Winning the Walmart Buy Box in 2022

Winning the Walmart Buy Box means getting your products on the top of the searched item list for either type of seller: 1P (first-party) or 3P (third-party). Positioning your products in the buy box is the key to more traffic, reviews, and sales. The Buy Box plays a crucial role whether you are a supplier or seller in the Walmart marketplace. You have to put your best listing forward to win the buy box since the buy box greatly influences the shopper’s behavior.

In this article, we will learn about the Walmart Buy Box, its importance for sellers, and the factors that help you win the buy box.

What is the Walmart Buy Box? And why is it important for sellers?

Similar to the Amazon Buy Box, the Walmart buy box also appears as an “Add to Cart” button on product pages rewarded to strong Walmart sellers themselves which allow shoppers to purchase something with ease and speed benefitting both the seller and buyer. An algorithm is used to determine the product of sellers which belongs at the top of the search results giving more visibility to shoppers and help increase traffic and conversions.

On marketplaces like Walmart when multiple sellers or more than one seller sells the same product they share the same listing and compete for the win to ‘Add to Cart’ button. This is the most important button as this is where most shoppers make their purchasing decision. The seller who wins the ‘Add to Cart’ is the winner of the buy box. However only one Walmart seller can win the buy box, the buy box winner is the default seller whose product goes into the ‘Add to Cart’.

Nearly every seller who does not have the buy box loses sales. To be more exact with the numbers, according to statistics, 82% of sales go through the buy box. Walmart Buy Box is a fundamental part of the shopping experience and allows boosting online sales. Walmart Buy Box effectively works to provide customers with a low-hassle experience. Winning the buy box is important for sellers as customers are more drawn to the first listing. It is the winner whose product gets displayed and is added to the shopping cart once a shopper clicks on the ‘Add to Cart’ button. This allows you to stand the advantage of the best sales and revenue.

How to Win Buy Box on Walmart? The Winning Factors

On the Walmart marketplace, the probability of winning the buy box is high with few sellers unlike on Amazon. If you want to win the Walmart Buy Box you need to consider the factors that can affect your chances of selling efficiently both on Walmart’s mobile app and website. As the competition is aggressive and potential customers come with potential competitors sellers need a progressive strategy to beat the competition and establish a successful business.

Walmart has different factors that go into who wins the buy box. Below listed are some of the important factors that the Walmart buy box algorithm considers to discover how you can increase your chances of winning the buy box.

• Competitive Pricing

As Walmart is known for its lowest price, they consider competitive pricing as one of the most important factors in winning the buy box. Sellers need to keep track of competitors, sellers, and pricing and make sure to set their pricing rules to have a minimum price. Walmart’s buy box algorithm ranks the product listing on the top keeping ‘price’ as the important factor. If you keep your product price lowest than that of your competitors considering other multiple factors you will have high chances of winning the buy box on Walmart increasing your sales. It is important to consider the total price including both product price and shipping costs as it appears to the buyers.

For orders above $35, Walmart marketplace offers free shipping so sellers should consider the lowest possible price for their products to ensure that they win it. Price intelligence software that continually monitors the competitive landscape can help you win more buy boxes along with profit maximization by letting you change your prices quickly to adapt to the prices in your market.

Note: Sellers should keep in mind that winning the buy box on Walmart is not only about the lowest price. It works only if all the criteria mentioned coming together and Walmart’s other guidelines are fulfilled.

• Good Reviews and Ratings

Reviews and ratings are one of the most crucial elements that help you win the buy box. As Walmart gives priority to customer’s preferences Walmart’s algorithm automatically pushes your listing down making you lose out on sales and revenue if your product has negative or bad reviews. A majority of shoppers buy a product only after reading through the reviews. Since every product page on Walmart includes a “customer reviews” section and potential shoppers find them convenient in making their buying decisions it is very important to maintain good reviews.

Having good customer reviews and ratings helps to earn trust from buyers and encourages them to shop with you. This increases your sales and credibility for a brand with the chances of winning the buy box. Our data analysis on shoe products showed that 46% of the buy box winners on the Walmart Marketplace had more than 50 reviews and over 90% of them had a rating higher than 3 as shown on the graph below.

• Stock Availability

Another important ranking factor Walmart Marketplace values highly when it comes to the buy box eligibility is stock availability. Walmart ensures that you can meet the new demand and cover the sales volume so it is important to make sure you have good inventory management so you never run out of stock for your chances of winning a buy box. The algorithm prioritizes sellers with higher listed stock availability to fulfill the orders anytime so having more inventory increases your chances of selling more.

You will be pushed down from the top results the moment your products go out of stock as your competitors might have more products available for sale. To avoid this issue, you can set up an automated notification that alerts when your products reach a specific limit or runs out of stock to monitor your listings and maintain stock availability. As the Buy Box is all about a convenient shopping experience Walmart rewards sellers who keep enough amount of stock available to sell customers with a higher possibility of being awarded a Buy Box.

• Free or Low-Priced Shipping

It is the general rule that states the lower the shopping price; the higher is the chances of owning the buy box along with the fulfillment of other criteria. For the sellers to make it to the top of the listing and generate more sales it is a must to offer low shipping charges for the products you sell. It is a huge advantage for you over your competitors if you are willing to offer ‘free shipping’. You can raise your competitiveness in winning a Walmart buy box by offering free shipping. Also, you need to always ensure that your shipping is prompt and reliable as buyers expect their purchase to be delivered quickly and on time, earlier, if possible. Walmart leans towards fast shipping options as an important ranking factor when it comes to Buy Box ownership.

According to SellerActive’s automated repricing research, sellers who have 2-Day Shipping tags enabled can reprice their items up to $1 more expensive than their competitors, and still capture the Buy Box.

• Content Quality

Sellers must follow Walmart’s Guidelines for each item you sell at Walmart and look after the aspects like item’s title, description, features, and images to create great listings. You need to have a good selling history on Walmart and satisfy your customers with your services. You need to maintain the Performance Standards set by Walmart which lead to positive reviews about the product and shopping experience by customers maximizing your chances of winning Walmart Buy Box.

Seller Performance Standards for Walmart Marketplace include:

• 90-Day Order Defect Rate <2%
• On-Time Shipment Rate >99%
• Valid Tracking Rate >99%

These are Walmart’s key measures of quality service which shows that you are a trustworthy seller. Sellers must meet these seller performance metrics that are requirements to be eligible for Walmart’s Buy Box placement. Those who top the seller qualification metrics for the buy box own the buy box.

Product Intelligence tool from GrowByData gives you detailers scores into several aspects of your product’s content as well as your competitors’ product content like title, image, price, promotion, review, rating, etc. The image below shows the product detail page scores of Wranglers on their jeans products on the Walmart Marketplace. A detailed view like this helps brands understand what specific aspects of the product content needs improvements. Targeted optimizations of specific aspects mean there are no wasted efforts.

Advantages of Winning a Buy Box

• Visibility: By winning a buy box you can develop your success and build a strong and positive reputation for your brand.
• Credibility: Buy Box winners are chosen only after they meet exceptional standards. If you can sell your product on one of the world’s largest retail platforms, you will easily gain customer’s trust which leads to your business growth.
• Selectivity: As only one seller can win a Buy Box you will ultimately be the only seller of your product with the convenient and one-click buying feature that ensures the promotion of your brand value.

To Sum Up

Winning a Buy Box on Walmart Marketplace is both easy and difficult. Owning the Walmart Buy Box for your products can be a good source of sales and revenue. To earn the buy box placement, you as a Walmart seller have to monitor your product prices constantly and ensure that you offer the lowest price and best quantity, manage your inventory well and maintain strong seller metrics, optimize them for better Walmart SEO. You need to optimize every aspect of your products to make your products stand out from your competitors.

Understand the different criteria used by Walmart marketplace to win the buy box and let your product be the best product to win the top spot. External tools such as Marketplace Intelligence can greatly reduce the time and resource that goes into monitoring, tracking, and optimizing all the various factors of winning the buy box. The tool allows sellers on the Walmart Marketplace to dynamically reprice their products per the market demands, get in-depth insights on their product and campaign performances, and optimize your product contents to improve your chances to win the buy box.