Walmart Seller Analytics: What to Track

Walmart seller analytics should answer one question first: after everything Walmart takes, what did I keep? A sales total from Seller Center is a starting point, not an answer.

The costs behind a Walmart sale

• Referral fee, charged as a percentage of the sale and set by category
• WFS fulfilment, if you use Walmart Fulfillment Services for pick, pack and ship
• Advertising spend behind the specific sale
• Refunds and returns, allocated to the product returned
• Your own product cost and any operating costs

On a worked £24.99 sale, a 15% referral fee takes £3.75, WFS fulfilment £4.20 and ads plus return allocation £3.00. That is £10.95 gone before cost of goods is counted. Your own figures will differ, which is the reason to measure them.

What to track every week

• Net profit and margin per SKU, sorted from worst to best
• Referral fee and WFS fulfilment as separate lines, so you can see which one moves
• Ad spend against sales, by campaign
• Refund rate by product
• Stock levels against sales velocity, so stock issues show up before a stockout

Compare Walmart with your other channels

The useful view is Walmart next to Amazon, eBay and your own store, on net margin. If Walmart earns less per order than the others, that may justify different pricing or a smaller range there. If it earns more, it may deserve more of your stock and effort.

An example

On a £24.99 sale: referral fee £3.75, WFS fulfilment £4.20, ads and return allocation £3.00. Together that is £10.95, or about 44% of the sale, before cost of goods. On a product costing £9, what remains is £5.04. If you saw only the sales total, you would not know.

What is WFS?

Walmart Fulfillment Services is Walmart's programme where it picks, packs and ships orders for sellers, for a fee. Seller Center has the current details.

How is Walmart different from Amazon for analytics?

The structure is similar, with referral fees, optional fulfilment, ads and returns, but the rates and reports differ. That is why comparing them on net margin matters.

Do I need a US entity to sell on Walmart?

Walmart's seller requirements are set by Walmart and change over time, so check Seller Center. We only cover the profit side.

WhatSales connects to your Walmart Seller Center account and rebuilds every order into a profit figure, so Walmart sits in one dashboard with every other channel. See /integrations/walmart for how it works, and /profitability for the wider view.