Walmart – Affiliate Program Review

Walmart started out as an American multinational retail company. Walmart operates a chain of:

• Supermarkets
• Markdown Department Stores, and
• Grocery Stores (En.wikipedia.org. (n.d.))

An affiliate program is also known as an associate program. This kind of program is a plan between an online retail company and another individual or business, typically people who have online websites. The online retail site that offers an affiliate program pays the colleague a percentage of their sales to send them traffic. (Harris. (2019))

What is Walmart Affiliate Program and How Does it Work?

This program was created to help Walmart encourage sales of their products. It was also designed to help individuals and businesses earn extra money. When you place a banner ad or text URLs on your website, which are used to refer patrons to Walmart’s site, you can earn a commission on each sale the store gets.

Walmart does not pay commission just when visitors go to their site. They pay a percentage to you when a visitor buys a product.

Walmart’s service provider for their affiliate program is referred to as LinkShare. The service provider offers the online merchant a basic crossing point that tracks all sales, click-throughs, impressions and commissions. The service provider does not track consumer data that might be sensitive. It does not collet any such data either. (Walmart.com. (2019))

How it Works

The online merchant offers its affiliates designed banners, as well as news bulletins, and a set of helpful text links — URLs, weekly, in each newsletter. The company also offers access to banners and newsletters, which can be found in their archives. They have a vast collection of items you could place on your website.

Also, you could make custom text links that could direct visitors to any page on Walmart’s site. You can do that whenever you choose. You would open an account for the affiliate program, after approval from Walmart. Then, when a customer follows URLs or banner ads from your website and buys one or more products, your account gets credited.

However, you are not required to have an affiliate account to access text links and banners. If you do not have an account, though, you cannot earn a percentage of sales.

Advantages and Disadvantages of the Walmart Affiliate Program

One advantage is that it is free. Once you are approved, you can start earning money right away. Other benefits are as follows:

• Free affiliation
• The influential attraction of Walmart’s daily low prices
• Professionally-designed banners – free
• News Bulletins with product details and links, and with concepts to assist associates with increasing earnings
• Data feeds with details about goods that are top sellers and select goods
• Contests
• Additional chances to earn more revenue
• A great commission layout

In addition to the above benefits, there are a couple other advantages with their affiliate program:

• More online exposure – Walmart is ranked as a company with one of the highest levels of traffic to their website
• Trustworthiness – Walmart is ranked as a highly respected company

A couple disadvantages might be:

• Online merchants/individuals are selected based on reputation, exclusive product variety, inexpensive pricing, and fast and dependable fulfillment. (Ong. (2017))
• Although there are no brand limitations, Walmart does not allow personalized goods you would sell on websites like eBay and Etsy. (Ong. (2017))

The Walmart.com Affiliate Program helps turn web traffic to your site into income for you. Place links/URLs to their products on your website, and when a visitor follows those links/URLs to Walmart.com and buys one or more products, you earn a percentage of the sale(s).

Walmart makes it easy to enter and maintain this partnership by giving you:

• Free affiliation
• The influential draw of Wal-Mart’s Daily Reduced Prices
• A great percentage of sale structure (see chart)
• Free professionally-developed banners
• Free news bulletins with product information and links/URLs, and concepts for increasing your earnings
• Data feeds with information on top-selling and exclusive goods
• Contests and additional prospects to earn more income
• A enthusiastic team to assist you with maximizing sales

As you see with the chart, the commision rate varies, depending on the kinds of products on Walmart’s site.

Terms and Conditions

The terms and conditions/rules include details about:

• Membership program
• Links/URLs on individual or business websites
• Links on third-party websites
• Prohibitions/Bans
• Referral charges
• Referral payment schedule
• Referral fee sum
• Guidelines and pricing
• Limited license; boundaries
• Terms of the arrangement
• Adjustment
• Association of parties
• Indemnification
• Limitation of liability
• Disclaimers

To learn more about guidelines/terms and conditions, you can visit Walmart’s site here.

Is the Program Legitimate or is it a Scam?

The affiliate program is legit. The only catch might be that someone would need to put out a lot of online content online, like product reviews, and add as many text links and banners to those web pages to earn more commission.

This program might offer an additional alternative to earn extra money online though. According to Wahba (2016), “As of now, Walmart’s online assortment is made up 9 million different kinds of items” (Wahba. (2016)).

How to Sign Up and Login

First, you fill out Walmart’s online form to sign up. They ask you a few questions, like your name and contact info, some question about your online business, company name, etc., and the other portions of the form involve questions like:

• Primary website info
• Payment threshold
• Language preference

And then, you check the boxes at the end of the form – information certification – stating that you have read their terms and agree to them, and that you are 18 years of age or older. Then, you click the “sign up” button. Once you are approved, you will receive login information.