC only or balancing wholesale and online. Is it a large SKU count with constant range churn, or a tighter assortment where storytelling matters more.
You don’t need inside information. You just need to show you’ve paid attention.
When you can say things like “This looks like a brand that trades hard around key seasonal moments” or “Your online range feels curated rather than endless”, it tells the interviewer you’re thinking like someone who understands e-commerce as a commercial channel, not just a website.
Talk numbers, even if you weren’t the final decision maker
You do not need to have owned the P and L to talk about impact.
What matters is that you can explain how your work influenced outcomes. Revenue growth, conversion rate, average order value, sell-through, returns, email contribution, repeat rate. Pick a few that genuinely connect to your role.
If you improved something, talk through what changed and why. If performance dipped, talk honestly about what you learned.
Strong candidates don’t pretend everything was perfect. They show they understand cause and effect.
Go deeper than the platform name
Saying you worked on Shopify is table stakes now.
What interviewers really want to hear is how you used the platform. How you structured collections. How you handled merchandising rules. How you worked with devs or agencies. How you balanced speed versus best practice.
If you’ve worked across multiple platforms, that’s great. If you’ve worked deeply in one, that’s also great. Depth almost always wins over a long tool list.
Show you understand the full customer journey
Good e-commerce people think beyond the product page.
Talk about acquisition, but also retention. How traffic behaved once it landed. What happened post-purchase. Where friction showed up.
Even if your role was focused on one area, showing awareness of the wider journey signals maturity. It shows you won’t operate in a silo.
Be honest about what you enjoy and where you do your best work
Not every e-commerce role is the same.
Some are very trading focused. Some are heavily platform and optimisation driven. Others sit closer to brand, content, and storytelling.
You don’t need to mould yourself into what you think they want. You need to articulate where you add the most value and why.
Interviewers are often trying to work out fit just as much as capability. Clarity here helps everyone.
Prepare examples, but keep them human
Have a few solid examples ready, but don’t over rehearse them.
If it sounds like you’re reciting a case study, it can create distance. If it sounds like you’re explaining something you’ve genuinely lived through, it builds trust.
Pause. Think. Speak like you would to a colleague.
Key Takeaway
Nailing an e-commerce interview is less about impressing and more about connecting the dots.
Show that you understand how online performance works, how customers behave, and how your decisions influence outcomes. That’s what separates someone who can run a site from someone a business wants to build around.
Got a question for an upcoming #AskAmelia?
Email me at askamelia@campfirerecruitment.co.nz, and your question could be featured in the next post.