Interview with Ross Allsop – Building Sustainable Growth

Can you tell us a bit about your journey into e-commerce and what initially drew you to this space?

I started in agencies, which was brilliant training because you get exposure to lots of verticals and you learn quickly what “good” looks like across creative, performance, and execution. But the real step-change for me was moving into private equity. That’s where most of my commercial mindset was built, because you’re forced to care about the whole machine, not just one channel. I was very lucky to work with some incredible brands at Clark Equity Partners, including ThruDark, Bremont Watches and a number of others. You’re constantly thinking about value creation: the levers that move margin, cash, and growth, not just dashboards. After that, I did stints inside brands. I enjoyed it, but it didn’t always give me the autonomy or pace I was looking for, so I went back into building my own incubator and advisory model. That’s also where I started working more closely with SaaS partners like Swap and Dema, which kept me right at the frontier of what’s changing in commerce.

Looking back, what experiences have most shaped the way you advise brands today?

Private equity, without question, because it teaches you to be commercial first. It trains you to diagnose problems properly: is it demand, is it offer, is it pricing, is it channel mix, is it ops, is it team, is it data? Most brands jump straight to “we need better ads” or “our website doesn’t convert high enough” when the truth is usually somewhere else. The other big one is being inside brands and managing teams. I’ve led teams of two all the way up to twenty. That range makes you realistic. It’s easy to write a strategy; it’s harder to design one that fits the actual operating model and talent you have. Every business is different, so I don’t believe in a single blueprint.

How would you describe your role as an e-commerce consultant today, and where do you feel you add the most value?

I sit at the intersection of commercial strategy, digital transformation, and acquisition. I’m bullish by nature, but not reckless. I like being deep in the data, but I also step back and look at environmental factors: category shifts, competition, pricing pressure, platform changes, and organisational constraints. Where I add the most value is aligning the whole system. I always take an omnichannel view, even if the contract is “just ecom”. Decisions made in product, retail, wholesale, finance, ops, and CX have causal impact on digital performance. One of the biggest causes of stunted growth and diminishing returns is siloed data, siloed teams, and/or (hopefully or) siloed processes. Fix that, and performance usually follows.

In your view, what is the biggest misconception brands have about e-commerce success?

That success is a ROAS problem. Or worse, a top-line problem. That mindset has been behind a lot of brand failures since 2018, and honestly even earlier. It creates businesses that look great on a dashboard and weak on a P&L (and you can’t hide that under ROAS & other inflated metrics forever). ROAS and topline are not outcomes, they’re symptoms. Everything needs to ladder up to contribution and sustainability of your revenue growth: epROAS, POAS, GP3, payback windows, retention curves. We should be building sustainably grown brands, not pocket rockets that spike revenue and then fall apart when the market tightens.

How should brands balance long-term brand building with short-term performance marketing?

Start with the net goal/outcome and work backwards. The brand/performance debate gets messy when you don’t have a model. I like to build an allowable and investment framework (top down or bottom up, depending on the category of business): if everything was perfect, what would the business look like? What would margin, repeat rate, and payback look like? Then work back into what you can afford to spend and where you should spend it. That gives you permission to invest in the brand properly, without losing discipline. Brand building becomes an input to efficiency, not a separate vanity project.

What is one emerging trend in technology, consumer behaviour, or platforms that you believe will shape e-commerce over the next three to five years?

AI-driven storefronts and marketing operating systems. We’re moving from static catalogues to adaptive experiences that respond to intent, behaviour, and context in real time. Shopping becomes more like a guided journey than browsing a grid. In parallel, we’ll see marketing operating systems mature. More businesses will stop asking “is this a people or process problem?” and start asking “is this a tech, AI, or people problem?” Because agents make it easier to create and run processes that used to require teams. And underpinning all of it is intent and sentiment data. Third-party data is dying, but that doesn’t mean targeting is dead. It just shifts to first-party signals: what people are looking for, how they behave, what they respond to, and the experience you deliver at that moment.

With privacy changes such as cookie deprecation, how should brands rethink measurement and attribution?

This is a pivotal shift away from MTA, ROAS and CVR-led thinking, and toward MMM, incrementality, LTV and contribution. If your measurement system can’t survive less tracking, it probably wasn’t measuring the right thing. The future is: MMM to understand how channels drive outcomes at a macro level

• Incrementality testing to understand what’s actually causing lift
• LTV and cohort health (customer quality scoring)
• GP3 / contribution to ensure you’re growing profitably, not just growing

Attribution should support decision-making, not create false certainty.

Many brands are experimenting with AI right now. Where is AI genuinely driving performance today, and where is it still more hype than substance?

Genuine performance today is in operational leverage. AI is already valuable when it reduces cycle time or improves output quality in areas like:

• Creative iteration and concepting
• Product content and data enrichment (PDP quality is still massively underrated)
• Customer service automation and triage
• Merchandising support: tagging, clustering, on-site search improvements
• I’ve even seen some incredible movements in AI-driven CRO recently, absolutely crazy what can be achieved there.

Where it’s hype is “fully autonomous growth” or “AI will run your marketing.” AI can improve velocity, but it doesn’t replace fundamentals: positioning, pricing, offers, and unit economics. If those are broken, AI just helps you lose money faster.

How should e-commerce leaders think about introducing AI into their growth strategy without losing focus on fundamentals?

Treat AI like an efficiency layer, not a strategy. Start with bottlenecks: where are you slow, inconsistent, or over-reliant on manual work, where do you need more process and where can you automate tasks that won’t tear the business down if they fail? The best approach is to pick one or two problems that create real commercial drag, solve those with AI-supported workflows, and measure impact. If it doesn’t improve speed, margin, or customer experience, it’s not a priority.

What risks do you see for brands that adopt AI too quickly or in the wrong areas?

Two big ones: brand dilution and misallocation.

• Brand dilution happens when AI output becomes generic, inconsistent, or “same-y” across touchpoints. You lose differentiation quietly.

• Misallocation happens when brands automate broken processes or chase novelty while fundamentals are unresolved.

The other risk is organisational: people treat AI as the answer and stop thinking. AI should raise the bar on decision-making, not replace it.

Looking at performance overall, what signals tell you a brand is scaling in a healthy way versus simply chasing short-term gains?

Healthy scaling looks like stability as you grow:

• Contribution margin is steady or improving
• CAC isn’t inflating faster than AOV or LTV
• Repeat rate and cohort retention are stable or improving
• The business isn’t becoming more promotion dependent and if it is, it’s strategic, not desperate.
• Inventory and ops can keep up without breaking customer experience

If revenue is up but margin, retention, and cash are down, that’s not growth. That’s fragility with a nice headline.

What role does data play in shaping e-commerce decisions, and how should smaller brands think about data maturity?

Data should improve decision quality, not slow teams down. Smaller brands don’t need complex measurement theatres. They need to know the few numbers that matter: contribution, payback, repeat rate, and cash. Data maturity isn’t about having more dashboards. It’s about having shared definitions, clean inputs, and the ability to answer basic commercial questions quickly. Most “data problems” are actually process and ownership problems.

Which tools, platforms, or parts of the tech stack do you find most valuable right now, and why?

The most valuable parts of the stack are the ones that directly affect revenue and margin: The core commerce platform, it’s not a one size fits all, no matter what people may think.

• CRM and retention tools (because repeat revenue is where the economics get real & the CAC pays back).
• Analytics that connect to contribution, not just orders & undercovers quality of sales.
• Product data systems, because PDP quality and catalogue structure drive conversion and reduce returns
• Discovery tools (on and off site), because discovery is often the silent killer or any brands margin - right products, right place, right time.

Everything else is optional until it proves commercial value.

Where do you see AI having the biggest practical impact on e-commerce in the next 12 to 18 months?

Product data and merchandising (universal catalog), and then storefront experience. The brands that win will have: Cleaner, richer first-party product data

• Adaptive experiences that react to intent and context
• Faster content and campaign production without dropping quality

A lot of brands are underestimating how much “boring” catalogue work is about to become a competitive advantage.

When it comes to e-commerce platforms, what should brands be thinking about beyond the obvious feature comparisons?

Total cost of ownership, the platform’s roadmap, and the underlying thought logic behind it. The decision isn’t just about what the platform can do today, it’s about whether its direction aligns with where the e-commerce landscape is heading. Commerce is changing quickly, with AI, new discovery layers, and more complex omnichannel models reshaping how brands operate. So the real question is: does this platform have a roadmap and philosophy that will keep pace with that change, or is it a large, legacy solution that looks solid today but struggles to adapt over time? The best platform is the one that evolves with you, not the one you outgrow.

How do you see the role of platforms like Shopify and Centra evolving as brands scale and become more complex?

They’re both moving towards being operating systems, not just storefront engines which I feel will change a lot over the next 2-3 years. As brands scale, they need orchestration: data, channels, markets, pricing, inventory, content, and experience all connected.

The winning platforms will be the ones that stay flexible as complexity increases, without forcing brands into slow, expensive or commoditised implementations, both will need broader ecosystems and plenty of flexibility.

What platform decisions do you see brands regretting later, and how could they avoid those mistakes?

The classic regret is over-engineering too early or trying to “break the system” before you’ve even proven the operating model. Brands jump into complex setups, heavy custom builds, or enterprise platforms because they think that’s what serious growth looks like. Then they spend the next two years managing the platform instead of actually growing the business.

Another common issue is building a stack without a clear set of commercial goals. Every brand should be honest about its top priorities over the next phase: is it market expansion, profitability, or operational scale? Your stack should be built broadly enough to support those goals, but flexible enough to drop tools that don’t deliver. A single point of failure is risky, but so is running twenty overlapping systems that all claim to do the same thing.

The other big regret is underestimating international and multi-entity complexity: tax, duties, shipping promises, pricing consistency, and returns. That’s where platform choices really get tested.

The way to avoid all of this is to be honest about your 24-month roadmap and choose the platform and stack that supports that journey. Not the one that only solves today’s pain, and not the one built for a future you haven’t earned yet.

What common UX or site experience mistakes do you see holding brands back?

Basic friction. Most conversion loss comes from: Poor mobile experience

• Slow site speed or rendering
• Weak product pages (unclear value, sizing, materials, delivery/returns info)
• Confusing navigation and collection structure
• Too many distractions en route to the checkout

The fancy stuff is irrelevant if the fundamentals aren’t clean.

If you had to highlight five key growth levers that every e-commerce brand should understand, what would they be?

• Contribution margin and allowable CAC
• Pricing architecture (and disciplined discounting)
• Retention mechanics and customer quality (LTV, cohorts, customer quality)
• On-site conversion drivers (Nav, PDP, speed, UX)
• Channel mix and incrementality (what’s actually causing growth)

If you’re missing any of those, you’ll feel it eventually.

Customer experience is often talked about, but rarely defined. What does truly differentiated e-commerce experience look like today?

Clarity, confidence, and ease. Differentiated experience isn’t a gimmick. It’s when the brand removes uncertainty:

• I understand the product or value proposition instantly
• I trust the brand, quality and sizing
• I know delivery, post purchase and customer service are straightforward

I feel the brand has taste and consistency in the market.

When you reduce doubt, conversion goes up and returns go down. That’s a commercial win, not just a nice-to-have.

Brands often think loyalty is built with discounts, constant launches, or “community” as a marketing tactic. Real loyalty is built through trust, consistency, and reliability.

Customers come back when the product is great, the experience is frictionless, and the brand does what it says it will do. That sounds obvious, but it’s surprisingly rare for brands to ‘nail this’.

As competition increases and products become easier to replicate, how can brand and experience become a real growth lever rather than just a layer on top?

By increasing willingness to pay, diversifying the channel mix, and reducing dependency on paid acquisition. If the brand is strong and the experience is consistent, you protect margin across every channel, not just your primary acquisition source. You’re less reliant on one paid platform, less exposed to rising CAC, and less forced into aggressive discounting just to keep volume moving.

A strong brand attracts higher-quality customers, performs better in organic, retail, wholesale, and partnerships, and gives you more leverage across the entire go-to-market model. That’s when brand stops being a creative exercise and becomes a financial lever, because it directly improves unit economics and resilience. That’s the real game.

What parts of the on-site experience do you think will matter far more in the future than they do today?

Discovery and guidance will matter far more than static navigation. Search, recommendations, and personalised pathways will become the primary way customers move through an experience, rather than fixed category trees. We’ll see more conversational, assisted journeys and dynamic storefronts that respond to intent in real time.

The key shift is that this won’t just live on the .com. Brands will need to capture and act on customer data, intent, and sentiment signals across every sales channel: marketplaces, retail, wholesale, social, and direct. The businesses that unify those signals and treat every touchpoint as part of a single adaptive experience, not just a static catalogue, will be the ones that win.

But all of that starts with the fundamentals: high-quality product data, clean attributes, and strong relevance. The game hasn’t changed, it’s just evolving. The brands with the best data foundations will be the ones that benefit most from these new discovery layers.

Looking ahead three to five years, what do you think will fundamentally change in e-commerce?

The interface between the customer and the catalogue will fundamentally change, but it will still be built on the same core principles. We’re moving from browsing to being guided. Storefronts will adapt, agents will assist, and the path to purchase will become less linear and more conversational.

But all of that only works if the foundations are strong. High-quality product data, clean attributes, and clear relevance will become even more important as discovery becomes more automated and intent-driven. The brands with the best data will surface more often, convert more efficiently, and perform better across every channel.

So while the interface will look very different, the underlying game hasn’t changed. Strong products, strong data, and clear positioning will determine who wins, no matter how the customer arrives at the catalogue.

What do you believe brands are currently underestimating about the future of online commerce?

How quickly distribution advantages are eroding. When discovery increasingly happens through AI interfaces, marketplaces, social platforms, and agentic layers, you can’t rely on “we have the best website” as a moat anymore. The path to the customer is becoming more fragmented and less controlled by the brand.

In that environment, your real defensibility comes from product quality, clean and structured data, strong margins, and clear brand positioning. Those are the assets that travel across channels and surfaces. If you don’t have them, growth becomes increasingly expensive because you’re constantly paying for attention instead of earning it.

If you had to make one clear prediction about where e-commerce is heading, what would it be?

E-commerce will become more agent-driven and outcome-based. Customers won’t “shop” in the traditional sense; they’ll express intent and expect the system, or an agent, to guide them to the right outcome with minimal effort.

In that world, the winners won’t just be the brands with the best-looking storefronts, but the ones with the strongest foundations: clean, structured product data, healthy unit economics, and a clear, differentiated proposition. Those are the brands that will plug seamlessly into new discovery layers, perform well across channels, and stay competitive as the interface continues to evolve.

Lastly, what (non-fiction) book or podcast do you recommend Grebban’s followers to read?

The Obstacle Is the Way by Ryan Holiday. It’s one of those books that applies just as much to your personal life as it does to business. The core idea is simple: the resistance, the setbacks, the uncomfortable moments are usually the exact things that shape the outcome.

There’s a section where he talks about how astronauts train repeatedly for failure scenarios, so when something actually goes wrong, it’s just another procedure. That mindset is incredibly relevant to building brands. So many founders think they’re doing something wrong the moment performance dips or a plan doesn’t work. In reality, brand building is full of ups, downs, and constant learning.

The real skill is not panicking. Maintaining control, staying rational, and making the next right decision is 80% of the battle. The operators who can stay steady through the turbulence are usually the ones who build something that actually lasts.

Where can people follow your work or get in touch with you?

LinkedIn is the best place to follow what I’m working on and the ideas I’m sharing day to day. I’m also launching an operator-led podcast (not and never will be sponsored), ‘*The New Commerce Order’ * by Pion333rs.

The first episode drops on the 27th of February with Rudy from BA&SH, and you’ll be able to find it on Spotify or via my LinkedIn.