What we learned from marketplace sellers at Prosper Show 2026

At Prosper Show 2026, one theme surfaced repeatedly: While growth is still top of mind for Marketplace sellers, they’re prioritizing predictability and efficiency more than ever, with a continued emphasis on performance-driven outcomes.

Today, that often translates into a strong focus on bottom-of-the-funnel tactics like search. However, the retail media landscape is evolving, and sellers are looking to capture greater influence at the consideration stage, supported by diversified ad formats, stronger measurement frameworks, and emerging AI-driven tools to guide decision making.

Insights from our booth quiz, session polling and conversations on the show floor point to several themes shaping how sellers are approaching growth today.

1. Growth is still the priority, but sellers need predictability

Through our interactive booth quiz at Prosper Show, we asked attendees about their primary goals for the year.¹ The response was clear:

• 63% are focused on increasing sales
• 25% want to reach a new, wider audience

In the same quiz, when we asked what’s holding them back, a deeper challenge surfaced:

• 54% cited budget constraints
• 38% pointed to measuring ROAS or proving impact
• 25% said standing out in crowded categories

The implication: While budget constraints remain, sellers are willing to invest more when they have clear, reliable signals that build confidence in ROAS.

We shared how we’re building toward that clarity with a measurement roadmap designed to eventually give sellers greater visibility into:

• Growth forecasting: Estimating how much incremental revenue a given budget can drive, or what investment level is required to hit a specific target.
  
  
• Ad investment benchmarking: Comparing media investment against similar advertisers to better understand share, efficiency, and opportunity
  
  
• Customer lifetime value modeling: Quantifying the full revenue impact of newly acquired customers to guide acquisition decisions beyond immediate ROAS.

The takeaway: Growth isn’t just about access to media inventory, but also about confidence in the outcomes those investments can drive. Choosing a trusted retail media partner to gain all the necessary insights is key to success.

2. Diversification is building seller resilience

Sellers are thinking beyond a single marketplace and a single hero product.

During our Sponsored Search certification session, we polled attendees on whether they were running Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Videos in addition to Sponsored Products. Nearly half of respondents said they were already layering at least one additional format — a sign that sellers are moving beyond single-solution strategies and towards more full-funnel advertising approaches.

A pattern reinforced at Prosper: Many sellers start with high-intent formats like Sponsored Products to capture existing demand, then expand into additional formats as they gain confidence in performance.

Increasingly, AI-powered tools are accelerating this process — surfacing recommendations and performance signals faster, so sellers can identify opportunities and optimize campaigns in real time.

The same thinking also came through in conversations around assortment strategy. During the session, sellers asked how to determine which products are ready to scale versus when it’s time to pivot. Performance signals, such as underperforming keywords often provide those cues. With AI helping to analyze larger datasets quickly, these decisions can happen faster.

The takeaway: Diversification isn’t about being everywhere. It’s about reducing reliance on any single lever, whether that’s one marketplace, one ad format, or one product.

3. Retail readiness is moving from operational detail to media strategy

We also polled attendees on overall campaign troubleshooting confidence² and here's what we discovered:

• 17% very confident
• 53% somewhat confident
• 15% not confident
• 15% rely on an agency or partner

Many sellers are actively managing campaigns, but most are still building deeper optimization confidence. What’s changing is how sellers think about performance drivers. Increasingly, advertising outcomes are being evaluated alongside retail fundamentals like listing quality, inventory availability, and fulfillment speed.

Across conversations at Prosper, sellers recognized that fulfillment reliability and fast delivery influence not only shopper trust but also advertising efficiency.

Fast delivery signals and fulfillment reliability increase shopper confidence, and stronger conversion rates make every advertising dollar work harder.

The broader takeaway was that, as retail media matures, media performance and retail fundamentals are becoming inseparable. Sellers who optimize both simultaneously are better positioned to turn ad spend into profitable growth.

The strongest signal from Prosper

Sellers aren’t debating whether retail media works. They’re asking how to make it work better for their business.

The sellers who grow fastest in 2026 will be the ones who combine strong performance foundations with expanded strategies across the funnel, using AI-driven insights to guide smarter investment decisions. To learn more about how to apply these strategies, explore Walmart Connect’s solutions and resources.  

Sources: ¹Walmart Connect’s Prosper Show Booth Quiz, March 2026. ²Walmart Connect’s Prosper Show Sponsored Search Certification Course, March 2026.