Director, Digital Commerce
- Applications are considered on a rolling basis
- London
- Hybrid
The Director, Digital Commerce is a people leader that owns the guest journey from the moment a guest decides to book their expedition through to a successful booking. The position is responsible for delivering a digital experience that builds anticipation and confidence at every step, reflecting the scale of the adventure being booked, while the booking engine works flawlessly to ensure conversion. The ideal candidate brings extensive experience leading a digital commerce function within a global, guest-facing organisation, with a genuine feel for how to translate an emotional, aspirational brand into an online experience guests want to move through.
Key Responsibilities & Deliverables
Strategic Leadership
- Own the digital commerce vision, strategy and roadmap, translating business goals, guest needs and market opportunities into measurable growth in bookings, revenue and guest satisfaction.
- Lead the end-to-end digital booking journey, ensuring a seamless, compelling and brand-led experience from initial consideration through to conversion. Drive commercial performance through ongoing optimisation of the booking funnel, digital merchandising, and conversion strategy.
- Champion a data-driven approach to digital commerce, ensuring robust measurement, customer insight and performance reporting inform investment decisions, roadmap prioritisation and optimisation efforts.
- Act as a senior owner of the digital guest experience, aligning stakeholders across marketing, commercial, product and technology teams to deliver a consistent and effective journey.
- Take accountability for identifying conversion barriers and commercial leakage, then driving the actions required to remove friction across website, booking engine and supporting journeys.
Technology
- Oversee the platform, booking engine, and related digital infrastructure to prioritise enhancements and minimise down time.
- Ensure the booking engine and support systems perform reliably at scale, particularly during high-demand periods and in anticipation of key campaigns.
- Champion personalisation, testing, and experimentation capability that lets the digital experience adapt to individual guest intent.
- Ensure digital commerce systems integrate cleanly across broader tech stack to ensure insights are shared across the guest journey teams.
- Stay ahead of industry trends and emerging technology, bringing forward leading-edge ideas that keep the digital experience competitive.
Digital Commerce Operational Discipline
- Establish clear performance measures and accountability across digital commerce, using data and insight to guide decision-making and investment.
- Lead planning, budgeting and prioritisation processes, ensuring resources are focused on the highest-value commercial opportunities.
- Set the standard for pace, quality, and consistency across the team.
- Lead, coach and develop a high-performing Digital Commerce team, ensuring accountability, engagement and continuous professional growth.
- Build strong cross-functional relationships to remove barriers, accelerate delivery and ensure alignment with broader business objectives.
- Contribute to broader team and business priorities as needed.
- Think sustainably and bring this mindset to the team and partners.
- Champion the HX Spirits.
Skills & Requirements
Requirements:
- Fluency in English is required. Additional business level language proficiency in German beneficial but not required.
- Extensive experience as a senior digital commerce leader with a track record of owning end-to-end online commerce, conversion, or booking journeys at scale.
- Proven experience translating an emotional, aspirational brand or product into a digitally engaging experience.
- Experience in maritime, expedition, or cruise industry beneficial but not required.
- Proven experience leading and developing high performing team in a global organisation.
- Extensive expertise in platforms, booking/reservation systems, and digital analytics tools.
- Proven ability to use data to shape strategy and drive decisions
- Extensive experience managing budgets and optimising resource allocation.
- Proven ability to lead and influence effectively within complex, global matrix organisations.
- Tech-forward and adaptable, with a proven ability to quickly learn new systems.
- Proficiency in MS Office applications including Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, and Excel.
- Experience working in a multi-national organisation with a global guest mix.
Key Personal Attributes/Behavioural Competencies:
- Safety and Compliance minded for yourself and others.
- High degree of personal integrity and honesty.
- Excited to work in a hybrid work environment to leverage time in person with colleagues across the business.
- Passionate about inclusion and belonging. You take pride in bringing people and different perspectives together to promote a diverse and inclusive workplace.
- Clear and effective communication with internal and external stakeholders.
- Ability to manage execution and competing demands.
- Ability to adapt to change in a positive, productive manner.
- Strong sense of initiative and urgency, with the ability to follow-up on outstanding matters efficiently.
- Demonstrated polish and professionalism at all times when engaging with leaders and team members with differing points of view.
Great Place to Work
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Passionate Explorers - We are proud of our history and are driven to create more.
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‘Can-Do’ Mindset - We jump-in and proactively contribute to the greater good.
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Supportive and Collaborative Teams - We are curious and generous with our knowledge. We Trust.
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Genuine Interactions - We want all people to be their true selves.
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Humble Leadership - We have a short distance between leaders and teams.
About the company
Since 1896, HX have championed sustainability in the expedition cruise sector. From launching the world’s first battery-hybrid expedition cruise ships to banishing heavy fuel oil and single use plastics from our fleet. We are at the forefront of driving sustainable practices in expedition cruises that prioritise greener travel.
For nearly 130 years we have been committed to continuously improving what we do for our guests but also for the people we work with.
We are a group of explorers who want to seek out the very best journeys for our guests but also for ourselves. We take our guests on big life-changing adventures, from the stunning wilderness of the Arctic to the incredible creatures on the Galápagos Islands all on our purpose-built expedition ships. Our HX fleet explore hundreds of destinations in over 30 countries across 5 continents.
Our ambition is strong and lofty – we want to become the number one sustainable expedition brand in the world. But we recognise we need passionate explorers, with can-do mindsets, humble leadership skills which bring people together for genuine interactions in a supportive and collaborative way.
As a newly branded company built on a 130-years heritage, HX is at an exciting new chapter and as we embark on this new journey, we believe your skills and passion could thrive. We are looking for talented explorers who want to join us on our exciting expedition to growth and success. This could include travelling and working in amazing HX hubs both on sea and land. From our impressive new Headquarters in London to our state-of-the-art Customer Service Centre just opened in Prague as well as various offices across Europe, the US and APAC.
One thing you’ll find whether on sea or land is a group of people, all connected with the same mindset and purpose - we want to explore more, champion sustainability and become the world’s very best expedition cruise operator.
Single-use plastic banHurtigruten was the first major travel company to have removed single-use plastic from its entire fleet and our hotels.
Hybrid Explorer shipsHX Expedition has two hybrid-electric powered expedition cruise ships that offer a 20% reduction of fuel consumption.
Beach cleanupsHX Expedition Teams encourage guests to take part in beach clean-ups, which results in several metric tonnes of trash every year being removed.
HX Expedition FoundationOur HX Foundation is a dedicated charity supporting local communities and environmental initiatives solely on the areas where HX’s Expedition ships sail, from the Arctic and Alaska to the UK, Galápagos Islands and Antarctica.
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