Elective
Digital Commerce
Most dispensaries treat online ordering as a digital brochure: an iFrame menu bolted onto a template site, a Weedmaps listing nobody measures, and a pickup counter that improvises. This course teaches the operator to run digital commerce as a real P&L channel instead. You build the channel strategy and the online P&L carried to cash-effective margin under 280E, then work the full operating system: menu merchandising, cannabis SEO as the load-bearing acquisition channel when paid Google and Meta are closed, the marketplace-versus-branded data-ownership trade, conversion through the age-gate and limit-aware checkout, the cash-business payment friction, menu-sync plumbing, and the dashboards a manager and operations leader actually read. Every lesson filters through the cannabis constraints that break the mainstream playbook. The capstone rebuilds a leaking digital channel end to end for a single-store independent.
30 lessons9.0 hours0 section quizzes7 chapters
Begin courseFree during early access
What you'll master
Outcomes you can defend.
- Score the four cannabis digital-commerce channel archetypes on margin retention, data ownership, and discovery traffic, then pick a channel mix for a given operator profile and market maturity.
- Build an online-order P&L line by line and carry it to cash-effective contribution margin under 280E for both a single store and a multi-store chain.
- Rebuild a digital menu for conversion: reset the default sort, fix the filter taxonomy and synonym map, prioritize listing completeness against the health-score weighting, and set a compliant image standard.
- Diagnose where a cannabis funnel leaks across the age-gate, mobile checkout, limit meter, and payment steps, then design prioritized A/B tests valid at single-store and pooled portfolio traffic.
- Model marketplace spend against attributed cash ROI and build a budget-migration plan that shifts spend from rented marketplace discovery to owned branded SEO and SMS over the operator lifecycle.
- Choose an online payment-method mix and capture-timing model, quantifying the completion-rate lift against the fee drag and processor-continuity risk.
- Design a menu-sync architecture and buffer policy that minimizes oversell, plus the floor-level recovery playbook for the orders that slip through.
- Stand up a role-appropriate digital-commerce dashboard with cannabis-correct KPI bands and run an operating-cadence review that reallocates channel spend on cash-effective contribution.
Curriculum
The full syllabus.
Every lesson, in the order we recommend you take them. Click any lesson to begin. Your progress saves automatically.
Part 01
5 lessons • 94 minStrategy and the Online P&L
- 01The Four Channel Archetypes and the Mix MatrixThe four cannabis digital-commerce channels (branded/headless site, iFrame-embedded menu, marketplace listing, native POS storefront) scored on margin retention, data ownership, discovery traffic, and switching cost, plus the cross-industry benchmarks (Domino's, Chipotle, Target, Sephora/Ulta) that show why cannabis digital mix caps in the 20-40% band. Teaches the operator to pick the channel chassis before the platform and to read why data ownership is load-bearing in cannabis in a way it is not in mainstream retail.21 min
- 02Building the Online P&L and Carrying It to Cash Under 280EBuild the online-order contribution model line by line (platform SaaS fee, marketplace fees, payment processing, pick-pack labor, marketing) and carry it to cash-effective margin under 280E, with a worked $1.2M single store at 25% digital mix versus a $4M chain at 40%. Rank every channel by post-280E contribution per after-tax dollar, never by face invoice.17 min
- 03Branded Site vs Marketplace: The Allocation Decision and the iFrame-to-Headless GateThe central allocation trade between an owned branded site (email capture, SEO equity, repeat driver) and rented marketplace discovery, the maturity-based budget split and the migration trigger that fires it, and the strategic iFrame-to-headless gate with its cannabis-specific timing and compliance risk.16 min
- 04Channel Strategy by Market Maturity, Format, and Portfolio ScaleMap the channel-mix decision against market stage (emerging, growth, saturated) and operator format (single store to MSO), then hold the operations-leader lens on cross-store digital consistency, the centralized-vs-federated stack, and the 12-month digital roadmap that sequences the rest of the course.23 min
- 05Selecting the Platform: Criteria, TCO, Integration Fit, and Migration RiskThe platform-selection decision guide for operators: the weighted selection-criteria framework (POS-native vs best-of-breed, SEO capability, payment-rail support), total cost of ownership carried to cash under 280E, integration-fit scoring across POS, CRM, compliance, and analytics, migration-risk assessment across the two real switching patterns, and a per-scenario recommendation matrix. Positions platform choice as downstream of the channel-strategy chassis, not the start of it.17 min
Part 02
4 lessons • 68 minMerchandising and Discovery
- 06The Digital Menu as a Merchandising Surface: Default Sort Is the LeverThe online menu is a planogram with infinite shelf space, and default sort order is the single highest-leverage merchandising decision an operator controls, applied to 100% of traffic. This lesson covers the four sort logics, the first-screen eye-line, and the cannabis compliance line that the sort can never push expiring or recalled product.20 min
- 07Filter Architecture and Product-Data Quality: The Online Health ScoreStructure cannabis categories and high-intent filters (need-state, potency band, price tier) on the canonical eight-category tree, kill the no-results dead-end with automatic filter relaxation, and prioritize listing completeness using the catalog health-score weighting (images 44%, description 23%, details 21%, attributes 12%) as the order of work, with COA presence gated as a hard compliance requirement.15 min
- 08On-Site Search, Synonym Mapping, and Visual Merchandising StandardsOn-site search is the highest-intent surface on the menu and the most neglected: this lesson covers search ranking and the three failure modes, the heavier cannabis synonym-mapping burden (cart equals vape, dab equals concentrate) fed by the zero-result log, and the image standards that convert: real photography, gallery depth, page-speed delivery, and the state-by-state imagery compliance line.13 min
- 09Pricing Display, Limit-Aware Cross-Sell, and Mobile MerchandisingHow prices, discounts, and tiers render online under cannabis tax stacking and state discount-display rules, how to build limit-aware cross-sell and a buy-again reorder surface that never proposes a non-compliant cart, and why the mobile web menu is the de facto cannabis app, closing with a worked menu-rebuild costed to cash under 280E.20 min
Part 03
6 lessons • 105 minSEO and Demand Generation
- 10Why Organic Is the Load-Bearing Cannabis Acquisition ChannelCannabis inverts mainstream retail's paid-dominant acquisition mix: paid Google and four of five major paid-social platforms are foreclosed, X is the lone open paid channel as of 2026, and structurally low CAC is a ceiling rather than a lever. That makes organic and local search the only scalable new-customer channel, measured in organic share of new customers and justified in cash-effective CAC terms under 280E.14 min
- 11Technical and On-Page SEO: The iFrame Crawl Problem and Compliant SchemaThe technical-SEO foundation under the load-bearing organic channel: crawlability, indexation, Core Web Vitals, and the iFrame-menu crawl-invisibility problem stated in concrete terms, plus on-page and structured data (Product, LocalBusiness, FAQ schema) inside the FTC and state claim-compliance line that bars therapeutic claims.19 min
- 12Local SEO, the Google Business Profile, and Content as a Discovery EngineThe dispensary-as-local-business play (Google Business Profile, the local pack, NAP and citation consistency, review velocity, and GBP suspension risk) - the content-to-commerce funnel where compliant need-state and education pages rank and route to the menu - and the image and off-page authority surfaces, assembled into a worked two-quarter SEO build for a single store. This lesson is written for the GM or store owner of a single-location independent, or the portfolio Director of Operations managing multi-store consistency and resource allocation.23 min
- 13The Paid-Channel Reality and the Three-Layer Marketing Compliance StackThe foreclosed paid map (no paid Google, Meta, TikTok, YouTube, or LinkedIn; X only as of 2026) and why structurally low CAC is a ceiling, not a lever, plus the state / platform / FTC three-layer compliance stack with its seven universal creative restrictions and the 70-90% audience-composition threshold that governs every cannabis marketing channel.17 min
- 14Email and SMS: The Owned-Channel WorkhorsesEmail program design (age-gated double opt-in, the cannabis retail-calendar cadence, deliverability under provider-deplatform scrutiny, the coordinated win-back) and SMS as the highest-yield retention channel (TCPA consent as a financial control, silent carrier filtering, the restock and lapsed win-back campaigns, frequency discipline). Both judged on owned-channel revenue share (55-70% of new-customer revenue) and sized in cash contribution under 280E, where email and SMS platform fees and coordinator hours are non-deductible against the adult-use portion.17 min
- 15The Limited Paid Surfaces, Affiliate, Influencer, and the CAC RealityThe paid channels that remain when Google and Meta are foreclosed (X, cannabis DSPs, Weedmaps and Leafly ads, connected-TV), affiliate and influencer under FTC disclosure, web push under the cookie constraint, and how to measure CAC by channel when paid is structurally capped, with the watched metric being owned-channel revenue share rather than paid efficiency.15 min
Part 04
6 lessons • 101 minConversion and Payments
- 16The Cannabis Funnel Defined and the Age-Gate Drop-Off ProblemUnderstand the full eight-stage cannabis funnel with its two cannabis-only stages (age-gate at the top, ID-checked pickup-completion at the bottom) and stage-conversion benchmarks, then learn to tune the mandatory age-gate to minimum compliant friction.17 min
- 17Mobile Conversion and Limit-Aware, Tax-Transparent CheckoutMobile is the whole cannabis conversion game with no native-app fallback, so page speed and the iFrame penalty are CRO levers you must measure on the live menu, not the shell. This lesson works the limit-aware, tax-transparent checkout inside cannabis constraints: the flower-equivalent limit meter, round-dollar out-the-door tax transparency, and the medical-vs-adult-use branch, all carried to cash under 280E.16 min
- 18Cart Abandonment, Trust Signals, and the A/B Testing DisciplineThis lesson is scoped to cart abandonment, recovery strategy, and CRO discipline for ops leads and operations leaders managing ecommerce conversion. Rank the cannabis cart-abandonment drivers (payment friction, tax shock, limit block, stockout) and fix the structural ones before recovery messaging, run trust signals (inline COA, real photos, live stock) as nearly-free conversion levers, and run valid CRO experiments at thin single-store traffic through portfolio pooling, effect-size prioritization, and projection to 280E-adjusted cash. The Buyer consumes the trust-signal framework (inline COA, real photos, live stock) as PDP infrastructure; the full checkout and recovery orchestration lives with the Ops lead.19 min
- 19Why Cannabis Has No Card Rails OnlineVisa, Mastercard, and Amex prohibit cannabis transactions and processors deplatform cannabis merchants, so the one-tap card checkout mainstream e-commerce treats as solved is structurally foreclosed. This lesson explains the three-layer foreclosure, names the five constraints every payment decision sits inside, and establishes why payment friction is the single biggest cannabis-specific online conversion killer.19 min
- 20The Online Payment Method Menu and the P&L Fee DragUnderstand online payment mechanics and compliance risk for each rail; flag payment-setup gaps when reading market scan data; support the Operations Leader's rail-choice decisions by surfacing data on payment-failure scenarios and cost drift. The rail you want on cost grounds is the rail with the highest enrollment friction, and the resolution is amortization.13 min
- 21Capture Timing, Curbside Edge Cases, and Processor-Continuity RiskThe pay-online versus pay-at-pickup capture decision and its completion-rate gap, payment choreography at the curb and delivery boundary, and the processor sudden-shutdown risk with the pre-staged backup-rail runbook, closing with the worked payments decision.17 min
Part 05
3 lessons • 57 minFulfillment and the Compliant Handoff
- 22The Online Order Lifecycle, Pick-Pack Workflow, and Fulfillment SLAMap the full online-order lifecycle from cart to ID-checked handoff to Metrc finalize, enforce the order-is-not-revenue-until-handoff rule with the order-ready SLA, and design the in-store pick-pack workflow and labor model against a $1.00-1.80 cost-per-order band carried to cash under 280E.14 min
- 23Staging, BOPIS, and Curbside: Fast but Compliant PickupRun the cannabis pickup operation as a fast-but-compliant system - design staging around the live-Metrc-inventory constraint, schedule pickup windows against the ID-check bottleneck, build a BOPIS express lane that never skips the gate, and gate curbside on state legality first, all read in cash under 280E.19 min
- 24The Age-Reverification Handoff, Oversell Recovery, and the Delivery BoundaryThe non-negotiable ID-check-at-handoff gate (six-beat script, four refusal branches, documentation, and the structural POS fix that makes pre-verify-and-wave impossible), the floor-level oversell recovery playbook (consent-only substitution versus compliant cancel), the storefront-to-dispatch delivery boundary, and the two cannabis-specific fulfillment metrics, closing with a worked single-store buildout costed to cash.24 min
Part 06
5 lessons • 94 minIntegration, Sync, and Measurement
- 25The Integration Map and the POS as Inventory Source of TruthUnderstand why your POS is the single hub of your digital commerce stack, why split-brain kills you, and how to read an integration failure report from your integrations team so you do not get sold a second source of truth when a staleness problem looks like a design problem.15 min
- 26Sync Architecture, Latency, and the Oversell ProblemThe technical anatomy of menu sync (push versus pull versus batch, the multi-channel fan-out, and where latency accumulates) and the oversell problem in depth: why a stale menu sells product that is already gone, the buffer-stock and reservation tactics that close the window, the Metrc decrement-timing trade, and the four-layer monitoring that catches a silent sync failure before a customer is cancelled at the counter.21 min
- 27Marketplaces and Syndication: Listing Economics, the Data-Ownership Trade, and Budget MigrationThe marketplace decision carried to cash: listing-tier economics under 280E and the 2.0x new-customer floor, the data-ownership trade that quietly hands your customer graph to a competitor, the single-source-of-truth and recall-pull rules, identity match keys, and the lifecycle budget migration from rented discovery to owned channels.17 min
- 28The Digital KPI Set: Funnel, Order, Fulfillment, and Channel AttributionThe online KPI encyclopedia with cannabis benchmark bands: funnel KPIs named by stage (age-gate pass through pickup-completion), order and basket KPIs bounded by daily limits, the two cannabis-only fulfillment metrics, and channel attribution under fragmented cannabis identity. The through-line: a digital KPI without a stage label, a benchmark band, and a cash-effective read is a vanity number.19 min
- 29Role Dashboards, the Operating Cadence, and the Cash-Effective LensTwo buildable dashboards (the manager's daily-weekly digital dashboard and the operations leader's portfolio dashboard), the four-tier operating cadence that turns them into decisions, and the 280E cash-effective overlay on every digital revenue and spend line, closed with a worked Michigan store that goes from iFrame blindness to a cash-justified budget shift.22 min
Ready when you are
Digital Commerce starts with one lesson.
The Four Channel Archetypes and the Mix Matrix, 21 minutes. Pick it up here whenever you have time.
Start lesson 1