core week 1 day 1

CORE WEEK 1

Facilitator Guide DAY 1

Core Week 1 – Day 1

Page | 2 Facilitator Guide

Table of Contents Preparation ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 3

Welcome! ............................................................................................................................................................................................ 4

Sam Walton ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 6

The Future .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 9

What’s Your Impact? .................................................................................................................................................................... 12

Customer Decision Tree ............................................................................................................................................................ 17

CVI Sales Channels ...................................................................................................................................................................... 20

Daily Recap ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 24



Preparation

Goal The goal of this week is to introduce the participants to the core functions of their new job.

Before Class • Check to see if the class can log into the following tools: • FlightDeck • Thoughtspot • CVI Dashboard • Looker (Walmart Version) • Meet/Beat Report



Welcome! Time: 30 minutes Purpose: Understand the purpose of the course.

Introduction

Welcome participants to the Category Specialist Core Week.

• This week is all about setting them up with the tools and knowledge to successfully drive their categories.

• Introduce yourself. • Introduce the Ice Breaker Activity.

Ice Breaker Activity

Goal: Introduce participants to each other. Directions: • Have participants share their:

• Name • Category • Something interesting about themselves

• Ask the following questions and have participants share their responses with the class: • If you could pick up a new skill in an instant what would it be? • What’s something you want to do in the next year that you’ve

never done before? • What’s the most challenging experience you’ve had so far? • What was challenging about it? • How did you tackle it?

Course Overview/Structure

The purpose of this week is to teach the core functions of their job. • Briefly cover some of the topics that will be discussed this

week: • Business intelligence • Customer decision tree • Tools • Retail math

Explain how to evaluate your business and understand how your customers shop your category in order to maximize the Customer Value Index (CVI). • Describe how informed decisions add value to their

categories and service to their customer. • Briefly describe the lifecycle of an item



Wrap-Up Key Message: This class won’t teach them everything but will prepare them to look at their business and the resources to help them discover answers.



Sam Walton Time: 30 minutes Purpose: Understand where Walmart came from.

Mr. Sam

Summarize the following for the participants: • Walmart as we know it today evolved from Sam Walton’s goals

for great value and great customer service. “Mr. Sam,” as he was known, believed in leadership through service. This belief that true leadership depends on willing service was the principle on which Walmart was built, and drove the decisions the company has made for the past 50 years. So much of Walmart’s history is tied to the story of Sam Walton himself, and so much of our future will be rooted in Mr. Sam’s principles.

• In 1945, Sam and his wife, Helen, moved to Iowa and then to Newport, Arkansas. During this time, Sam gained early retail experience, eventually operating his own Ben Franklin variety store. This eventually became the Walton’s 5-10 (Five and Dime).

The Road to Walmart

Briefly review Walmart’s history from the 1960’s to present: 1960’s

• Sam Walton opens the first Walmart store in Rogers, Arkansas.

• 24 stores, $12.7 million in sales. • Incorporates as Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

1970’s • Becomes a publicly traded company sold at $16.50 per

share. • 51 stores, $78 million in sales.

1980’s • 276 stores, 21,000 associates, $1 billion in sales. • Replaces cash registers with computerized point-of-sale

systems, enabling fast and accurate checkout. • Installs the largest private satellite communication system in

the U.S., linking the company's operations through voice, data and video communication.

1990’s

• Goes global. • Employs 371,000 associates in 1,928 stores and clubs.



• Celebrates its first $1 billion sales week and $100 billion sales year.

2000’s

• Walmart.com is founded. • 1.1 million associates in 3,989 stores and clubs worldwide. • Makes a commitment to environmental sustainability, zero

waste, renewable energy and sell products that sustain people and the environment. Walmart.com launches its Site to Store service.

• Exceeds $400 billion in annual sales.

2010’s • Over 11,000 stores in over 20 countries • Commits to buying $250 billion in goods manufactured in

the United States over the next 10 years. • Acquires Moosejaw, ModCloth, Bonobos, Parcel, Jet, and

Shoes.com.

Changing the Face of Retail

Briefly review Walmart’s approach to changing retail: • Sam credited the rapid growth of Walmart not just to the low

costs that attracted his customers, but also to his associates. • Sam shared his vision for the company with associates and made

them partners in the success of the company. • In addition to bringing new approaches and technologies to

retail, he also experimented with new store formats—including Sam's Clubs, Walmart Supercenters, and smaller format stores.

10 Rules for Building a Better Business

Briefly review Sam’s 10 Rules: • Commit to your business. • Share your profits with all your associates and treat them

as partners. • Motivate your partners. • Communicate everything you possibly can to your partners. • Appreciate everything your associates do for the business. • Celebrate your success. • Listen to everyone in your company. • Exceed your customers’ expectations. • Control your expenses better than your competition. • Swim upstream. Ask the participants to share their thoughts on how each one can be applied to their role.



Walmart by the Numbers Activity

Goal: Reinforce the magnitude of Walmart’s impact through a quiz. Directions: • Have participants look at the slide with the numbers on it. • Have them guess which number corresponds to each of the

following statements (answers are in parenthesis): • __ million Walmart associates around the world (2.2) • __ billion dollars in total revenue last year (500.3) • __ billion dollars from Walmart eCommerce last year (11.5) • __ million customers per week (270) • __ countries we operate in (28) • __ states where Walmart is largest private employer (22)

Why Does it Matter? Activity

Goal: Link the history and success of Walmart to the present and future. Directions: • Generate a discussion around the following questions: • What elements of Walmart’s history are relevant to you now? • Why? • How do you Walmart’s past will affect your customers? • Why?



The Future Time: 1 hour Purpose: Assess where Walmart is now and where it’s going.

Introduction

Ask the class the following: • What do you think of Walmart today? • What might be the perception about Walmart that they might

have to overcome? • Why do we need to change?

• To keep up with our competitors both in stores and online. Mention that they are an advocate not only for their business but the company.

Doug McMillon

Briefly provide some background on Doug McMillon, the CEO of Wal-Mart, Inc.: • In 1984, he started out as an hourly summer associate in a

Walmart distribution center. • In 1990, while pursuing his MBA, he rejoined the company as

an assistant manager in a Tulsa, Okla., Walmart store before moving to merchandising.

• In 2005, he was promoted to president and CEO of Sam’s Club.

• In 2009, he was promoted to head of Walmart International. • In 2014, he became the CEO of Wal-Mart, Inc. and set a

long-term goal to increase investments in Walmart’s eCommerce business.

Marc Lore

Briefly provide some background on Marc Lore, the CEO of Walmart eCommerce: • Co-founder and CEO of Quidsi, parent company Diapers.com,

Soap.com, Wag.com and more • Co-founded Jet.com in 2014 • Jet.com purchased by Walmart in 2016 • Made CEO of Walmart eCommerce in 2016



Technology in Our Stores

Briefly review some of the new technologies in our stores: • Walmart is now investing in technologies to improve our Supply

Chain such as adoption of autonomous vehicles, faster loading and unloading process.

• Store No. 8 is our incubator testing out new technology to support our stores.

• Technologies in our stores such as robots that autonomously clean floors and help associates to identify outs on the shelf so it can be filled for the customer.

• Show participants video of robot floor scrubber - https://youtu.be/rcMCFe6XVC0

• Show participants Walmart News Highlight Reel video Discuss how the store experience impacts the participants’ role.

Future of Retail

Generate a brief discussion around the following: • Where do you buy the bulk of your goods? Online or in stores? • Why do you choose that method? Mention some of the companies Walmart acquires such as Moosejaw, ModCloth, Bonobos, Parcel, Jet and, Shoes.com. Emphasize that our growth in eCommerce is growing fast and we need to deliver a seamless omnichannel experience. Review some of the digital trends: • 174 Million Americans shopped during the 5 days (Thanksgiving

through Cyber Monday) • ~$58.37B in sales based on an average spend of $335 • $251 of that spend was on holiday gifts

• Digitally enabled sales in the US will reach at least $800+ billion by 2025

Are you the Oracle? Activity

Goal: Start thinking about the future of retail. Directions: • Have participants think about their view on the future of retail • Have them plan an elevator speech (1-2 min) they’d deliver to

Doug McMillon if they had the chance. • Have them deliver their speech to the class • Discuss the thoughts and ideas that were mentioned by the

participants. What was similar? What was unique?



Wrap-Up Briefly review the importance of staying competitive and adaptive. • We stock around 67 million items and we are actively investing in the eCommerce side of

business to boost transactions and deliver excellent customer service – both online and in-store. • Stay competitive and adaptive to stay one step ahead of the competition. • Change and innovate in stores and online.



What’s Your Impact?

Time: 1.5 hours Purpose: Recognize how their role can impact many parts of the customer experience.

Introduction

There are many things a category specialist can impact. Some of them are more tangible than others. Encourage a discussion around these questions: • How can you impact the customer experience? • What elements are out of your control? Why? • Are they really out of your control? What could you do to

control them?

Customer Value Index (CVI)

Briefly describe CVI and mention the 5 ITs: • Have It • Find It • Display It • Price It • Deliver It Explain how CVI is calculated and how it correlates to Gross Merchandise Value (GMV). Briefly review the CVI dashboard. Show the participants where the CVI dashboard is and how it is used.

Teach It Activity

Goal: Learn about the 5 ITs and understand how they can impact them. Directions: • Break the participants into five groups. • Assign each group an IT to research from Confluence Page –

CVI & The 5 ITs: • Have It • Find It • Display It • Price It • Deliver It

• Have them identify: • What it measures • Score description • How it is measured • What they can do to improve it



• Have each group teach their IT back to the class. • Facilitate discussions around each of the ITs. Ensure the following is covered during the discussions: Have It:

• Do we offer the right assortment? • What does it measure?

• Have It measures how good a job we did last week or last month at getting our assortment right. Amazon's top selling items are used as the yardstick for what is considered the right assortment, given they are the eCommerce market leader. This data is provided by market data partners and forms the basis of Have It and all other IT scores. The list is not fixed and will change as shopping patterns do. Currently the top 100k selling items are used for CVI scores

• Score description: • % of days in the measurement week or month the Top

100k were buyable on Walmart • How is it measured?

• Each item from to the Top 100k list we have in catalogue from the top 100k list is given a score according to the % of days in the measurement week/month that an item was buyable (published & in stock). So if an item was in buyable for 30 days out of a month, it's score would be 100%. Any items we do not have in catalogue count as 0% in the calculation. Retail brands are measured individually i.e. Jet items will not count in the Walmart brand score. 1P and 3P items are considered. And items must be available for STH. These scores are combined and divided by the full 100k to create an overall score . Have It is therefore is item weighted.

Find It:

• Is our assortment easy to discover? • What does it measure?

• Find It measures how discoverable the top 100k items we have are. The scores measures organic search relevance when the shopper intent is both item specific and non-item specific

• Score description: • % of found items from the Top 100k Have It

Walmart items • How is it measured?

• Find It is generated by real-life shoppers and is sample based. Shoppers are shown an item on Amazon's site,



asked to focus on the product imagery and then requested to create and enter a search string on Walmart.com. Shoppers must find an exact match in the search results page and an item is only considered 'found' if it is discovered within 2 searches and appears in the first 20 search results. Because the score is created by real-life shoppers, it is sample based so to ensure you have the granular data you need to improve your category's score, additional tactical tools have been created to help you do this.

Display It:

• Do we have sufficient content? • What does it measure?

• Display It measures if our display page content on the Top 100k items we have and that are discoverable provide sufficient information for shoppers to make a purchase decision

• Score description: • % of found item pages rated as having sufficient

information • How is it measured?

• Similarly to Find It, Display It's score is generated by real-life shoppers. The rating is opinion-based. Shoppers provide a 'yes' or 'no' answer to the following question 'Did Walmart's product page contain enough information, photos, etc. to make a purchasing decision?' As with Find It, Display It is sample based so to ensure you have the granular data you need to improve your category's Display score additional tools tactical tools have been created to help you do this.

Price It:

• Are we competitive with Amazon's price? • What does it measure?

• Price It measures our daily price competitiveness vs. Amazon on the Top 100k Have It Walmart items. Because our price competitiveness changes frequently, the Price It score is an aggregated figure according to how competitive we were at the times when most shoppers were viewing our prices and potentially making comparisons to Amazon

• Score description: • % of days in the measurement week or month the Top

100k Have It Walmart item prices meet or beat Amazon's price



• How is it measured? • Amazon's “buybox” price (the main price displayed on

Amazon's item page) is crawled (the page's data is downloaded, stored and made available to us to analyse) at several points during the day. Our buy box price is compared to Amazon's buy box price which typically means the cheapest price on both sites is compared regardless if it is 1P or 3P. Each Have It Walmart item from the Top 100k is given a daily meet, beat or lose value. Similarly to Have It, every item given a % score for the days in the measurement week / month where we either meet or beat Amazon's price. For example, if we beat Amazon's price for 30 days out of a month, the item's score is 100%. Similarly if we meet Amazon's price for 30 days out of the measurement month, the item's score is 100%. The score for every Have It Walmart item from the Top 100k is then combined to create an overall score. Price It is therefore item weighted.

Deliver It:

• Do we deliver quickly and on time? • What does it measure?

• Deliver It measures how quickly and how reliably we Deliver items from the Top 100k. It considers both the promise we make and whether or not we actually deliver to that promise because, to win the sale and to encourage customer retention, we need to perform strongly on both. Calendar rather than business days are used in the calculation as customer expectation is that weekend deliveries should be an option. Deliver It measures the actual experience of our shoppers on the Top 100k items sold on our site

• Score description: • % of UNITS sold from the Top 100k items that are

promised and delivered ≤2 CALENDAR days • How is it measured?

• Every unit Walmart sells from the Top 100k item list is considered for Deliver It. In the vast majority of cases units must be promised AND delivered in ≤2 CALENDAR days for us to be given credit for it. For example units ordered Monday must be delivered by Wednesday for them to be counted in our favor. No order cut of time is factored into the calculation. In a minority of instances the delivery promise threshold used in the calculation is >2 calendar days. This occurs whenever a) we do not promise 2 calendar days and b)



when Amazon does not promise 2 calendar days. On these occasions the most common Amazon delivery promise for items in the relevant sub category is then used as the delivery duration threshold. For example, if Amazon is promising to deliver office furniture in ≤3 CALENDAR days then we must also promise and Deliver Items from this sub cat ≤3 CALENDAR days. Unit level delivery performance on the Top 100k items is then combined to create an overall score. Deliver It is therefore unit sales weighted.

Wrap-Up Briefly review the content and emphasize that the participants not only own the different components but also the entire item lifecycle end to end.



Customer Decision Tree Time: 1.5 hours Purpose: Analyze how their customer shops.

Introduction

Ask the class the following: • Why is it important to know our customers?

• We can predict their spending habits so we can sell them what they need how they want to shop for it.

• What is a customer decision tree? • Tells us how our customer shops for any intended category.

Customer Decision Tree

The customer decision tree starts with the customer. Expand and elaborate on the different aspects of the decision tree Information • Media, internet, research, consulting, word of mouth Need • Anticipated, immediate, desire Channel • Online, in-store, other Planning • Planned vs impulse Shopping • Browsing, Trying things on, Window Shopping Buying • In-store, online, phone, text, voice activated device, other Post Purchase • Reviews, Warranty, Return, Gift receipt, financing,

other service



Customer Decision Tree Activity

Goal: Practice developing decision trees. Directions: • Split the participants into three groups. • Assign each group one of the following shopping situations:

• A college student buying an outfit for a job interview. • A mom with 3 sons buying a video game birthday present

for her 13-year-old middle son. • A newlywed couple living in Manhattan buying a new bed

for their new apartment. • Have them discuss and create a customer decision tree for

their assigned shopping situation: • Start with how they would shop in situation. • Then consider whether the journey would be same for

their mom/dad, sister/brother, niece/nephew, best friend, etc.

• Adjust the customer decision tree to meet different branches that may occur.

• Use resources available (i.e., laptops). • Look at walmart.com and amazon.com to see how websites

guide purchase decision they’ve been given. • Have each group give a brief presentation on their group’s

decision tree and have the other participants discuss the presenting group’s choices.

• Utilize discussion questions: • What are some additional ideas you can suggest that came

to mind as you listened to the presenter? • What are some things that you weren’t 100% clear on

when listening to the presenter? • What are things you heard that were different, yet

applicable to your own work?

Category Specific Decision Tree Activity

Goal: Practice developing decision trees. Directions: • Have the participants work individually to prepare customer

decision trees for their category. • Have them prepare one based on a Walmart customer persona

and another for JET/Hayneedle/Moosejaw primary customer persona.

• Ensure they identify their customer’s traits in addition to their decision tree.

• Have each participant share their trees with the class. • As they are sharing have the other participants listen and discuss

their thoughts.



Wrap-Up Review the content and explain that if their category isn’t going well, they can track the issue to one of the areas outlined in the customer decision tree. It may be brand perception but a lot of reasons why a category isn’t selling are well within their control.



CVI Sales Channels

Time: 1 hour Purpose: Understand how we deliver on CVI.

Introduction

There are several ways that we get a product to a customer: the “Channels”. They also reflect how customers like to shop with us. Generate a discussion around the following question: • What are some of the ways we get product to our customers?

Channels

Briefly describe the different channels and have the participants fill in the blanks in their Participant Guide: 1P – eCommerce inventory

• Owned Items • Carried in eCommerce Fulfillment Center’s (FC) and

replenished by Walmart.com Supply Chain team. Walmart.com is the seller of record

• DSV Items (Drop Ship Vendor) • Carried by drop ship vendors, or more commonly,

distributors. • Walmart.com is the seller of record

Web Initiated - Store inventory

• Ship From Store (SFS) Items • Carried in store warehouse and replenished by Walmart

store Supply Chain team. Walmart store is the seller of record

• Put Up Today (PUT) Items • Carried in store warehouse and replenished by Walmart

store Supply Chain team. Walmart store is the seller of record

3P – Marketplace inventory

• Marketplace Vendors/Sellers/Merchants (MP) • We collect a commission on the sales transacted on

our websites.



Owned, DSV, Marketplace

Highlight the differences between Owned, DSV, and Marketplace: Owned

• Fulfilled directly by Walmart • Walmart owns and manages inventory • Walmart manages retail pricing • Walmart is paid cost in a batched process net 90 days • Walmart pays for shipping • Walmart handles returns and customer support • Supplier pay for returns/destroy

DSV

• Fulfilled directly by DSV • DSV owns and manages inventory • Walmart manages retail pricing • DSV is paid cost after order is shipped net 30 days • Walmart pays for shipping • Walmart handles returns and customer support • DSV pays for returns/destroy

Marketplace

• Seller fulfills directly to customer • Seller owns and manages inventory • Seller manages retail pricing • Seller is paid net profit every two weeks or weekly • Seller pays for shipping • Seller handles returns and customer support

What Channel Works Best for Our Business?

Highlight the benefits of Owned, DSV, and Marketpalce: Owned • Fulfilled in two-day shipping • Protect sales • Control over supply chain • Set pricing to be competitive • Preferred method for consumables and low Price Items as

we can ship together from same FC • High velocity items

DSV

• No inventory risk • Lose inventory control & insights • Can still set competitive retail pricing • Better for bulky or non-sortable items that cannot be

shipped with others • DSV pays for returns/destroy



• Takes pressure off DSV for high velocity Marketplace

• Great for items we cannot profitably ship • ~15% margins guaranteed • No insight into supply chain • Not guaranteed to be competitive as seller sets pricing • Sometimes poor customer experience • Not shipped & sold by Walmart • Seller handles returns and customer support

Customer Experience View

Review how these channels look from a customer’s perspective: Home experience

• 1P Site to Home (S2H) – Owned or DSV • Web-Initiated Ship From Store (SFS) • 3P Marketplace (MP)

Store experience

• 1P Site to Store (S2S) Owned or DSV • Web-Initiated Pick Up Today (PUT)

Typically, we deliver product to customers in Two Channel or Five Channel sales methods.

• Two Channel includes S2H and S2S • Five Channel includes two channels plus SFS, PUT,

Marketplace Each channel has differences in how Walmart eCommerce gets credit for the sale. Emphasize that we always need to be advocates for our customer.

Customer Channel Activity

Goal: Determine how your customer would best utilize the different sales channels. Directions: • Have participants go back to their customer decision tree and

determine how their customer would best utilize these sales channels.

• Have the participants share why they think their customer would utilize each of the different sales channels.

• Facilitate a discussion around their findings.



Wrap-Up Briefly review the content and emphasize that understanding the different channels we have and what our customers prefer for specific categories can help us focus our attention on them and maximize profits in that category.



Daily Recap Time: 15 minutes Purpose: Review the day’s content and preview tomorrow’s content.

Content Recap

Have the participants discuss the key points from each of the sections covered using the following questions: Who was Mr. Sam and what was his approach to business?

• Sam Walton started Walmart with the mindset of keeping the prices as low as possible and keeping the customer the main focus of our business.

How is Walmart preparing for the future of retail?

• Investing in new technologies in our stores, supply chain, and approaches to eCommerce

What is CVI and how is it calculated?

• Customer Value Index (CVI) is calculated by multiplying the 5 ITs.

What are the 5 ITs and what do they mean?

• Have It - Do we offer the right assortment? • Find It - Is our assortment easy to discover? • Display It - Do we have sufficient content? • Price It - Are we competitive with Amazon's price? • Deliver It - Do we deliver quickly and on time?

What are the CVI sales channel?

• Ship to Home (S2H) • Ship to Store (S2S) • Ship from Store (SFS) • Pick Up Today (PUT) • Marketplace

What are the areas of the Customer Decision Tree?

• Information • Media, internet, research, consulting, word of mouth

• Need • Anticipated, immediate, desire

• Channel • Online, in-store, other

• Planning • Planned vs impulse

• Shopping • Browsing, Trying things on, Window Shopping



• Buying • In-store, online, phone, text, voice-activated device,

other

• Post Purchase • Reviews, Warranty, Return, Gift receipt, financing,

other service.

Preview of Tomorrow

Tomorrow will start with a quiz to reinforce today’s learning. Have the participants take some time to review today’s content and come prepared with any questions they may have. Review tomorrow topics: • How to calculate various components of Retail Math • Where you can find resources and tools • How to use FlightDeck • How to pull reports and utilize ThoughtSpot • Deep dive on the Have It score, its impact, and how equivalent

SKUs are impacting it

CORE WEEK 1




Table of Contents Preparation ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 28

Welcome to Day 2! ....................................................................................................................................................................... 29

Retail Math ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 31

Tools Overview .............................................................................................................................................................................. 36

FlightDeck 101 ................................................................................................................................................................................. 38

ThoughtSpot 101 ............................................................................................................................................................................ 41

Have It ............................................................................................................................................................................................... 44

Have It – Brand List vs. SKU List ............................................................................................................................................ 47

Have It – Equivalent SKU Set (ESS) .................................................................................................................................... 49

Daily Recap ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 51



Preparation Goal Introduce the participants to the core functions of their new job.

Before Class Check to see if the class can log into the following tools: • iSAM • Smart Pricing • ThoughtSpot • FlightDeck • CVI Dashboard



Welcome to Day 2! Time: 15 minutes Purpose: Understand the agenda for the day.

Introduction

Review key content of what was covered the previous day.

Quiz Activity

Goal: Review key points discussed in Day 1. Directions: Have the participants answer key points from each of the sections covered yesterday. Who was Mr. Sam and what was his approach to business? • Sam Walton started Walmart with the mindset of keeping the

prices as low as possible and keeping the customer the main focus of our business.

How is Walmart preparing for the future of retail? • We are investing in new technologies in our stores, supply

chain, and approaches to eCommerce. What is CVI and how is it calculated? • Customer Value Index (CVI) is our strategy and the

fundamentals of eCommerce shopping. It is calculated by multiplying the five ITs.

What are the five ITs and what do they mean? • Have It - Do we offer the right assortment? • Find It - Is our assortment easy to discover? • Display It - Do we have enough content? • Price It - Are we competitive with Amazon's price? • Deliver It - Do we deliver quickly and on time? What are the CVI sales channels, and how does credit get distributed? • Ship to Home (S2H) – Walmart.com (US eCommerce) gets

credit for 100% of the sale. • Ship to Store (S2S) – Walmart.com (US eCommerce) gets

credit for 100% of the sale. • Ship from Store (SFS) – Walmart.com (US eCommerce) gets

credit towards 5-channel GMV, but not towards profit.



• Pick Up Today (PUT) – Walmart.com (US eCommerce) gets credit towards 5-channel GMV, but not towards profit.

• Marketplace – Walmart.com (US eCommerce) collects a commission on the sale of the product/item.

What are the areas of the Customer Decision Tree? • Information

• Media, internet, research, consulting, word of mouth • Need

• Anticipated, immediate, desire • Channel

• Online, in-store, other • Planning

• Planned vs. impulse • Shopping

• Browsing, trying things on, window shopping • Buying

• In-store, online, phone, text, voice activated device, other • Post Purchase

• Reviews, warranty, return, gift receipt, financing, other service.

How is the way you shop different from how your customer does? How do you need to think differently about your category?

• Have an open discussion about this point with the participants.

Today’s Agenda

Discussion of the following tools and concepts need to become category leaders: • How to calculate various components of retail math • Where to find resources and tools • How to use FlightDeck • How to pull reports and utilize ThoughtSpot • How to define the Have It score, its impact, and how

equivalent SKUs are impacting it

Wrap Up Verify there are no outstanding questions.



Retail Math Time: 2 hours Purpose: Demonstrate how to calculate various components of retail math.

Introduction

Understanding the math behind how we price and sell our goods is an important first step in maximizing your category’s performance. Discussion:

• What are some of the financial components that you think affect our business?

Components that Affect Our Business

Briefly review the following concepts, and have participants share their thoughts on each concept: • Revenue – Sales of product on site • Marketplace Commission – Percentage of sales and vary by

category • Supplier Funding – Co-op: dollars provided by the supplier to run

promotions or advertising funding for site placement • Product Cost – Cost of goods sold (COGS): Cost charged by the

supplier for products we buy from them or “Price” by the supplier • Variable Fulfillment – A fixed number from the FCs

• Owned – Receiving, pick and pack, warehouse storage cost, credit card fees

• DSV – Percentage already built into the cost – DSV cost is normally higher than owned

• Shipping Expense – What it costs us to ship to the customer • Customer Service Cost – Normally a percentage of the overall

cost that’s spread across the board at category level

Key Performance Indicators

Explain some Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to the participants: GMV – Gross Merchandise Volume • Total sales value of merchandise sold including web-initiated sales

and marketplace • GMV is a measure of total transaction volume on our site,

regardless of inventory ownership • Most departments track this over anything else – discuss with

participants why this is the case



Revenue • Net Sales – Income from the sale of products on our site less

returns, 2 channel ONLY • Marketplace Commissions – Commissions from sale of third-

party products • ADs Revenue – Supplier dollars for selling ad space on the site Cost • Product Cost – Cost charged by supplier for products that we

purchase and sell • Co-Op – Supplier dollars collected for item promos (e.g., price

promotions, markdowns) • Shipping Cost – Cost of shipping packages to the customer-

specified location Expense • Variable Fulfillment Expenses – Cost associated with warehouse

labor for product receiving, picking and packing, as well as credit card fees

• Customer Service – Cost of customer care operations involving answering calls and appeasements

Product Margin $ (IMU$) • = Revenue – Product Cost • 2 channel only Product Margin% (IMU%) • = IMU$ / Revenue IM% • = (IMU$ + Co-Op$) / Revenue Shipped Profit % • = (Revenue – Product Cost – Shipping Cost) / Revenue Contribution Profit % • = (Revenue – COGS + Co-Op + Shipping Revenue – Shipping

Cost – Var Exp) / Revenue



Profit Scenario Modeler

Briefly explain to participants how profit scenarios can be calculated using Excel. Walk participants through an example using Gillette Shavers. Be sure to point out the following: • In this example, we see Gillette Shavers. • The first column is our current setup and columns A, B, and C

are different proposed adjustments. • In column A, we’re looking at the impact of raising the retail

price. As you can see this does improve the CP$ by $0.99 and CP% by 2.8%.

• In column B, we’re looking at the effects of asking the vendor to lower cost by $0.86. This also improves the CP$ and CP%.

• In column C, we negotiate a Co-Op of $1.00. This also improves the CP$ and CP%.

Adjusting the retail price produces the largest increase in CP$ and CP%. Ask the participants what this change assumes and develop a discussion around their answers. • It assumes that customers will continue to buy the product at

the higher retail price • There are several ways you can adjust the profit of an item, but

it is not always as straightforward as it may appear.

Order Metrics

Briefly explain the following order: AOV – Average Order Value • = revenue / orders • *also can be reported in GMV terms AUR - Average Unit Retail • = 2CH sales / units • *can be 4CH as well ASP - Average Sales Price • = GMV / units Units per order • = units / orders • = AOV / AUR



Supply Chain Metrics

Briefly explain the following Supply Chain Metrics: DOH - Days on Hand • = Units of available inventory / average daily sales last X days • *(typically last 30 days) DOS - Days of Supply • = Units of available inventory / expected daily sales forecast

next X days • *(typically last 30 days) In-stock rate (velocity weighted) • = Sum (UnitsSoldi x SkuInStocki) / Sum (UnitsSoldi) • *(typically last 30 days)

Math Class Activity

Goal: Practice doing the calculations. Directions: Have the participants work individually to create an Excel table based on the following information: Item: Sprockets • Price/Retail: $56.19 • Cost: $48.88 • Co-Op: $0.00 • Shipping Rev: $0 • Fulfillment Cost/Unit: $5.12 • Shipping Cost/Unit: $3.55 • CSA/Unit: $1.25 Ask the participants to calculate the following metrics: • PM/IMU $ • PM/IMU% • IM$ • IM% • CP$ • CP% Ask the participants to make three columns, each column with a different variable: • Column A – Price/Retail changed to $58 • Column B – Cost changed to $46.02 • Column C – Co-Op changed to $5 Have the participants compare their answers against the solution. Generate a discussion around the effects of making these changes and their potential impact on the customer.



Assessment Time Activity

Goal: Gauge your comprehension of key retail math terminologies. Directions: • Have the participants download the Excel file from the Day 2

In-Class Materials labeled “Retail Math Assessment”. • Allow them 45 minutes to work with others or by themselves to

complete the assessment and upload it to the Day 2 Assignments folder for review.

Wrap Up • There are several factors we can adjust to maximize profit. • Remember that some of these changes, like increasing the retail price, may impact the overall

performance of the item.



Tools Overview Time: 30 minutes Purpose: Identify where resources for tools are located.

Introduction

Ask the participants: What are the tools you need to be effective in your new role? • Note that answers may vary. • Explain to participants that there are various systems we refer

to as “Tools” to do their job.

My Tools

Review some of the tools participants may need: https://launch.walmart.com will be the landing page for accessing all tools iSam

• A catalog item setup and management tool Smart Pricing

• Allows merchants and buyers to set pricing for their items • Used to manage prices and set promotions, and determine

how long the promotion should run for • Buy Box

ThoughtSpot

• An analytics platform that allows you to analyze sales, product, vendor data, and more

• The main point of business intelligence • Can pull a variety of reports for different applications of

business analytics • This will be reviewed in more detail later today

FlightDeck

• A collection of actionable metrics for evaluating category performance

• This will be reviewed in more detail later today



Access Your Tools Activity

Goal: Access the tools they will need for your job Directions: • Ask the participants to access the Tools site

(https://launch.walmart.com). • Ask participants to ensure they can access all the tools listed

above. • Discuss and address any difficulties the participants encountered. • The more participants use a tool, the more they will be able to

customize information to suit their needs and category. • A Continued Tool Training is available.

Wrap Up Briefly wrap up the tools overview and answer any questions that come up.



FlightDeck 101 Time: 1 hour Purpose: Learn how to use FlightDeck.

Introduction

Some participants may already have been exposed to FlightDeck before. Ask who has already used the tool and who is new to using the tool. Explain that after becoming more familiar with the retail math terms we discussed earlier, participants will probably look at the tool differently than they did before. FlightDeck helps category teams to improve category performance and experience across Walmart US eCommerce. It does so by using: • A seamless platform • Actionable metrics and insights • User-friendly tools and workflows • Key communications • Educational content

FlightDeck

Live FlightDeck demo. Touch on the following points: Global Selector • Use the global selector to choose your reporting hierarchy,

site, and time period. RH Explorer • You can see the category owner for the selected RH as well as

explore the entire hierarchy and owners. Granularity • How you want to view your data – day over day, week over

week, or WMT week over WMT week. • Note that Walmart YTD in FlightDeck starts 1/27/18 for fiscal

year 2019. Playbook • This provides best practices and a mental checklist of

considerations for how one might leverage the data on the page.



Notifications • Get feature updates and alerts on items in your Custom SKU

Lists through notifications. Knowledge Base • This serves as a collection of information gathered from

subject matter experts and peers to share instructions, best practices, and tips to maximize your success.

Share Feedback • Use the Share Feedback button to communicate your

thoughts to the FlightDeck team. • You can also reach the FlightDeck team via Slack at

#FlightDeck-help Info Tips • Hover over the gray info icons to access info tips, which

provide additional content and definitions Export • In many of FlightDeck’s tables, you can right click to export: My Collections: Accessing the Feature My Collections: Creating your collection My Collections: Saving your collection My Collections: Viewing saved collections

Takeoff Activity

FlightDeck allows you to monitor your category’s performance and customer experience metrics, which in turn allows you to make smart merchandising decisions. Goal: Use FlightDeck to understand your category’s metrics. Directions: Participants should: • Access FlightDeck and look up their category. • Preview their GMV, IMU and AUR.

• Record or leave up a tab where their category is in these metrics. In later modules they will be able to calculate this using data from ThoughtSpot.

Group discussion to review their findings: • Ensure the group utilizes the retail math content reviewed

earlier in the day to suggest what is impacting their numbers.

Ask participants: • Where are these numbers coming from? • How could you improve these numbers?



Wrap Up Participants to recap how they expect to use FlightDeck to make informed decisions and gain insights into their categories.



ThoughtSpot 101 Time: 2-4 hours Purpose: Demonstrate how to pull reports and utilize ThoughtSpot.

Introduction

Discussion: • How can you ensure you are staying on top of business and

market changes for your category? • Encourage a discussion about ad-hoc and detailed analytical

business reports. • Explain that ThoughtSpot is a customizable business

intelligence tool used to create and/or edit ad-hoc and analytical business reports for specific categories at an in-depth level.

• ThoughtSpot enables user to view and analyze data through a search-based user interface. The tool makes it easy to see one’s data, get questions answered, create interactive graphics, and customize pinboards.

ThoughtSpot Setup

ThoughtSpot live demo: Log in to ThoughtSpot • Everyone has access to ThoughtSpot • When logging in for the first time, choose the data source you

are interested in. Any time you log in afterwards, that data source will be available.

Set up Data Sources • Once in the system, choose your sources to get the data. Finding Answers • Answers are reports in ThoughtSpot. • You can search to find answers. • You can make copies of work already in place in ThoughtSpot. • You can customize copies of answers by selecting subcategories. Setup a Pinboard • Pinboards are the dashboards in ThoughtSpot where you can

collect all your answers. • You can create a pinboard directly from the pinboard page, or

from the pin icon on any answer. • You can make layout changes to your pinboard depending on

what you need. • Always remember to save any changes in your pinboard.



• You can arrange your answers however you want by dragging and dropping answers in your pinboard and adjusting sizes as you like.

Interpret various reports • Visualizations are charts based on answers. • On any answer, you can toggle between the table and different

charts and visualizations. Show how to export to excel. Show how to look for a particular data set, and then formulate a process around that by asking the following questions: • What is it that I’m trying to track to improve the customer

experience? • What is the health of my category? • Where are my areas of success and what is keeping them going? • What are my areas of opportunity and how can I address them? • What do I need to focus on today to continue to grow my

category? Summarize the demonstration and remind participants about when to pull and what to do with the information available in ThoughtSpot.

ThoughtSpot Activity

Setting up ThroughtSpot properly ensures that you can quickly access your category’s metrics. Goal: Set up ThoughtSpot for your category. Directions: Have participants: • Access their ThoughtSpot accounts. • Navigate through the components of ThoughtSpot. • Create and save a search based on their category. • Pull information about their category including AUR, GMV,

and cost. • Pull information about channel sales. • Pull information about different dime frames. • Review results and export to Excel.

• Ask the participants to discuss their findings with the group, focusing on the utility of the tool and how they expect to use the tool.



Wrap Up Participants are to summarize their key learnings. Answer any outstanding question.



Have It Time: 1 hour Purpose: Understand the Have It score.

Introduction

Ask participants: What is Have It? • Have It is one of the five “It” metrics that make up the CVI. • It measures how good a job we did last month at getting our

assortment right. Why is having the right assortment important? • It means that our customers can shop with us for what they

are looking for.

Have It

Briefly explain what Have It is and how it can be used. Be sure to explain: • Have It is one of the five “It” metrics that make up the

Customer Value Index, and it measures the degree to which our assortment includes the top selling products in the external market.

• Have It measures how good a job we did last month at getting our assortment right. It’s a yardstick for determining if we are going after and bringing onsite the top-quality brands in the market that we said we would.

Ask participants: How is Have It measured? • The new Have It scoring will be purely brand status based:

• Live with Limited Assortment (At least 35% of Brand’s Full Assortment Live Onsite = 45%/200% Credit for Have It)

• Live with Majority Assortment (At least 80% of Brand’s Full Assortment Live Onsite = 80%/100% Credit for Have It)

• Live with Full Assortment (100% of Brand’s Full Assortment Live Onsite = 100% Credit for Have It)

• Deliberate Do Not Pursue (Brand Removed and not counted towards Have It Scoring)

• Additionally, brands will be GMV weighted based on their twelve months market dollar sales versus the total GMV of the target brand list.

What can improve Have It? • Our overarching goal is to win eCommerce market share, and

Have It is one of our primary levers to do so.



• The top products in the market account for a disproportionate number of customer touch points and transactions, so a relatively narrow focus will produce outsized sales growth.

• Our focus is to get the top brands and get their top items; brands before items.

• Having the items and brands when the customer wants it and the ability for the customer to shop for them how they want to can make a big impact.

• Channel sales can play a role in improving Have It as well.

Face forward, not backwards – What does this mean to you? • It means that you need to plan for future trends, not play

catch-up with your competitor.

FlightDeck

Walk the participants through how to review Target Brands on FlightDeck.

Manage Your Top Brands Activity

Goal: Practice reviewing the top brands influencing your Have It score. Directions: Tell participants to pull up the Top 100K SKU list for their L1. Have participants open FlightDeck and generate Target Brands reports for their L2. Ask participants to consider the following questions: • What are some brands or items that you wish Walmart carried? • What makes shopping at our site so attractive? • What are the value propositions of shopping through

Walmart.com/jet.com/allswell.com/Moosejaw.com/etc.? Generate a discussion with the participants on their findings and steps they could take to improve their scores. • If participants don’t know what they could do to improve

their scores, guide them through looking up items, considering the following:



• Who else carries them? • What kind of shipping do competitors offer? • What is the pricing of our competitors? • Are there advertisements for this item?

Wrap Up Participants briefly summarize the Have It score, its utility, and its impact on their category’s CVI. If their Have It score is low, it can have a dramatic impact on overall CVI. Answer any outstanding questions.



Have It – Brand List vs. SKU List Time: 45 minutes Purpose: Understand what to focus on to impact the Have It score.

Introduction

Once you know your SKUs and your brands, it’s time to focus on the brand list. Brand lists have lower churn and therefore they increase your profitability.

Brands

Ask participants: Who knows what is a target brand? • Target brands are those that contribute to the top 75% of

units sold over the past year. • Target brands have a consistent SKU presence in the Amazon

panel data. • Target brands vary by category. What is a priority brand? • Priority brands are those that contribute to the top 75% of

units and dollars sold over the past year, decreasing representation of lower quality brands and altogether eliminating extremely low AUR brands.

How should teams use the priority brand flag? • The priority brand flag will help teams further filter and rank

the “target brands” list.

FlightDeck

Demonstrate how to change Brand Status in FlightDeck.



Brands Activity

Goal: Identify your brands. Directions: • Tell participants to review the brands in their category. • Have participants identify their top target brands and top

priority brands. • Ask participants to check that their priority brands are

flagged in the system. • Discuss the findings as a group, encouraging conversation

about possible trends that they see.

Wrap Up Participants should summarize what to focus on to impact the Have It score. Focusing on their brands enables CSs to see what they should focus on and what should be eliminated.



Have It – Equivalent SKU Set (ESS) Time: 1 hour 30 minutes Purpose: Understand how equivalent SKUs are impacting Have It scores.

Introduction

Ask participants: What is an equivalent SKU Set (ESS)? • SKUs within a brand, sub-brand, and/or product line that are

substitutable for their intended use or customer desire. Do we need all SKUs to win with customers? • Have It logic assumes yes, but ESS revises this assumption. • The process should change how we setup ESS. Review important points about ESS, including: • ESS prevents Have It points from being wrongfully

unattributed when an assortment is well rationalized. • Have It will increasingly be scored based on top ESS, rather

than top SKUs. Coverage of at least one SKU per ESS is required to receive credit.

Creating ESS

Walk participants through the process of creating ESS. Include a brief demonstration of what an ESS is. The ESS Work Flow Overview Step 1: Gathering Data • Filter and pull market data using the Assortment Targeting

Tool and download the data into Excel. • Gather supporting detail, including the Base Item ID, Site

Link, Product Type, and Product Family relationships. • Upload the appropriate template via the Assortment

Targeting Tool and download the Upload Template workbook to assign ESS definitions.

• You will end up with three workbooks: • Market Data • Supporting Detail • Upload Template

Step 2: Determining ESS Definitions • Explain that as the experts, the participants will determine

the ESS definitions.



• Brand, Sub Brand, Product/Product Line, and Product Type provide the starting point for all ESS, and virtually no exceptions should exist across these dimensions.

• Beyond this, variants that group ESS are yours to define. • When in doubt, ask yourself, “would a customer be

indifferent to buying any other item in the ESS if the item they wanted wasn’t available?”

Step 3: Upload Template to the Assortment Targeting Tool • Be sure to save the completed Upload Template locally and

go to the Assortment Targeting Tool Edit Tab. • A pop-up window will appear to upload your Upload

Template. Wait for the processing status bar to complete, and verify the data populates correctly.

• Click the “Upload to Server” button and wait for the status bar to complete.

Ask participants to dive through their categories to see what Equivalent SKU Sets apply. Though these typically are found in consumables, ESS are very relevant across all categories.

Wrap Up Briefly summarize ESS, reminding participants that ESS will enable us to more accurately measure our assortment against the market. If participants have questions, take a moment to discuss with the group.




Content Recap

Divide the participants into seven groups and assign each group one of the sections from today’s lesson. Ask each group to take five minutes to create a brief list of the main points from that section. Then, have each group give a two-minute recap of the section for the class. Assign the following sections to the groups: • Retail math • Tools overview • FlightDeck • ThoughtSpot • Have It • Brand List vs. SKU List • Equivalent SKU Sets

Preview of Tomorrow

Tell participants that tomorrow we will start with a quiz to reinforce today’s learning. Encourage participants to take some time to review today’s content and come prepared with any questions they may have. Tomorrow will include introductions to: • How relationship building influences others • Key behaviors and terminology when working with vendors • Setting up a new vendor in GSM and Retail Link • Common solutions to vendor onboarding problems • How to setup a new item on Walmart.com • How to use the Spec Sheet and verify it for accuracy Thank the participants for their attention and answer any remaining questions that arise.



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CORE WEEK 1




Table of Contents Welcome to Day 3 ........................................................................................................................................................................ 55

Gotta Have It ................................................................................................................................................................................... 57

Vendor and Supplier Relations ............................................................................................................................................... 58

Setting Up a New Vendor .......................................................................................................................................................... 61

Vendor Onboarding – Troubleshooting ............................................................................................................................ 63

Item Setup – iSAM ........................................................................................................................................................................ 65

Item Setup – Spec Sheet ........................................................................................................................................................... 66

Daily Recap ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 72



Welcome to Day 3 Time: 15 minutes Purpose: Understand the agenda for the day.

Introduction

Welcome participants to the third day of training. • Review the topics covered yesterday with a short quiz.

Sales Performance Activity

Goal: Review yesterday’s learning and how it applies to sales performance for a category. Directions: Have participants split up into pairs. Have them consider the key points from the previous day and review yesterday’s sales performance for their category. Key points from the previous day: • Retail Math • Tools Overview • FlightDeck • ThoughtSpot • Have It • Brand List vs. SKU List • Equivalent SKU Set (ESS) Make sure they compare the sales to where they were the previous days by utilizing FlightDeck and ThoughtSpot. Lead a discussion on the participants’ findings.



Scorecard Review Activity

Goal: Establish a habit of looking at your numbers in Flight Deck each morning. Directions: • Instruct participants to look at yesterday's numbers in Flight

Deck to see if anything unusual has happened in the last 24 hours and to spot emerging trends.

• Have them also look at different time frames (Week-To-Week, Month-To-Date, Year-To-Date) to see long-term trends.

• Have the participants identify two metrics and either dig deeper for reasons why something is happening and/or what they would do to find out how to impact it.

• Allow up to 10 minutes for category specialists to look for their metrics.

• Ask for participants to present their numbers to the class and explain what is happening. • Don’t allow them to simply read the numbers. Have them

explain what is happening • Push back against the participant’s reasoning with

questions such as "So what?" and "Why?".

Today’s Agenda

The purpose of today is to look at vendors and vendor relationships in order to become a category leader. • How relationship building influences others • Key behaviors and terminology when working with vendors • Setting up a new vendor in GSM and Retail Link • Common solutions to vendor onboarding problems • How to set up a new item on Walmart.com • How to use the Spec Sheet and verify it for accuracy



Gotta Have It Time: 30 minutes Purpose: Understand how relationship building influences others.

Prized Possession Activity

Goal: Practice your bargaining skills. Directions: • Have the participants break into pairs. • Have each person pick out an item they currently have on

them that isn’t their laptop, has value to them, but isn’t money related.

• Have the pairs take a minute or two to try to convince their partner to give them their item. Remind them that if they are convinced to give it to their partner, they will lose the item forever!

• After a few minutes, have them switch roles and try and convince the other person to give their partner their item.

Debrief: • Who was successful? • What was your strategy? What worked? Why? • Who wasn’t successful? Why not? • What made this difficult? • How does this change with our vendors?

Driving Relationships

Briefly review the importance of driving relationships: • Part of driving your Have It score is working with new brands

that drive value for Walmart. • We’ve done this in the past by creating new partnerships

with Lord & Taylor, EV1 (Clothing Brand with Ellen DeGeneres), Maurices, and Advance Auto Parts.

• Often, you will find yourself having to convince a vendor that doesn’t do online business with you currently to change their mind.

Debrief Ask participants the following questions:

• What is the importance of building valuable relationships with business partners?

• Can you come up with an example of how a strong relationship with a vendor could help to increase sales?



Vendor and Supplier Relations Time: 1 hour Purpose: Understand key behaviors and terminology when working with vendors

Supplier and Terminology Basics

Cover the following salesforce terminology: • Lead – A lead is a person or a company who could potentially

become a client/partner for Walmart/Jet/Hayneedle, etc. • Account – An account is an entity that the Walmart group of

companies plan on doing business with. • Partnership – A partnership is the relationship between the

Walmart group of companies and the partner company. • Opportunity – An opportunity is a business process for

acquiring/onboarding a new partner or growing an existing relationship/account. • Acquisition Opportunity: Every partnership will have an

acquisition opportunity that is customized to acquire and onboard a partner.

• Growth Opportunity: Once acquired, the existing partnership can have any number of growth opportunities to track and forecast the SKUs we could potentially get with respect to Category/RHID/Brand.

What Tools Do You Need?

Have participants write in what each of the systems is used for. • iSAM: Item setup, item maintenance, cost changes, check

configurations, replenishment • Sims: POs and sales forecasts • Supplier Center: Variant updates, item

setup/maintenance (being moved to iSAM, but still used by suppliers)

• Retail Link: Store and dotcom WM#, Cost, Dims (used by suppliers)

• GSM: Supplier contracts and details (within Retail Link)



Communication

Generate a brief discussion around the following: • When communicating with vendors, utmost professionalism is

required. Whether you contact them via phone or email, you need to remember that you are representing Walmart. We will go more into detail around ethically what is required when talking to vendors, but for now, we want to remind you that professionalism is key.

• Also, you may need to instruct vendors over the phone or email in order to get things done. Be patient and be aware of the Sundown Rule.

• Explain that we have a strict anti-gifting policy to make sure our relationships are ethical. They are the face of their business and represent Walmart.

• Encourage them to practice their pitch to someone and listen to themselves over the phone.

• Email • Reference the sample letter here.

• This is a sample letter of what is sent to some vendors. Category Specialists are free to use this, but it is important to point out the professionalism.

• Log all calls and emails • Having a better relationship with vendors increases the

likelihood that we will be able to work with them to get what we need.

• Keep in mind how much that particular supplier drives your business. Are you comfortable giving them feedback if you need to? What could happen if you don’t have a good relationship with them?

GSM Tool

• Demonstrate logging into GSM. • Demonstrate creating a new agreement. • Demonstrate how to search for an existing agreement.



Agreements Activity

Goal: Identify existing vendor agreements in the GSM. Directions: • Have participants log into GSM. • Have them review vendor agreements for their top

three suppliers. • Have each participant summarize the agreements in place with

their vendors. • Have the participant broadcast their screen on the larger screen

via Proximity so everyone can see what they are seeing. • Provide insight and feedback of the CS’s description. • Have the participants consider and discuss:

• How would you initiate conversations with your vendors? • How much does that particular supplier drive your business? • Are you comfortable giving them feedback if you need to? • What could happen if you don’t have a good relationship

with them?

Wrap Up Briefly review the content and emphasize that understanding how our vendors interact with our site and how the agreements are settled is vital for handling new brands and vendors to keep your category at its peak performance.



Setting Up a New Vendor

Time: 2 hours Purpose: Demonstrate setting up a new vendor in GSM and Retail Link.

FlightDeck

Walk participants through how to set up a new vendor: • This is for 1P Vendors. There are seven parts… Prospecting,

Application Verification, Approved to Sell, Contract Signed, Registration Completed, and Item Setup. Show participants what they see and what their new supplier will see as there are actions required on both ends.

• Remind the participants that you’re walking them through the process so that they can assist a vendor throughout their own setup, as it can be a bit confusing.

• Follow these steps for GSM acceptance: • Registration • Certification • Additional Info • Returns Info • Addresses • Business Terms • Review Agreement

• Show participants how to view an existing agreement. • Log in to Supplier Center to see a checklist at the top of

your account page. • The Launch checklist will be specific to the contract you

agreed to, so it will a DSV, an Owned checklist, or both. • Show the Confluence page referenced as a place to see

where all the contacts are and how to identify where your vendor is at in the process.

Vendor Check Activity

Goal: Identify the status of your vendors. Directions: • Have participants find where vendors are in their category.

Who is live and on site, who is pending, etc.? • Have them discuss their findings. • Discuss how this will help them to identify not only who they

are working with currently, but also what brands they carry. • If participant is in a new category, have them think about who

they may need to connect with, and also to partner up with those that have established businesses.



Wrap Up Briefly review the content and emphasize the following: • At any point, the supplier can reach out to the CS for troubleshooting, but it is important to

remember what can and can’t be done to appropriately assist the vendor. • It is important that new vendors attend the vendor webinar to get instructions on how to

complete the spec sheet.



Vendor Onboarding – Troubleshooting Time: 30 minutes Purpose: Identify common solutions to vendor onboarding problems.

Introduction

Occasionally vendors will reach out to you with issues they are experiencing during the Onboarding Process. Because you’re not expected to be an Onboarding specialist, it’s important to know where to turn to for information. Category specialist resources: • Support • Slack – #gecrm • FAQs Vendor/Seller resources: • Marketplace Application • Dun & Bradstreet • Retail Link/GSM Technical Support: [email protected] • Insurance Requirements • Insurance questions:

• New or existing suppliers with new supplier agreements can contact: [email protected]

• Existing Suppliers with Insurance Policy Renewals: [email protected]

Troubleshooting Activity

Goal: Determine how to solve each vendor scenario. Directions: • Have participants review each of the scenarios that follow. • Have them determine who is responsible for fixing it (the CS

or vendor). • Have them choose the appropriate solution and consider the

following questions: • How would you handle this conversation? • How would you do this?

• Scenarios and solutions: • Vendor reaches out to you and states that they cannot

afford WERCS. • Vendor fixes this. There is nothing we can do if a vendor

cannot afford WERCS. • Vendor reaches out to you and wants to know the

difference between DSV and Owned configurations.



• CS owns this. Often, terms are not exactly industry standard. You may need to rephrase our business terms so that they can understand.

• Nike is a vendor and doesn’t want to have their products on Marketplace because they feel it hurts their brand image. • Both the CS and vendor can do this. It all starts with the

conversation. Some vendors who are big partnerships and authorized vendors will want to do this, however, for smaller brands, you may want to offer listing with us as a solution.

Wrap Up Ask participants the following question: • What are the benefits of solving issues quickly with your vendors?



Item Setup – iSAM Time: 1.5 hours Purpose: Set up a new item on Walmart.com

Introduction

Ask the class the following: • Once you identify an item or brand and get the vendor

onboarded, what’s your next step? • Add the item to the system and list it in your category.

• For listing items, you will use iSAM. • iSAM is used for Item Setup, Item Maintenance, Cost Changes,

Check Configurations, and manage replenishment.

iSAM

Walk through the basic functions of iSAM. • Vendors will use the same setup sheet that you can access

to upload the attributes for their items. • Demonstrate layout and basic navigation of iSAM

(e.g., how to Find It, button layout, etc.)

Item Check Activity

Goal: Navigate iSAM and review your category items. Directions: • Have the participants access iSAM. • Have them view the top ten items in their category and note

any potential issues. • Generate a discussion on their findings and steps they could

take to improve.

Wrap Up Ask participants the following question: • What is the purpose of getting your item in the system and ready for customers to purchase as

soon as possible? • It ensures that you don’t miss out on potential sales.



Item Setup – Spec Sheet Time: 2 hours Purpose: Demonstrate how to use the Spec Sheet and verify for accuracy.

Introduction

When it comes to item attributes, your supplier should be providing you the attributes. You’ve seen what it looks like on your side, but now we can take a look to see what it looks like on their side.

Item Setup Sheets

Review instructions for the item setup “spec” sheets. • V3 spec sheet • Enable macros • Review the instructions • Subcategories • Field definitions • Required fields

Required Fields

SKU • SKUs are the string of letters and/or numbers a vendor uses to

identify the item, also known as the Vendor Stock Number. • It can be an alphanumeric ID (ex. AD1234). • If the vendor has no SKU number, then they can use their UPC

number in this column. • Remember, the SKU is important because it is the ID they will

use to load inventory if they are DSV vendors. Product ID • A numeric ID that uniquely identifies the product. • There are four options to select from within the “Product ID

Type” dropdown, but please only provide UPCs or GTINs. • GTIN:

• The GTIN is a 14-digit number on the barcode of the selling unit (it can be the UPC with two leading zeros).

• UPC with two leading zeros and a check digit. • If their product ID is an EAN, then a leading “0” can be

added, and select GTIN as Product ID Type. • Walmart #:

• Specific to a configuration for an item. • Often has multiple WM#’s for DSV and Owned

configurations.



• They can even have multiple DSV WM#s if you have DSV inventory from multiple suppliers, and multiple Owned WM#s if the item has a store WM# and an online only WM#, or if we are buying the same product from multiple suppliers.

• Used in cost changes and it is essential you choose the WM# for the correct configuration when changing cost.

Universal Product Code (UPC):

• Not Walmart specific. • Typically, when suppliers send UPCs they include check

digits, which is the last number in the UPC, but WM systems do not recognize UPCs with check digits, so you will have to drop the check digit if you want to search a UPC in our system.

Base Item ID:

• For items with variants, this is the Item ID or Tool ID for the item, regardless of variant.

• For all other items it is the same as the Item ID, Tool ID, or Catalog Item ID.

SKU ID

• Same as the Vendor SKU. Catalog Item ID

• This is the Item ID or Tool ID for the item, which is the easiest way to look up and pull data on most of our systems.

• For items with variants, the Catalog Item ID is the ID used to distinguish specific variants.

• Demonstrate what the downloaded form looks like and what attributes need to be entered.

• Demonstrate live how to view an item and see it online.

Supplier Center

Demonstrate where to find Supplier Center, how to log in, and some of the functionality: • Login • Supplier.walmart.com • CS logs in using Walmart userID – not email.

• It is important to note that the CS view is different from what the suppliers see. • Depending on the supplier role they can perform Single Item

Setup and Match and Bulk Item Setup and the Spec functionalities. Items on hold – issues to address.



• While most of you will be using iSAM, Supplier Center is where your supplier will be uploading content for their items.

• Demonstrate how to search for a specific vendor and where to find their Vendor ID.

• Demonstrate the tiles at the top that explain the Supplier’s items’ status breakdown.

• Demonstrate variant updates and item setup/maintenance.

Spec Sheet Components

• Global Trade Item Number (GTIN) – Has 14 digits and must include the check digit. If less than 14 digits (ex. EAN), add leading zeros to make it 14.

• Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) – Not required. Can be higher or equal to price, must be higher than cost. It is not what customers will pay for the product.

• Price (REQUIRED) – What the customer pays for the product, must be higher than cost.

• Minimum Advertised Price (MAP) – If your products have a MAP, then an official letter from your company must be sent to us, listing the policy, SKUs, and their minimum advertised price.

• Unit Cost – The price Walmart is paying the supplier per selling unit. Should be lower than the numbers in the other pricing columns.

Product Images

Walk participants through how to add product images.



Packs

Show participants how to fill out the Owned Vendors vendor pack on the spec sheet. • Warehouse pack is the inner pack (or break pack). If the

warehouse pack quantity is 1 (meaning there is no inner pack inside of the vendor pack), then the warehouse pack GTIN and consumable (selling unit) GTIN should be the same.

• Identify what a vendor pack looks like. • When a vendor packs the boxes containing several selling units

inside the larger box (vendor pack), then the smaller box (inner) is called the warehouse pack.

• Consider the following: In a case there are two warehouse packs, each warehouse pack contains four selling units. What is the vendor pack quantity? What is the warehouse pack quantity? • The vendor pack quantity is eight. • The warehouse pack quantity is four.

Be sure to check accuracy of the dimensions and weight that the vendor supplies you with.

Discoverability and Nice to Haves

• Discoverability is what helps shoppers find the products in search and left-hand navigation. Vendors can use this to add information for attributes that apply to their products.

• Nice to Have outlines items that can help with SEO. Always try to get this information from the supplier if at all possible.



Fields

• For batteries, you must choose “Yes” from dropdown if product contains batteries.

• Expiration Date should be “Yes” if product is labeled with any type of expiration or code date that indicates when the products should no longer be consumed or are no longer at best quality. • It cannot be more than a three-digit number and it must be in

days. The highest will be 999. • If product contains chemicals, “Yes” should be selected.

• Also, vendor MUST OBTAIN WERCS! • Note of Caution: If the CS updates information that the supplier

provides through Supplier Center, your supplier will not be able to make any further edits! Ensure that you notice errors and inform your supplier to update.

Spec Sheet Activity

Goal: Create a spec sheet for a single item and in bulk. Directions: • Using the sample data provided, and have participants create

a spec sheet for a single item. • Then have them create a bulk item version using a different

data set.

Spec Sheet Error Activity

Goal: Identify errors on real vendor spec sheets. Directions: • Have participants utilize the provided real-life vendor spec

sheets to identify errors. • Working in pairs, have them identify common errors. • Have participants discuss the errors.

Debrief: • If a vendor has submitted a spec sheet with an error, you must

contact them to correct the issue. • If the CS corrects the error after the vendor has completed

the sheet, the vendor will be locked out of making further edits due to a system glitch.



Category Assortments Activity

Goal: Identify issues in your own category. Directions: • Have the participants work individually to research their

category assortment. • Have them find three SKUs to troubleshoot. • Have them identify the issues and what could be their course

of action. Possible issues to troubleshoot are: • Negative IMU • Has inventory but not published • Retail price is incorrect onsite • Diminishing sales • High inventory

• Have them discuss their findings and proposed solutions with the class.

• Generate a discussion around future steps that should be considered.

Wrap Up As a category specialist you must carefully look at the information in the spec sheet before submitting it. Aspects such as the cost, price, and case pack quantity can affect your business and cause issues that are difficult to fix after it is submitted. Provide examples or lead participants to a wrap-up discussion on how this could possibly look and cause issues for them.




Content Recap

Have the participants discuss the key points from the day and generate a discussion around any questions they have. Directions: • Split participants into groups of two or three. • Have them think about what they learned today and come

up with five key concepts that apply to their category. • Generate a discussion around their key points and challenge

them to consider how others’ key points may affect their own category.

Preview of Tomorrow

Mention that tomorrow will start with a quiz to reinforce today’s learning. Have the participants take some time to review today’s content and come prepared with any questions they may have. Review tomorrow topics: • What item maintenance and management mean • Your category’s taxonomy

CORE WEEK 1




Table of Contents Preparation ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 75

Welcome! .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 76

Maintenance and Management Overview ....................................................................................................................... 79

Item Setup – Tango ..................................................................................................................................................................... 80

CS AMA .............................................................................................................................................................................................. 83

Daily Recap ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 84



Preparation CS AMA (Ask Me Anything) Module Schedule at least one experienced category specialist (CS) from each business group to come in to the class to discuss what their day is like and any tips they have for the new hires. • Participants will ask the speaker(s) any questions they may have. • This activity will take one hour.



Welcome! Time: 1 hour Purpose: Review past content and agenda for the day.

Introduction

Welcome participants to the fourth day of training.

Quiz Activity

Goal: Review the key points that have been discussed so far this week. Directions: Have the participants answer the questions around the key points from each of the sections covered so far: Who was Mr. Sam and what was his approach to business?

• Sam Walton started Walmart with the mindset of keeping the prices as low as possible and keeping the customer the main focus of our business.

• What are the Five ITs and what do they mean?

• Have It – Do we offer the right assortment? • Find It – Is our assortment easy to discover? • Display It – Do we have sufficient content? • Price It – Are we competitive with Amazon's price? • Deliver It – Do we deliver quickly and on time?

• What are some important Key Performance Indicators? • Revenue • Cost • Expense • GMV – Gross Merchandise Volume • Product Margin $ (IMU$) • Product Margin% (IMU%) • IM% • Shipped Profit % • Contribution Profit %



• What is the difference between a target brand and a priority brand? • Target brands are those that contribute to the top 75% of

units sold over the past year, whereas priority brands are those that contribute to the top 75% of units and dollars sold over the past year.

• How can you drive your “Have It score?”

• Work with new brands and create new partnerships to ensure your category has what our customers want.

• What are leads, accounts, partnerships, and opportunities in a

salesforce context? • Lead – A lead is a person or a company who/that could

potentially become a client/partner for Walmart/Jet/Hayneedle, etc.

• Account – An account is an entity which the Walmart group of companies are planning to do business with

• Partnership – A partnership is the relationship between Walmart’s group of companies and the partner company.

• Opportunity – An opportunity is a business process for acquiring/onboarding a new partner or growing an existing relationship/account.

• When setting up a new vendor, what is the six-part process

that should be followed? • Prospecting, Application Verification, Approved to Sell,

Contract Signed, Registration Completed, and Item Setup.

• What resources are there for you when you or a vendor has issues during vendor onboarding? • Slack – #gecrm • Onboarding Support Desk on Jira –

https://jira.walmart.com/servicedesk/customer/portal/2342 • FAQs on the Confluence website –

https://confluence.walmart.com/display/CDSIM/FAQ%27s

• What is iSAM used for? • iSAM is used for Item Setup, Item Maintenance, Cost

Changes, Check Configurations, and Manage Replenishment.

• What are the components of the Spec Sheet?

• Global Trade Item Number (GTIN) – 14 digits and must include the check digit.

• MSRP manufacturer’s suggested retail price (not required).



• Price (REQUIRED). What the customer pays for the product – must be higher than cost.

• Minimum Advertised Price (MAP). If your products have an MAP, then an official letter from your company must be sent to us, listing the policy, SKUs, and their minimum advertised price.

• Unit Cost is the price Walmart is paying the supplier per

selling unit.

Scorecard Review Activity

Goal: Establish a habit of looking at your numbers in Flight Deck each morning. Directions: • Instruct participants to look at yesterday's numbers in Flight

Deck to see if anything unusual has happened in the last 24 hours and to spot emerging trends.

• Have them also look at different time frames (Week-To-Week, Month-To-Date, Year-To-Date) to see long-term trends.

• Have the participants identify two metrics and either dig deeper for reasons why something is happening and/or what they would do to find out how to impact it.

• Allow up to 10 minutes for category specialists to look for their metrics.

• Ask for participants to present their numbers to the class and explain what is happening. • Don’t allow them to simply read the numbers. Have them

explain what is happening • Push back against the participant’s reasoning with

questions such as "So what?" and "Why?".

Daily Overview/Structure

Today, we’re looking at maintenance and management practices. Briefly cover the topics that will be discussed today: • What item maintenance and management mean • Your category’s taxonomy • The life of a category specialist



Maintenance and Management Overview Time: 1 hour Purpose: Review what item maintenance and management mean.

Introduction

Tell the participants to consider the picture in the background of the slide. Divide the room in half, have one half consider the image on the left of the slide and the other half of the group consider the image on the right of the slide. Ask the groups: • Can you find the cash flow book in the room?

The group looking at the image on the right should Find It first. Ask the participants: • How was it navigating the picture of the messy closet

compared to the picture of the organized closet? • That’s just a room; now think about an entire website that has

hundreds of thousands of items from many vendors scattered throughout… If it wasn’t organized, you probably couldn’t find something, even if you knew exactly where it was.

A big part of your regular routine will be to make sure that you browse shelves and that items are listed correctly.

Manage Your House Activity

Goal: Ensure your category’s items are where a customer would think to look for them. Directions: • Have the participants break into pairs. • Have each person review their partner’s category as a customer. • Have them take notes of issues they found when browsing

the category. • Have each pair discuss their findings with each other. • Afterwards, have the participants discuss their findings as

a group.

Wrap Up

Key Point: Use a number of systems to not only ensure that items are listed properly on the site but also that GMV is reported correctly. Understanding what to look for and how to correct these issues in your category is essential.



Item Setup – Tango Time: 1 hour Purpose: Identify their category’s taxonomy.

Taxonomy

Briefly summarize following points: • Properly tagging each item (aka properly managing taxonomy)

helps to ensure that we don’t Have Items all over the various websites that we manage.

• When a spec sheet is submitted into iSAM, our system, known as R2D2 or Tango, attempts to automatically tag where the item goes on the site. However, it can only do so much and doesn’t get it right all the time. Your help is needed to ensure it is listed correctly for our customers.

• You edit the attributes in Editorial. You need to be able to distinguish between different types of product attributes. • For example: Fresh Milk versus Dry Milk or even Butter Milk.

There’s only a set number available and it’s important to understand what applies to your items.

Have the participants decide taxonomies for the following items: • Mickey Mouse T-Shirts

• Product Type: T-Shirts • Character: Mickey Mouse

• Chinchilla Carriers • Product Type: Animal Carriers • Animal Type: Chinchilla

• Lunchables • Product Type: Prepackaged Meals • Brand: Lunchables

Discuss the following: • What does this look like when it goes wrong? Let’s say you were

going to build a shelf for “Bistro Patio Set” and it isn’t tagged correctly, or if you search for “dog toys,” but “cat toys” come up. What are the impacts of incorrect tagging? • Downstream impacts (customers won’t be able to find

an item). • Financial reporting could be completely off. You could

sell X number of units but none of the sales would be reported to you. This can be corrected, but you want to prevent this as best as possible, especially for month-end performance accuracy.



Tango

Briefly review what Tango is: • Tango, or R2D2 (or “RHID 2.0”) was designed for profit and

loss (P&L) management, planning, and reporting. Using product types and product attributes, merchants can set rules that automatically assign items into a five-level reporting hierarchy that organizes items into logical reporting groups.

• Tango advantages • Consistent hierarchy change cadence

• Limit major hierarchy changes to three times per year on a predictable date (start of Q1, Q2, and Q3), with support for cost and plan restatements.

• Real-time data flow • Item-level R2D2 assignments triggered by rule or

content updates will be pushed to all systems in near real time (Q3).

• User management • All node ownership will be defined within Tango,

including Primary Owner, Site Merchandiser, Marketing, Finance, Supply Chain, etc.

• Data governance • Improved control over item-level data, including rule

change freezes, item locks, etc. Demonstrate the following within Tango: • Setting your division to Walmart USGM upon logging in

• This is necessary to open up all taxonomy options. • Iconography • Hierarchy editing • Shelf listings • Identification of node relationships • State management • Rule writing Briefly review Presto: • Presto enables internal users to manage shelves, categories,

and edit content attributes for single items. • Demonstrate how it is used.



Tango Activity

Goal: Review your category’s taxonomy. Directions: • Have participants log in to Tango and find what their category

hierarchy is. • Have them search online at Walmart.com and see if anything is

out of place on their browse shelf. • If they find something is out of place, have them use Presto to

edit the content attributes for the item. • Have participants note if there are any node relationships

within their browse shelf. • Have the participants create a rule to define their shelf. • Have the participants discuss their findings and any troubles

they had.



CS AMA Time: 1 hour Purpose: Learn the ropes from experienced category specialists.

CS AMA

Introduce the experienced category specialists and have them each talk a little bit about themselves, their category, and their daily routine. Invite the participants to ask questions of the guest category specialists.



Daily Recap Time: 15 minutes Purpose: Review the day’s content and preview next week’s content.

Content Recap

Have the participants discuss the key points from each of the sections covered using the following questions: Why is it important to routinely review and maintain your category’s items?

• Keeping your browse shelves organized ensures that your customers can easily find what they’re looking for.

Why are tagging and taxonomy important?

• If items aren’t categorized and tagged correctly, our customers may not find what they need.

• Incorrectly tagging or categorizing items may result in sales of that item not being reported correctly.

Preview of Next Week

Have the participants take some time to review today’s content and come prepared with any questions they may have. Review next week’s topics: • Business analytics • Marketplace • Compliance • Search Engine Optimization (SEO) • Pricing

core week 1 day 1

Documents