Sam’s Club streamlines ad targeting
Sam’s Club is following the lead of its parent company Walmart and revamping its ad platform.
The warehouse club retailer is transforming its advertising business into the Sam’s Club Member Access Platform (MAP). MAP offers sponsored product search ads, and in tandem, the company is also launching a self-service platform for sponsored product ads.
Sam’s Club is offering these new platforms to enable its partners to buy search ads in an automated way. The retailer is also launching a programmatic partnership with independent demand-side platforms LiveRamp, IRI, and TradeDesk.
According to Sam’s Club, as a membership organization, it has 100% visibility into customer purchases and search behaviors. In addition, by offering a curated assortment, the company says it can predict what its members want and need with substantial precision, creating what it terms a “member-additive” experience.
MAP is part of Sam’s Club’s newly-formed growth organization – led by Kieran Shanahan, chief growth officer, Sam’s Club – that includes representatives from the product, strategy, marketing & membership, and MAP areas of the business.
“Our mission is to deliver the most valuable member additive ads experience in the industry, and with our focus on the member – across all of Sam’s Club, now inclusive of MAP – we are poised to do so,” said Lex Josephs, VP/GM, Sam’s Club Member Access Platform, in a corporate blog post announcing the new targeted ad platform. “We are member-obsessed. We are associate-inspired. We are partner-focused. And we are excited about making our member’s shopping experience with Sam’s Club even more valuable, measurable, and fun.”
Walmart continues revamping ad platform
Sam’s Club parent Walmart has been actively assisting advertisers in reaching select customers with targeted ads for the past 18 months. In January 2021, Walmart introduced its Walmart Connect media platform.
Walmart Connect offers media placements on the retailer’s in-store TV walls and self-checkout screens with nearly 170,000 digital screens across its more than 4,500 stores. Many brand messages can be delivered with date, time and geographic specificity. Walmart also extended its d business on its own digital properties, including Walmart.com, pickup & delivery, and the Walmart app to offer holistic campaigns including search and display media, across the online shopping experience.
Walmart followed up in August 2021 with the launch of the Walmart demand-side platform (DSP) as a collaborative effort with The Trade Desk. The discount giant calls Walmart DSP a “first-of-its-kind” demand-side platform that, unlike other DSP products in the market, serves as a standalone platform combining the technology and performance of The Trade Desk with the scale of Walmart’s first-party omnichannel data.
As a result, Walmart says the offering enables advertisers to be more effective with their overall media spend. Marketers and advertisers have access to capabilities powered by Walmart’s omnichannel data, including reaching specific audiences with targeted ads, allowing advertisers to manage multiple campaigns within the same platform, and connecting online-to-offline sales.
Sam's Club, a division of Walmart Inc. operates nearly 600 stores across the U.S., including Puerto Rico.