Company Context
ShopSphere is a mid-market e-commerce platform serving 1,800 direct-to-consumer brands across apparel, beauty, home, and consumer electronics. The company provides storefront software, checkout, analytics, and a small but growing user research practice that supports product decisions for merchants and end shoppers. ShopSphere has grown quickly in the last three years, but leadership believes the next wave of e-commerce change—AI-assisted shopping, social commerce, retail media, privacy regulation, and omnichannel fulfillment—could materially reshape both customer needs and how product teams should conduct user research.
Strategic Situation
You are the Head of Strategy at ShopSphere. The CEO has asked for a recommendation on which e-commerce trends will matter most over the next 3 years and how the company should adapt its user research model. The immediate decision is whether to keep a traditional centralized research team focused on usability studies and surveys, or invest in a broader “continuous insights” capability spanning behavioral data, creator/social research, AI interaction testing, and merchant segmentation. The decision matters now because ShopSphere is finalizing its annual planning cycle and has budget for only one major capability build this year.
Data Points
| Metric | Value |
|---|
| ShopSphere annual revenue | $145M |
| YoY revenue growth | 18% |
| Gross margin | 71% |
| Current user research budget | $3.2M |
| Planned incremental investment available | $2.5M |
Market and operating signals
- Global e-commerce GMV is estimated at $6.3T, growing at roughly 9% annually.
- Social commerce accounts for 17% of online retail GMV in ShopSphere's top 5 markets and is growing faster than traditional web storefronts.
- 38% of ShopSphere merchants say AI-driven product discovery and personalization are now a top-3 priority.
- iOS/Android privacy changes have increased median merchant customer acquisition costs by 22% over two years.
- Only 14 researchers currently support 11 product squads; median research turnaround time is 4.5 weeks.
Deliverables
- Identify the 3-4 most important trends shaping e-commerce over the next 3 years and explain their strategic relevance.
- Assess how those trends should change ShopSphere's user research priorities, methods, and team design.
- Size the business impact at a directional level: where could better research create the most value for ShopSphere and its merchants?
- Recommend whether ShopSphere should invest the additional $2.5M in an expanded research capability, and if so, where to focus first.
- Propose a 12-month go-to-market and operating plan with clear milestones.
Constraints
- Budget is capped at $2.5M incremental spend this year.
- Leadership expects measurable impact within 12 months.
- Research hiring is constrained; the company can add at most 8 net new roles.
- Product teams are already committed to roadmap items in checkout, AI merchandising, and creator commerce, so recommendations must align with existing priorities.
