Walmart Shoppable Ads Shows Continued Investments in Retail Media

Marketplaces
Written By Rick Watson

A recent story highlights the hot war that keeps picking up steam between Walmart and Amazon. The two have been back and forth over the past 25 years... Mostly Amazon taking ideas from Walmart in its early history, inventing new concepts, and Walmart returning the favor in the last 5 years.

The latest involves a story from MarTech involving Walmart's test of shoppable ads on NBCU's Peacock. During commercials on shows like "Below Deck" (which I confess is a guilty pleasure of mine) viewers are able to flip through products worn on the show and purchase. Kind of a "purchase-tainment".

QR code takes you to checkout. Not terribly innovative per se, but something to track. Big problem though - I'm probably going to look on TikTok or Insta anyway if I'm watching TV not just Walmart. Still, it's a worthy experiment.

Walmart does not have its own media distribution outlets, and must seek out partners (Walmart used to own the ill-fated Vudu, no more), unlike Amazon which is more much advanced in its Prime Video, IMDB, and FreeVee outlets for video/TV distribution.

It will be interesting to see if Walmart continues to develop a network of partners looking for an alternative to the Amazon ecosystem. It's hard to imagine that either Amazon or Walmart will hook up with Disney, however. That prize is likely for Apple.

Rick Watson

Rick Watson founded RMW Commerce Consulting after spending 20+ years as a technology entrepreneur and operator exclusively in the eCommerce industry with companies like ChannelAdvisor, BarnesandNoble.com, Merchantry, and Pitney Bowes.

Watson’s work today is centered on supporting investors and management teams incubating and growing direct-to-consumer businesses. Most recently, in partnership with WHP Global, Rick was a critical resource in architecting the WHP+ platform, a new turnkey direct to consumer digital e-commerce platform that powers AnneKlein.com and JosephAbboud.com.

Watson also hosts a weekly podcast, Watson Weekly, where he shares an unbiased, unfiltered expert take on the retail sector’s biggest players.

In the past year alone, Rick has spoken at many in-person and virtual events as well as podcasts on topics ranging from retail/ecom to supply chain/logistics and even digital grocery including CommerceNext IRL, ASCM Connect, and Retail Innovation Conference.

https://www.rmwcommerce.com/
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