Amazon widens its web traffic gap with Walmart
Walmart has some ground to make up when it comes to grabbing online traffic from its rival, Amazon.
Amazon generated more than five-times the amount of traffic than Walmart. Moreover, traffic to Amazon was of higher quality, with visits averaging over 2.5 minutes longer, and taking in five more pages per visit than Walmart, according to “Amazon vs Walmart – The Battleground for Online Retail – Part I,” a study from SimilarWeb.
According to the data, both Amazon and Walmart have managed to maintain — and even improve — their share of traffic among the top 100 shopping sites in the United States. Both were up from a respective 29.6% and 5.3%, to 30.7% and 5.9%.
However, Amazon received around 20% of its U.S.-based traffic from referrals, while Walmart only saw 9% of its traffic come from this source. Looking at the shopping category as a whole, about 20% of online traffic comes from referrals. This indicates that Walmart is behind the curve on this front. Of the total volume of referrals that link to Amazon and Walmart online, 95% goes to Amazon.
Amazon’s advantage may be unsurprising, given the highly evolved nature and near-universal uptake of the online giant’s affiliate program, Amazon Associates. However, even when looking at sites where Walmart does well on referrals, the company’s share of referrals traffic is decreasing.
For example, nintendo.com sent 44.5% of its referral traffic to Walmart in April 2017, but by March 2018, that share was down to 28.6%. Slickdeals.net showed a similar trend, down from 17.2% in April 2017 to less than 1% in March 2018, data revealed.
“Amazon understands the paramount importance of partners. In building out its affiliate program, Amazon ensures that it offers appropriate rewards to referring sites that send traffic that converts into sales,” said Daniel Sevitt, content marketing manager at SimilarWeb.
“This is a part of their marketing mix which they continue to nurture and which continues to deliver a steady stream of primed-to-purchase consumers,” the study said.
While this is an underdeveloped source of traffic for Walmart, there are some aspects of shopping at walmart.com that are superior to the user experience at Amazon, according to the study.
“For example, Walmart offers free two-day shipping without an annual subscription fee, in contrast to Amazon Prime,” Sevitt added. “Nevertheless, Walmart is not realizing the full potential of affiliate shopping to bring consumers to discover this advantage.”
Amazon generated more than five-times the amount of traffic than Walmart. Moreover, traffic to Amazon was of higher quality, with visits averaging over 2.5 minutes longer, and taking in five more pages per visit than Walmart, according to “Amazon vs Walmart – The Battleground for Online Retail – Part I,” a study from SimilarWeb.
According to the data, both Amazon and Walmart have managed to maintain — and even improve — their share of traffic among the top 100 shopping sites in the United States. Both were up from a respective 29.6% and 5.3%, to 30.7% and 5.9%.
However, Amazon received around 20% of its U.S.-based traffic from referrals, while Walmart only saw 9% of its traffic come from this source. Looking at the shopping category as a whole, about 20% of online traffic comes from referrals. This indicates that Walmart is behind the curve on this front. Of the total volume of referrals that link to Amazon and Walmart online, 95% goes to Amazon.
Amazon’s advantage may be unsurprising, given the highly evolved nature and near-universal uptake of the online giant’s affiliate program, Amazon Associates. However, even when looking at sites where Walmart does well on referrals, the company’s share of referrals traffic is decreasing.
For example, nintendo.com sent 44.5% of its referral traffic to Walmart in April 2017, but by March 2018, that share was down to 28.6%. Slickdeals.net showed a similar trend, down from 17.2% in April 2017 to less than 1% in March 2018, data revealed.
“Amazon understands the paramount importance of partners. In building out its affiliate program, Amazon ensures that it offers appropriate rewards to referring sites that send traffic that converts into sales,” said Daniel Sevitt, content marketing manager at SimilarWeb.
“This is a part of their marketing mix which they continue to nurture and which continues to deliver a steady stream of primed-to-purchase consumers,” the study said.
While this is an underdeveloped source of traffic for Walmart, there are some aspects of shopping at walmart.com that are superior to the user experience at Amazon, according to the study.
“For example, Walmart offers free two-day shipping without an annual subscription fee, in contrast to Amazon Prime,” Sevitt added. “Nevertheless, Walmart is not realizing the full potential of affiliate shopping to bring consumers to discover this advantage.”