Winning the Walmart Buy Box can give you a huge competitive edge in the marketplace, making it a goal among most sellers. Here’s how to become the next winner.
If you want to make it big on Walmart and sell like crazy, you must win the Walmart Buy Box. Winning the Buy Box on Walmart Marketplace means only your products display on the Add to Cart button, making you the exclusive seller among competitor merchants selling the same product with the same features.
Typically, multiple merchants will sell identical products on Walmart. To make it easy for shoppers to find products online, Walmart lists all merchants selling the same products on one page. Walmart's algorithm then highlights what it believes is the best offer for that particular product.
When buyers browse a listing and click the Add to Cart button, the Buy Box owner's products are automatically added to the cart, unless the buyer decides to browse through offers from other sellers. These alternate offers are not distinctly visible on the page, so most buyers end up ignoring them.
Therefore, when you win the Walmart Buy Box, you win a huge advantage for making more sales.
What Winning the Walmart Buy Box Could Mean for Your Business
You may feel like you’ve hit the jackpot when you win the Buy Box on Walmart, given the many benefits this status brings to your e-commerce business.
These are the biggest perks of owning the Walmart buy box:
A Boost in Sales
When e-commerce shoppers add items to their cart, that shows a high purchase intent. Given that about 30 - 40% of shoppers will complete the checkout process after adding items to their carts, owning the Add to Cart button places you in a great position to boost your sales.
The fact that you’re the default seller of the products on a given listing means you’ll have the highest add-to-cart rate. Provided that most of the customers who add your product to their cart don’t find reasons to abandon their carts during the checkout process, you’ll make more sales than competing Walmart sellers.
In the best-case scenario, if 80–100% of shoppers who add to cart convert, you will be minting money without the heavy capital investment you would otherwise need to channel towards marketing campaigns. That’s why you should make every effort to win the Walmart Buy Box.
Greater Exposure to Potential Customers
The Walmart Marketplace receives over 100 million unique visitors each month. That’s a lot of traffic. As a regular Walmart seller, you have standard access to this massive client base, but as a Walmart Buy Box owner, you get a front-row seat.
Because most shoppers either trust that Walmart Marketplace selects the best deals to put in the Buy Box or don't even know that other offers exist, they don’t take the time to review different sellers. As soon as they land on the product they’re searching for, they add it to their cart and continue shopping until they check out. Thus, being the Buy Box seller gives your products prime exposure.
Enhanced Credibility and Trustworthiness
Before you become a Buy Box seller, you must satisfy and continually uphold high-level requirements dictated by the Walmart Seller Center. Their demanding conditions focus on many seller metrics that go beyond item prices to ensure Buy Box sellers offer top-quality products to their buyers.
As such, shoppers view sellers who occupy the Buy Box and thus meet Walmart’s highest seller performance standards as being more credible and dependable. This is the trust level shoppers desire for an e-commerce company, but they usually have no means or time to authenticate reliability.
Being the Buy Box winner signals to buyers that you’re a cut above the other sellers in various areas from product prices to shopping experience and product quality.
Become the Next Walmart Buy Box Winner With These 5 Strategies
If your ambition, like most Walmart sellers, is to capture sales with the Add to Cart button, you’re most likely busy researching how to win the Buy Box on Walmart. These five exclusive strategies will help you do just that:
1. Offer Competitive Pricing
Walmart built its global reputation as the marketplace where shoppers find the most competitive prices for all products. That’s why item price is the first thing Walmart considers before rewarding a seller with the Buy Box. The Walmart Marketplace employs an algorithm that may automatically award the Buy Box to the seller who offers the lowest product price (factoring in shipping prices).
Owing to the fast-paced seller competition, especially in popular categories like electronics and other best-selling Walmart items, you must optimize your product pricing to have success. Review competitor prices to hit the sweet spot and avoid getting outpriced by other sellers. Even a difference of one cent can make all the difference.
If this sounds intimidating, don't worry! There are awesome repricing software platforms like Flashpricer that automate these price changes for you 24/7 so that you're always competing fiercely to win the coveted Walmart Buy Box.
2. Make Sure Your Products Are Never Out of Stock
Running out of stock is bad for your business when you are trying to win the Walmart Buy Box because Walmart pushes you further down the seller list if you run into constant inventory shortages. Even if you have the lowest prices or you’re already the reigning Buy Box winner, you’ll lose it as soon as you run out of stock.
Frequently running out of stock could even earn you a higher defect rate due to the many order cancellations that follow. Consider investing in inventory management software to avoid these problems and keep track of your inventory levels in real time. The best tools will warn you about a looming inventory shortage so you can stock up beforehand.
If you're using a repricer, make sure it is configured to raise your price if competitors on the listing go out of stock. This is a great opportunity to make more money while your competition is reduced.
3. Create High-Quality Product Listings
Your product listings on Walmart must be highly engaging to facilitate a smooth shopping experience. Your product descriptions should include:
Keyword-integrated product titles
A concise product details section
High-resolution photographs of your product
Well-formatted content with scannable bullet points
Without an incredible listing that captures a shopper’s attention, Walmart will not consider your product a Buy Box contender. Take time to create quality, well-formatted, and coherent product listings to enhance your chances of winning the Walmart Buy Box.
4. Maintain Low Order Defect and Cancellation Rates
Order defects point to problems with your customer service or product quality. A high defect rate is triggered by:
Customer complaints
Late or missed deliveries
Product returns due to defective or incorrect products
Order cancellations due to listing or pricing errors
Walmart requires you to maintain a 2% or less order defect rate within 90 days and an on-time delivery rate of over 99%. If you meet or exceed these standards, Walmart will push your listing up the Buy Box contenders list, as meeting these standards speaks to your excellent customer service.
5. Earn Positive Reviews
Today, 98% of online shoppers consider reviews to be a key reference when making a purchasing decision. Almost every shopper will first read your product’s reviews before adding it to their cart. That’s why you should proactively seek reviews from past and current customers who’ve interacted with your products and brand.
The more positive reviews your company and products attract, the higher your chances of winning the Walmart Buy Box in 2023. If you get negative reviews, correct the issues behind the bad reviews and win back the dissenting customer. If your product attracts too many negative reviews, Walmart’s algorithms will automatically take down your listing.
Conversely, if you have superior positive reviews to your competitors, you might be able to charge a higher price for your item and still conquer the Buy Box. Good repricers like Flashpricer will automatically take these factors into account when setting the optimal price for your listings.
Remember, you need to practice these five strategies in tandem to have the best shot at winning the Walmart Buy Box. Although you’ll have one massive foot in if you get product pricing right, it’s not guaranteed to win you the Buy Box. Besides, you must also follow Walmart’s pricing rules, as we will illustrate below.
Walmart Marketplace Pricing Rules Sellers Should Keep in Mind
To keep things in order, Walmart employs this basic pricing rule.
Price Leadership Rule
The price parity rule says you must not sell the same product on other marketplaces at a dramatically lower rate than the price you list at Walmart. This rate also includes shipping costs. If you subvert this rule, Walmart will remove your product from the marketplace and only republish it if you reprice it and follow the parity rule.
Multichannel repricing software can come in handy here, as they will adjust your prices on other marketplaces like Amazon to keep you relatively consistent across the board.
Maintain a Competitive Advantage Over Your Competition With a Repricer
Admittedly, competing for price points in a busy and competitive marketplace like Walmart can feel like a lost cause, but it does not have to be. Winning the price war to secure the Walmart Buy Box simply requires an on-point strategy and continuous analysis of fresh seller data.
The good news is that you can leverage Flashpricer to automatically reprice your products to align with rapid marketplace price changes. With Flashpricer, you will get more accurate and up-to-date Buy Box data than your competitors, who rely solely on Walmart’s API. This gives you a massive advantage that will help you to win price wars without under-pricing your products.