Walmart, Wayfair Discuss Producing Engaging Content to Drive Sales

Retail giant Walmart and marketplace Wayfair have both been investing in content creation to drive customer relationships and online sales. This has included creating short-form episodic romantic comedies while working with celebrities and influencers who share their favorite products to try out.

Speaking during ADWEEK’s Commerceweek event, Sarah Henry, vice president and head of content, influencer, and commerce for Walmart, and Alex Frias, head of integrated marketing at Wayfair, discussed how they were both using creators and influencers, as well as streaming platforms, to encourage product discovery.

And while physical retail is important to both (Wayfair plans to open its first store in Chicago in May), a focus on online presence is an obvious route to direct audiences to buy.

“We create these moments of product discovery based on what people know they need and what people may not have known they needed, but then can’t stop thinking about the need to have it right then,” explained Henry.

“For us, that includes enabling and empowering people to think about not just the Walmart that they travel to—a lot of people think about the Walmart that maybe is nearest in proximity to them that they get in their car and go and drive to,” she continued. “But they don’t necessarily think about the fact that the closest Walmart to them is actually in their pocket.”

Walmart works with tens of thousands of creators, Henry claimed, adding that follower size was no longer the most important aspect of partnerships, but more about trust factor and how those creators could help the business get its story out.

The retail giant cited GWI data that around 200 million American consumers are spending 2.5 hours per day on social media, and many are watching short clips of romantic comedies, which proved popular for family and friends to watch together during holidays.

In response, Walmart developed 23 episodes of its own short-form romantic comedy, which it released across social media channels and Roku last December.

Within that were over 300 items that could be bought through Walmart, bringing a whole new dimension to product placement.

Wayfair’s own content evolution

The current Wayfair content strategy aims to improve its storytelling to be helpful to consumers and change how they think of the brand, offering inspiration across its own channels while using partner and creator affiliate channels to amplify that messaging and drive commerce.

One creator partnership that the company has held in place for years is with singer and presenter Kelly Clarkson, who fronts the company’s television campaigns, while another more recent recruit has seen it partner with the perhaps surprising choice of DJ, rapper and producer Lil Jon at the start of this year in a pilot for a new series.

That content series, “I Love My ___,” is part of a new social-first series where creators and personalities declare their love for a product in their home that means a lot to them, driving viewers to potentially seek it out and buy it themselves through Wayfair.

Lil Jon chose his bar cart, which allowed Wayfair to curate a collection on its site, with the artist driving traffic to it through an affiliate link, helping generate upper-funnel awareness.

“We haven’t been known for that deep product storytelling,” admitted Frias of the marketplace. But its influencer partnerships are evolving, with an eye on injecting seasonality into its content output. He also revealed that the content series was produced without any great investment, while drawing on community and culture for engagement.

“Tapping influencers allows us to fast-track that piece of our business and be able to resonate with different segments or consumers through a seasonal lens, in addition to an evergreen standpoint,” he added. “Storytelling is a new muscle that we’re trying to build. So this allowed us to fast-track that.”

A new campaign is on the way featuring influencers and curated collections, Frias teased.