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BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Walmart is partnering with Roku Inc. on a push to turn the streaming TV service into a platform for e-commerce sales.
Walmart will be the exclusive retailer to enable streamers to purchase featured products fulfilled by Walmart directly on Roku, America’s #1 TV streaming platform, the companies said, adding that their approach takes shopping beyond the QR code and will change the way customers interact and shop TV and video content.
“We’re working to connect with customers where they are already spending time, shortening the distance from discovery and inspiration to purchase,” Walmart chief marketing officer William White said. “No one has cracked the code around video shoppability. By working with Roku, we’re the first to market retailer to bring customers a new shoppable experience and seamless checkout on the largest screen in their homes – their TV.”
The companies said that their partnership pairs two companies that well-positioned to make shopping via television work. Walmart is unmatched in the ability to evaluate customer behaviors and then scale commerce offerings to customers where and how they want to shop, including during moments of entertainment. Roku’s purpose-built advertising tech stack will bring all the benefits of streaming TV advertising – targeting, optimization, and measurement – to the commerce partnership. This first pilot program fuses entertainment with the transactional world of commerce, unlocking an innovative and inspiring in-platform buying experience for customers that will continue to evolve.
To make a purchase during a shoppable ad, viewers will simply press “OK” with their remote. They will be taken to a checkout screen with their payment details easily pre-populated from Roku Pay, Roku’s payments platform. From there, tapping “OK” on the Walmart checkout page places the order. A Walmart purchase confirmation is then emailed with shipping, return, and support information.
“We’re making shopping on TV as easy as it is on social,” said Peter Hamilton, Head of TV Commerce, Roku. “For years, streamers have purchased new Roku devices and signed up for millions of subscriptions with their Roku remote. Streaming commerce brings that same ease and convenience to marketers and shoppers.”
OneView, Roku’s ad-buying platform for TV streaming, will have the exclusive capability to activate and measure these shoppable ads. Additionally, marketers will be able to use Roku Brand Studio to design custom creative and branded content built for TV streaming and shopping.
Future iterations of this pilot will look for opportunities to build deeper commerce experiences that meet customers where they are.
More information about shoppable ads is available here.
