Dive Brief:

• Walmart Connect, the retailer’s U.S. advertising arm, announced a group of new creative partners to help brands produce more effective self-service campaigns, per a company blog post.
• The roster includes VidMob, WhyteSpyder, Kaizen Ad, It’sRapid.ai and The Mars Agency. They will help marketers refine their advertising in areas like detail page optimization, video creation and editing and display content support. 
• Walmart said the expansion of its partner program is mostly aimed at smaller businesses that face challenges creating and iterating on content. The announcement follows the big-box store’s earnings last week, which showed strong momentum in advertising.

Dive Insight:

Over the past year, Walmart Connect has struck a number of partnerships to offer advertisers more sophisticated ways to reach consumers. The addition of a creative line-up looks to help brands using its retail media network —particularly those without deep pockets — improve the quality of their campaigns as Walmart’s ad products mature and extend into more resource-intensive areas, like sponsored video content, which is broadening availability, and connected TV. 

“Access to these services will become even more essential to Walmart’s self-serve advertisers as we introduce new ad experiences across our full-funnel, omnichannel solutions,” wrote Diana Finster, head of agency and technology partnerships for Walmart Connect, in the announcement. 

Self-service advertising is cheaper than managed services and can help digital platforms like Walmart Connect scale by welcoming more small- and mid-sized businesses into the fold. 

The initial batch of creative partners provides a range of services. VidMob is focused on data-driven creative effectiveness; WhyteSpyder specializes in Walmart.com listings; Kaizen Ad works on running mobile-first video campaigns; It’sRapid.ai produces assets like images, videos and display ads; and The Mars Agency positions itself around connected commerce solutions. Tapping into the creative partners is subject to eligibility requirements, Walmart said.

The creative partners fall under Walmart’s solutions cohort, which also features API partners like Helium 10. The company additionally operates a services cohort that is made up of more than 80 agencies to assist brands in optimizing their media buys, along with a technology cohort dedicated to off-site placements on third-party apps and a demand-side platform developed with The Trade Desk.  

Walmart has continued to grow its advertising bets at a healthy clip, emerging as a power player in the highly competitive retail media landscape. Retail media has been a bright spot in an otherwise down digital market, though it has experienced some contractions as it gets more crowded. 

Walmart Connect saw sales up nearly 40% in the first quarter of fiscal 2024, a rate of growth that outpaced rivals like Amazon, though Amazon’s ad sales revenue remains far higher. Globally, Walmart’s total advertising take for the period was up 30%.