Drive more sales during high-traffic seasonal moments
The successful advertiser playbook for making the most of your seasonal moments, from Black Friday to Back to School.
Plan for your biggest shopping moments
Increased traffic. Heightened competition. Compressed timelines. Peak seasons create some of the biggest opportunities of the year, but success takes more than offering a great deal. Pairing competitive pricing with a strong advertising strategy helps capture demand when it matters most.
Prepare in the pre-season
Get your products, keywords and campaigns ready before high-impact seasonal moments hit.
Get retail ready
Build a strong foundation for conversion with quality listings, competitive pricing and fast, reliable shipping. Walmart Fulfillment Services can help you meet expectations with Two-day and One-day delivery.
Broaden keyword mix
Customers search differently for seasonal moments. Expand your keyword coverage to capture more searches with seasonal intent.
Launch campaigns early
Give your campaigns at least four weeks to build search relevance before peak traffic. Holiday shopping begins in October, so it's important to start as early as possible to follow customer demand signals.
Marketplace sellers who enrolled in Holiday events, ran Sponsored Search campaigns and leveraged WFS averaged a 5.5x increase in unit sales compared to sellers who leveraged WFS alone.1
Amplify the peak
Layer on additional customer touchpoints and heavy-up on top performers.
Double down on top performers
Launch manual campaigns built on top-performing keywords and items to help maximize visibility when demand is highest.
Capture the browse, better
Onsite Display helps reach customers as they browse the Walmart site and app, building consideration for your products before they begin searching.
Reach high-intent customers
Expand with Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Videos to capture active demand and increase your visibility across more touchpoints.
Omnichannel expansion
Activate in-store during high-traffic moments to engage with shoppers as they browse and buy. Make sure to align your online messaging with offline discovery moments for a consistent brand presence.
Four steps to optimize for seasonal success
1
Pulse-check performance
Peak season is a limited window. Monitor campaign performance daily to stay on top of trends, spot unexpected changes and quickly troubleshoot potential issues.
2
Stay flexible
Use last season's performance as your baseline, but be ready to adjust your budget as demand changes — from campaigns that cap out early to surprise bestsellers.
3
Optimize with data
Leverage campaign insights to identify your top-performing products and keywords, then adjust bids, budgets, and targeting to maximize results throughout the remaining seasonal weeks.
4
Extend momentum
Keep your campaigns running one to two weeks after the season ends to capture incremental demand before returning to your always-on baseline.
Source: 1Walmart first-party data, November 14 and December 1, 2025 (as of July 2026); Includes an aggregated conversion rate from Holiday Events held between November 14 and December 1, 2025 which includes Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Walmart Deals Event Days. Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS) refers to items that are fulfilled by Walmart. Sponsored Search includes Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Videos. Due to seasonality, results may vary over a different period of time. Past performance does not guarantee future results.