Digital Commerce Lead - Cape Town HQ-ZAF

Overview

 

About PepsiCo PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the world. PepsiCo generated more than $79 billion in net revenue in 2021, driven by a complementary beverage and convenient foods portfolio that includes Lay’s, Doritos, Cheetos, Gatorade, Pepsi-Cola, Mountain Dew, Quaker, and SodaStream. PepsiCo's product portfolio includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including many iconic brands that generate more than $1 billion each in estimated.

 

Guiding PepsiCo is our vision to Be the Global Leader in Beverages and Convenient Foods by Winning with PepsiCo Positive (pep+). pep+ is our strategic end-to-end transformation that puts sustainability and human capital at the centre of how we will create value and growth by operating within planetary boundaries and inspiring positive change for planet and people. For more information, visit www.pepsico.com.

Responsibilities

What we’re looking for:

 

The Head of Digital Commerce will be responsible for leading the development and execution of the total Digital Commerce agenda across the organisation. This includes driving sustainable, customer-centric growth across all eCommerce platforms and retail partners by delivering differentiated value, consistent excellence in execution, and digital innovation.

This strategic leadership role is accountable for:

• Co-creating and executing integrated, customer-centric commercial strategies in partnership with sales, marketing, shopper, and category teams to accelerate digital growth, gain competitive advantage, and position the business as a trusted advisor to key customers—as measured by Advantage Monitor (TAG) priorities.
• Translating strategic priorities into actionable executional toolkits and enablement frameworks, including the embedding of PERFECT DIGITAL STORE shopper principles, gold-standard omnichannel execution, and granular growth opportunities at a customer and category level.

Elevating the organisation’s digital commerce maturity from foundational to best-in-class, by embedding digital-first thinking, fostering internal capability, and aligning internal and external stakeholders to deliver consistent value across the digital ecosystem.

 

• Establish and nurture strategic partnerships with key Modern Trade and eCommerce customers, positioning the organisation as a trusted advisor through thought leadership, data-led insight, and forward-thinking strategies aligned to mutual growth ambitions.
• Lead the development of category growth plans in partnership with the Sales, Category, and Shopper teams—equipping frontline teams with compelling, insight-driven narratives and execution plans that unlock joint value for PepsiCo and its retail partners.
• Champion excellence in eCommerce execution by guiding the business to define and deliver the optimal digital assortment, promotions, and path-to-purchase experiences across omni-channel and pureplay customer environments.
• Act as a centre of excellence for digital brand marketing strategy—partnering with internal Marketing, Media, and Shopper teams to define and embed best-in-class principles for brand-building in digital environments, ensuring alignment across the entire funnel from awareness to conversion.
• Harness multiple data sources (e.g., sales data, shopper behavior, digital shelf metrics) to diagnose performance drivers, identify competitive opportunities, and provide category benchmarking and tailored strategies to enable targeted, sustainable growth for PepsiCo and its retail partners.
• Develop and embed customer-centric category visions grounded in the DX operating model (Identify, Engage, Convert, Optimize), gaining alignment across internal PepsiCo stakeholders and external customers to elevate PepsiCo’s role in digital Category Captaincy and long-term strategic partnership.
• Drive integrated long-term planning with key customers, connecting the dots across shopper insights, category management, and digital shopper marketing to build robust, insight-led, end-to-end growth strategies.
• Enable PepsiCo to secure and maintain Trusted Advisor status by consistently delivering actionable insights, strategic foresight, and shopper- and channel-centric plans that drive long-term, mutually beneficial results.
• Define and operationalise success at the digital point of purchase, introducing a shared language for digital shelf excellence, educating stakeholders on key execution levers, and establishing a globally consistent set of KPIs to measure execution quality and track progress over time.

Qualifications

What will qualify you for the role:

 

Tertiary Qualification in a Commercial, Business or Statistical field coupled with previous exposure to FMCG environment (Understanding of the retailer landscape, and instore challenges) and at least 8 years’ experience across data analysis, strategy creation, category management.

• Strategic thinking and long-term digital commerce planning
• Leadership and cross-functional influence
• Strong analytical and data interpretation skills
• Deep understanding of retail, customer dynamics, and digital shelf optimisation
• Project management within a matrix organisation
• High attention to detail and accuracy
• Strong problem-solving capabilities
• Excellent interpersonal and stakeholder management skills
• Strong written and verbal communication
• Logical and methodical approach to planning
• Ability to manage multiple priorities under tight deadlines
• Commercial acumen and mathematical proficiency
• Advanced customer and sales data analysis experience
• Experience in marketing and/or category management
• KnowlPerfect Digital Store of the full GTM value chain
• Experience in eCommerce, digital marketing, and digital merchandising

“PepsiCo is an Equal Opportunity Employer in line with the Employment Equity Act"