Walmart Marketplace: Why it’s a key move for your ecommerce business

Walmart Marketplace has been steadily growing its community of sellers to offer one-stop shopping to its millions of Walmart.com customers. With key brand acquisitions, dedicated marketplace resources and a commitment to keeping it competitive by offering 2-day shipping programs and enhanced returns, Walmart Marketplace has achieved top marketplace status.

To make it easier than ever for you to take advantage of the Walmart Marketplace opportunity, we’ve partnered with them to quickly get you selling and growing your ecommerce business. Read on for more about the Walmart Marketplace opportunity and how Rithum can help you succeed.

When you join Walmart Marketplace, you’ll be selling your products next to the wide assortment sold by Walmart and other Marketplace sellers all while controlling your presence.

• Build your catalog, control inventory and set prices using one of Walmart’s convenient integration methods, including Rithum
• Manage orders and shipping methods, ship items directly to your customer and provide customer care

There’s no setup or monthly fees. A reasonable referral fee is automatically deducted from your prompt payment for sold items. Find out what it’s like to partner with Walmart Marketplace and sell on Walmart.com.

Walmart Marketplace Requirements

Walmart is looking for brands that meet the following criteria.

• Experienced ecommerce seller. Sellers must have a US Business Tax ID (EIN) and form W-9 and a proven history of marketplace or ecommerce success.
• Compelling product catalog. Your assortment needs to enhance or complement the Walmart.com assortment and be competitively priced with a GTIN/UPC GS1 Company Prefix Number.
• Exceptional customer experience. You need to offer fast/reliable fulfillment and exhibit B2C US warehouse shipping and return capability or an approved 3PL fulfillment provider. You must have a track record of first-class customer service to be considered as a seller.

Rithum ecommerce experts can help you become an approved Walmart Marketplace seller by advocating on your behalf and helping you through the vetting process.

Walmart Marketplace and Rithum

Walmart Marketplace uses the Rithum platform for EDI integration. The two companies have had a long-standing relationship and Rithum has played an instrumental role in helping Walmart establish a robust drop-ship model. If your company isn’t EDI capable, Rithum also offers a browser-based integration that can be set up in a day without IT resources.

Not only does Rithum offer a platform for easy connecting, it provides sellers with robust reporting capabilities, the ability to track order status and review order history, printable Walmart- branded packing documents for a seamless customer experience as well as notifications of compliant confirmations, cancellations and inventory updates.

Once your business is part of the program, Walmart Marketplace and Rithum will work directly with you to onboard your company and establish your fulfillment process.

Interested in learning more about our partnership with Walmart? Complete this form and we’ll follow up with you.

Q&A: Why Sell on Walmart.com?

How long—start to finish—does it take to set up on Walmart Marketplace?

Once you complete an application, it can take anywhere from two weeks to one month to get your company onboarded. This is due to our trust/safety review process, which diligently reviews your application to verify information and check customer satisfaction ratings. You may be asked to provide additional documentation. Fill out this form to get started. Please note: If you’ve applied to be a seller on Walmart Marketplace in the past and didn’t hear back, it’s worth contacting us again.

How does fulfillment work on Walmart Marketplace?

Sellers manage fulfillment of their own products. We encourage sellers to offer 2-day shipping. You can do this by taking advantage of our partnership with Deliverr. Through them, we offer special negotiated rates to ship products nationwide. You can choose how many SKUs to add and can enable it by location, giving you a lot of flexibility. If you take advantage of Walmart Sponsored Product Ads and can offer 2-day shipping in certain regions you can boost impressions and conversions.  

Who pays shipping?

Shipping is free to the customer. Sellers build it into their cost model. SEO improves when you participate in 2-day shipping in the regions you can meet this expectation and have the badge.  

How does Walmart address infringed brand content?

Walmart has a low incidence of these infractions due to the thorough vetting process and the high bar we’ve set for sellers to participate in our marketplace program. In the event that this does happen, there is a public notice form that you can complete and our team can give you support to address the content that is being infringed upon.  

Is Walmart accepting high-end products?

Yes, luxury products are welcome categories to our assortment. For example, Nike products can now be sold and Ray-ban products will be available in February 2020. We are working to increase our assortment of luxury products. If you have assortment in these categories, Walmart Marketplace is a great opportunity for your brand. 

If I’m already on Walmart.com, can I join Walmart Marketplace?

Yes, we support this hybrid approach. To be considered, your application has to be verified and allowed by the retail category manager on Walmart.com. If it makes sense for your business to be on both channels, we encourage you to fill out this form.  

Will the integration process on Walmart Marketplace be faster if I’m a Rithum customer?

Yes, it is a shorter timeframe to launch versus being a brand-new seller to the Rithum network. The integration is done via the Rithum Marketplace platform. We take your content and feed it into Walmart Marketplace.  

Does Rithum help with advertising on Walmart Marketplace?

Yes, we can fully support your advertising on Walmart Marketplace. We apply advanced metrics and proprietary practices to help customers find your products and we continually monitor the program and make adjustments in real time to boost impressions. We assign a dedicated account manager to advocate on your behalf, advise and adjust promotions to maximize conversions and develop click-worthy product content to get in front of the right customers. We also provide in-depth reporting and analysis of advertising, sales, profits, channel feeds and promotions to optimize your presence on Walmart Marketplace and other top marketplaces.   

Can you sell refurbished products on Walmart Marketplace?

Yes, in certain categories. For example, refurbished electronics is an approved category. To sell in this category, you are required to go through an additional vetting during our onboard process to be approved to sell these items.  

Who pays sales tax?

The seller is responsible for the sales tax. Please view our process on Seller Central. Rithum can assist by setting codes for where sales tax must be collected and then pass it to the seller so they can collect the tax.   

How does Walmart pay sellers? Are there referral fees?

Sellers are paid by ACH deposit transfer. Disbursements are made bi-weekly. We are expanding our partnership with PayPal to allow you to use Hyperwallet. There are no monthly fees or subscription fees. A referral fee is deducted from your regular payments for sold items. 

*Comscore Media Metrix, January 2019
**Walmart Annual Earnings Reports, 2018-19