The head of Walmart Connect outlined how the company is expanding and refining its advertising platform.
In a blog post on its corporate website, Rich Lehrfeld, senior vice president and general manager, Walmart Connect, declared that now is a transformative time in retail and reaching consumers across the various ways they shop is critical. Walmart’s advertising platform is evolving to do that, he asserted.
Walmart is expanding the scope of customer touchpoints to reach them wherever they shop with it, providing new ad formats such as connected television and video. It also is creating experiences developed to optimize how brands can showcase themselves at self-checkout screens, TV Walls, in-store events and sampling. At year’s end, Lehrfeld said, the retailer will ready new premium advertising experiences on Walmart.com as it conducts tests of new onsite ad units and video.
Walmart also is working to launch and manage display campaigns on Walmart.com which will make it faster, easier and more efficient for brands to launch and manage display campaigns. It recently rolled out Display Self-Serve to the first phase of advertisers, giving them more speed, flexibility and control with their display campaigns, Lehrfeld stated. The company is expanding its Walmart Platform Partner program, giving suppliers and sellers more options as they seek the right expert to scale, automate and optimize their search campaigns. It has partnered with Jungle Scout, as well, which Walmart has introduced as an advertising software platform that allows brands to better measure, manage and optimize their online marketplace presence.
The new Walmart Demand Side Platform, an automated system for advertisers for buying off-site inventory in one spot, continues rolling out to more advertisers, Lehrfeld maintained.
He added that Walmart has committed to exceeding advertiser performance goals by leaning into core offerings through a combination of innovation and evolution. Walmart is upgrading search and targeting capabilities – including moving to second-price auctions – to improve results for advertisers and establish better experiences for customers. At the same time, the company will keep on scaling its One Walmart approach, which aids suppliers in unlocking the full power of Walmart through integrated planning across merchandising, site operations, marketing and Walmart Connect, Lehrfeld noted, even as it expands measurement capabilities for its offerings, including in-store placements, to drive accountable results and a stronger end-to-end proposition.
He emphasized that all of the Walmart Connect functions have support from proprietary shopper insights that help ensure experiences are relevant to the company’s customers.
Lehman pointed out:
“Every year, 90% of American households rely on Walmart for a range of products from must-buy brands, both large and small. And every week, more than 150 million customers shop with us in-store or online. Our mission at Walmart Connect is to help brands and sellers meaningfully connect with these customers on their shopping journey, wherever that occurs, to find the right product or discover a new one.
How these meaningful connections happen can occur in a number of ways: In one of our stores, on our app or website, across the Internet or even on social media. Customers can discover and purchase new products through our search and native display ads, or through creative in-store or social experiences. For example, football fans on TikTok may have seen our #GetTheWChallenge to inspire their shopping for the Big Game. During the holidays, customers discovered new products through Walmart’s Gift Finder AR experience or purchased ingredients through co-created shoppable Pinterest recipes. Walmart Connect’s full-funnel suite of omnichannel solutions are truly relevant and purposeful for our shared customer: the shopper.”
