Throughout the years, countless number of entrepreneurs have made their fortune with dropshipping.
Until very recently, their main source of revenue came from Amazon FBA or Shopify.
In the last couple of years, a new huge competitor has come on the ring:
Walmart.
Forget the 40 somethings on their rascals and low budget brick and mortar Walmarts, though.
Everything happens through Walmart's online platform Marketplace.
And things seem to be really kicking off in the 2020/2021 years.
Marketplace is where third party sellers (ie you) can dropship their wares and sell to the Walmart buyers.
And this is a huge thing:
- According to the National Retail Federation, Walmart is the largest omnichannel retailer in the US.
- There are over 75 million items online up for sale.
- Walmart Marketplace receives over 100 million unique online visitors per month.
- Over one third of their customers online are millennials.
- And more than half of the buyers from Walmart.com are homeowners with medium-high income.
That means a lot of money is being spent, my friend.
The infographic above shows what people who shop at Walmart Marketplace are looking for.
The demand is huge, and you too, now, can get a slice of that pie:
- Very recently Walmart has started opening to a select number of third party sellers.
- That is because they need help with the overwhelming demand on their site.
- So Walmart actually needs people like you and is willing to help you become a seller for them!
This is what you can expect when you sell with Walmart.com:
I tell you, before I started my successful career in Local Lead Generation, I tried so many things.
Amazon FBA was one of them.
And don't get me wrong, I was quite successful with a couple of products.
But this is a whole new ball-game.
If my business were not booming at the moment, I would seriously consider this opportunity.
You can trust me, I've been in the online marketing space for almost 10 years..
Until 2014, like many of the people I review, I was working in a corporate job from 9 to 5.
Not only was it soul-crushing, but it didn't give me any time to pursue my bigger goals.
I was dabbling in online marketing and was quite successful at a few things, including dropshipping with Amazon.
But nothing worth leaving my job for.
That was until I discovered a method to rank sites organically, generating free leads for my clients.
That website you see above, for the tree care company, I created that site in 2015, and since then I haven't had to touch or update it:
It has gained me a passive income of $2000 a month.
That's more than $100,000 for one site, in 5 years.
That's the magic of the Lead Generation business, it's by far the best model to generate passive income. If you want to know more, just hop over here!
Since I have experience in the dropshipping scene, I thought I would highlight the 5 most important steps to become a Walmart Marketplace dropshipper.
This will cover:
- Documentation needed.
- What software(s) to use.
- What items to sell
- How to create automation.
- Shipping times and time management.
- How to remain on Walmart's good side.
Being selected by Walmart as a third party seller is hard, and I'm here to give you a hand succeed, if that is what you want to do.
I've gone and done some research so you won't have to spend hours looking for information.
We've got you covered.
The 7 Steps to Become a Walmart Marketplace Seller
1 - Amazon FBA vs Walmart Marketplace
If many of you haven't heard about dropshipping on Walmart before, or have hazy details about it, let's start by comparing it to Amazon FBA.
Amazon is a giant, taking up over 45% of online spending in the US, we all know that.
To this great number of buyers though, there are tens of thousands of sellers.
You know what that means:
More sellers = more competition = price wars = less profit.
What's more, Amazon has become rather picky with new sellers.
If you make too many sales to fast, your account will go under review.
Now, Walmart has only recently started to focus on their digital Marketplace
This means:
- there are a ton of buyers, of searches, but less competition.
- it's really what they call a ground floor opportunity.
- the platform has less than 100k sellers, a drop in the blue ocean!
- Walmart is even stricter in accepting new sellers, just read below.
Walmart Dropshipping or if you decide to go down the Automation route, is what Amazon FBA was 8 or 9 years ago.
It's really a blue ocean, and the amount of success stories I've read about researching for this post is astounding.
Read on to see the practical steps whether you want to become a Walmart seller yourself or if you want to go the Automation way and have a team of pros do it for you.
2 - Marketplace Qualifications
First things first.
Getting to partner with Walmart gives you great benefits, but not everyone makes it.
These are the following things that you will have to have in order when applying:
- US Tax ID (or EIN).
- Form W-9.
- Marketplace experience.
In the application process, they ask you to link your Amazon FBA link.
They do this to check your experience in the field of online sales.
It's an optional step, but Walmart dropshipper Noah Mincis has noticed that sellers get approved faster and more easily if they have an Amazon FBA account.
Scoping out how well you do with the competition..
If you do have an Amazon FBA account, they'll be looking for:
- Customer feedback.
- Amounts sold.
- Speed in shipping.
- Overall competence in online marketing.
You also want to upload items:
- with a UTC/GTIN number that can be catalogued by Marketplace.
- after scoping out other sites and offer the most competitive prices.
- ideally to which you can attach free shipping in 2 days.
- that you can ship from US warehouses (no FBA or Alibaba here!).
- that give the best customer experience.
The on-boarding process, then, is made up of 5 macro-stages:
- Application.
- Contract.
- Integration.
- On-Boarding.
- Going Live.
There are also some parameters that Walmart wants you to follow at all times.
The performance metrics need to be tip-top:
- 90 day order defect rate < 2%
- On-time shipment > 99%
- Valid tracking rate > 99%
With the order defect rate, the amount of times customers ask for a refund, you have to keep these metrics in mind:
- 0% - 2%: keep up the great work.
- 2% - 6%: start looking for a solution to whatever problem you might have.
- > 6%: you risk suspension from the Marketplace.
3 - Shipping Strategies
Walmart takes huge pride in shipping products on time and expects that from partners too.
That's why you should have a shipping strategy in place from the get-go.
Fast shipping:
- Should not be an afterthought
- Should be one of the first things you work on.
- Is an extension of customer experience.
- Is expected by Walmart customers.
- Will give your brand a competitive advantage.
That is why Walmart have created shipping benchmarks, so you know where you are at all the time:
- Ship orders by the end of the next business day (required).
- Deliver orders within 5 working days (top performers).
- Valid tracking number for at least 95% of shipments (required).
- Free shipping for all of your products (top performers).
Walmart will be monitoring your behavior through their Seller Center, so no way of cheating!
The importance of free shipping cannot be underestimated:
A whopping 57% of people leave their products in the cart and don't go through with the payment when they realize that there is no free option.
To that effect there are some things you can do to provide the service at all times:
- Find multi-carrier solutions to keep the prices down.
- Offer discounts by working with companies like Shipstation that offer such services.
- Save time and money by automating processes and grow your margins.
Shipping is an integral aspect of the Walmart experience.
Everything else can be amazing on your side, but if your shipping game is not great, you're toast.
If you want to make it as a Marketplace seller, you have to keep this thing in check.
4 - Automating Your Experience
Dealing with all the things I've written about until now can be a bit overwhelming.
Especially if you haven't got the greatest experience in eCommerce.
That's why a lot of people use automation systems to get everything in place.
Shipstation and SellerActive are the two most famous automation software companies.
Having their help will definitely help you out in your journey.
But what exactly do they do?
SellerActive is dedicated to help grow small to medium sized e-commerce retailers who sell physical products across one or more online marketplaces.
ShipStation is a web-based shipping software that was designed for the multi-channel merchant.
Anyone who sells on multiple platforms (Walmart, eBay, Amazon, etc.) & ships physical goods can save time & money with ShipStation.
Both have great support teams and very high ratings from customers, and with their support, it will be easier to organize all of your biz.
On SoftwareAdvice SellerActive has 30 reviews and a rating of 4.4 / 5 vs ShipStation which has 721 reviews and a rating of 4.7 / 5.
Either way you want to go, you're going to be good.
At the end of the day, automation will be your goal, and through the SaaS mentioned you should be able to increase:
- Order Management: it helps companies manage orders in an omnichannel way.
- Shipping: it’ll give you access to multiple carriers and rates, select shipping discounts, and print labels for you. Shipping documents are automatically generated and attached to the order within your system.
- Branding: you will create tracking pages and returns portals branded for your company always to have your logo available.
- Inventory Management: this includes the ability to view your stock levels, reserve inventory for specific orders, and set inventory alerts, so you get a notice before you run low.
- Integration: integrations include marketplaces, seller locations, shopping cart tools, stores, carriers, and many third-party plugins or design services.
5 - Done For You Automation Businesses
Even though the biz model is relatively new, there are already businesses that are willing to give you a done for you experience.
What does that mean exactly?
These businesses are already signed up to the Walmart business model.
All they do is design an automated store for the investors that automates many business processes such as shipping individual orders, handling product returns and general customer support management.
Therefore, allowing the investors to manage their business store just by downloading and signing up on their official app.
As an investor, you aren't really doing much aside from putting in the capital.
For example, one of the biggest companies in the space, EZ ECOMM, really sell you the dream.
If you invest capital, they will set up shop for you and start adding products to your online store, month by month.
In a couple of months you could have a store that is selling more than 5k hand picked products.
They use a variety of advanced methods and strategies to create optimized listings, that resonate with target customers to boost sales and providing significant profits.
Moreover, they also use split testing software that utilizes A/B testing to increase conversion rate and profits for the investors.
They start at $35k with a 60% profit to you and 40% profit to ECOMM, but the highest package goes to $50k with a 70% split your way.
What about the shipping and the storage?
They take care of that in exchange of their share for your store.
There are some downsides, though.
A lot of Amazon FBA sellers, for example, have complained of having been banned from the Amazon platform for selling on Walmart.
The king of Walmart Automation is Vladyslav Varizhuk, and according to his YouTube videos it really is possible to buy a store, without paid advertising, and make a small fortune with it.
Below you can see what one of Vlad's students has made in one month:
$68k in one month, which translates to $20k of pure profit.
Let me know in the comments if you would like me to create a list of the best Walmart Automation.
What's My Final Takeaway?
PROS:
CONS:
If you want to partner with a business and market your products, it's clear that Walmart is superior to Amazon, when it comes to selling online.
However, these days I don't really recommend going down the path of dropshipping, with either Walmart or Amazon.
And as a previous Amazon seller, I know what I'm talking about.
Lead Generation, where you rank your own website, is a far superior model to monetize your skills.
Let me explain, keep reading...
Why I Quit Dropshipping... Lead Generation Proved to be a Much Better Biz Model, Here's Why...
I run a $50K per month lead generation business but all of my leads are generating through free traffic or SEO, I don't have to depend on a centralized online platform.
So it's pretty much passive income, I don’t have to worry about free shipping, customer reviews or anything like that.
The website I create ranks on the first page of Google, in the so-called map pack, and the leads just start pouring in.
So, you see, it's passive income, I don’t have to worry about the performance of my products on Walmart or Amazon
Once my site ranks it generally keeps its rank with very little to no maintenance.
Don’t get me wrong you can still make a living selling on Walmart, but it's a harder route and very challenging to do so.
The problem with selling on Walmart is that you are constantly looking at the performance of your products, trying to think what went wrong and which new product is going to make you cash.
If things go wrong, it's back to tweaking, spending more time and money, trying a different approach.
This is why I still recommend people look into doing lead generation with free traffic
Conclusion
Walmart Marketplace is the future, everything is there to teach you how to choose your products and sell them via Marketplace.
Let me tell you, there are niches that work with this kind of method, but the problem is there are many niches that really struggle too.
Unlike selling through huge platforms, if you know how to generate leads with free traffic, you can go into any local niche and create an incredible level of results for clients.
That’s how 90% of my multiple 6 figure income is generated. And I should add that it's passive income: see free traffic never stops.
In 2021, even during Covid-19, I continue to build more lead gen sites and I write at least 1 blog post a day for this site, because I’ve come to realize that these are the high-income producing activities because it directly increases my free traffic every month.
Click here if you want to know more about my Lead Gen method.
