It is a centralized platform inside the Walmart marketplace that has the potential to become a powerful tool for brand owners, especially if they’re struggling to protect their brand identity. With a well-managed Walmart Brand Portal, you can prevent one of the most frustrating scenarios a seller can face: listing hijacking. How? Well, this article will explain everything to you.

What is Walmart’s Brand Portal?

As Jim Rohm once said, success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the fundamentals. So even if you already know this tool, it won’t harm you to go through the basics again. 

Walmart Brand Portal is a platform where sellers can register their brand. It allows registered brands to manage their listings, monitor for intellectual property (IP) violations, and take action against unauthorized sellers or listing hijackers.

When your brand is registered within the Portal, Walmart recognizes you as the rightful brand owner, ensuring you have control over your brand’s listings and the ability to monitor them effectively. This means that you will immediately have access to the following features:

Listing Control

Once registered, you’ll be able to assert control over your listings. As such, unauthorized sellers won’t be able to modify details of your products or list counterfeit items without triggering alerts. It gives you much more leverage for you to get ahead of listing hijackers.

Automated Monitoring and Alerts

The portal also provides automated monitoring tools that flag suspicious activity, such as unauthorized sellers or modifications to your listings. You can receive alerts and immediately address the problems before they affect your brand’s standing.

Analytics and Reporting

Finally, the portal offers tools to review suspicious activity, like hijacking patterns, to help you adapt your strategies as necessary.

Quick reminder – Only a rights owner with a registered United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) trademark can submit an application to the Brand Portal to pass the verification process for registration. 

 

How to apply

A quick guide to apply for Walmart Brand Portal.

Prepare Required Documents

You’ll need proof of ownership for your brand, such as a trademark certificate or copyright registration.

Remember to have the official contact information related to your brand. All of these details are key to registering on the Portal.

Access the Walmart Brand Portal

Go to the Walmart Brand Portal website, sign up, and create an account.

Register by entering basic information about your brand and setting up a user account. You’ll see something like this:

Submit Brand Ownership Verification

Upload documents like your trademark registration and provide any additional requested information to verify your brand ownership.

Walmart may ask for details about your brand’s products and distribution channels.

Wait for Approval

Walmart will review your application and may reach out for more information. It can take several days to a few weeks.

Simplify and Strengthen Your Brand Protection

One of the most important features is that Walmart Brand Portal lets you monitor your products and report IP violations, such as trademark infringements or counterfeit items. This direct reporting tool simplifies the process, allowing Walmart’s team to respond quickly. 

You can submit a claim through it regarding the following elements:

• Patent – You file this claim when another party uses a patented process or product of yours without permission. This is relevant for companies that produce unique, innovative products. Common Claims:
  
  • Infringement of a design patent
  • Infringement of a utility patent

• Counterfeit – If an inauthentic product is being sold as if it were part of your brand, you’ll have to file this claim. Common Claims:
  
  • This product does not exist and/or is not manufactured in specific colors, sizes, etc.
  • Packaging is incorrect or different from the original product
  • The brand owner has received customer complaints regarding counterfeit items purchased from this seller or listing

• Copyright – This involves filing a claim when another party uses copyrighted material without permission. This may include unauthorized use of images, text, designs, or music that are associated with your brand. Common Claims:
  
  • Unauthorized use of a copyrighted design
  • Unauthorized use of a copyrighted image
  • Unauthorized use of a copyrighted text

• Trademark – You file this claim when another party uses a trademark that is identical or confusingly similar to yours. Common Claims:
  • Unauthorized use of a registered trademark in the product title and/or description
  • Unauthorized use of a registered trademark in an image
  • Unauthorized use of a registered trademark on the product and/or packaging
  • The item is materially different from the original product due to lack of warranty

If your brand isn’t registered on the Portal, you would have to take a longer route, like using Walmart’s Online Infringement Form from their Help Center page or even emailing their Enforcement Team. It doesn’t sound very appealing, does it?

Practical tips

Walmart aims to maintain competition among sellers and avoids removing listings unless there are clear cases of counterfeit products. To gather proof and address these hijackers that take advantage of your brand, you should follow these practical tips when using Walmart Brand Portal:

Check Your Cases

Let’s say you’ve recognized a clear case of trademark infringement. Someone is selling a product falsely representing it as belonging to your brand or is using your brand name misleadingly. Okay. The next logical step is to file a complaint. 

But be careful. Why? Well, because Walmart doesn’t count someone reselling your product as a violation. 

You are getting into legal territory here. So you have to be absolutely sure this is actually an infringement and not uncomfortable -but legal- behavior happening on Walmart. 

Leverage Walmart’s Counterfeit Enforcement Advantage

Walmart has significantly improved its enforcement against counterfeit products over the past year, making it easier to address such cases. Sellers are constantly being removed from the platform after cases are opened with evidence of selling counterfeit items.

But where’s your advantage?

Unlike Amazon, Walmart does not require sellers to provide images when claiming an item is counterfeit; they rely on the seller’s declaration. Take it into account when facing these kinds of scenarios.

Strengthen Your Brand’s Equity

This tip isn’t precisely focused on your use of the Portal but rather on the bigger picture behind it: your trademark. 

Certain brands cannot be successfully registered as trademarks. Names that directly describe the product are often rejected. For example, if you were selling computers and your trademark was “Great Computers”, you wouldn’t qualify, as your trademark describes exactly what is being sold. That’s why unique names like “Apple” for technology products work; they do not describe the product directly.

If you are a new brand, steer clear of generic names to improve your chances of registration success.

Conclusion

Walmart’s growth is immense. Over 25% of Walmart sellers generate more than $500k annually. Such growth indicates a shift towards recognizing Walmart’s potential compared to other marketplaces like Amazon. As a seller, using all available tools at your reach -like Walmart Brand Portal- is a great way to get ahead of the game. But sometimes, you just can’t get everything right. Sometimes, you need help to grow your business and improve your visibility on the search algorithms, for example. The BellaVix Team is full of experts on the matter. Contact us to know more!

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