Wal-Mart's Dot-Com Head Becomes CMO

Walmart.com’s president and CEO, John Fleming, will take on the additional role of chief marketing officer for Wal-Mart Stores today. The move could be a harbinger of more interactive marketing initiatives for the world’s largest retailer.

While Fleming has been in charge of the dot-com end of the business, the company has turned its e-commerce site, and its corporate reputation-building site www.walmartfacts.com, into fundamental components of Wal-Mart’s identity. In his four years at walmart.com, Fleming worked to integrate the site with the brick and mortar stores, by developing features like one-hour photo service, music downloads, gift registry and online pharmacy.

Former CMO Robert Connolly just last month said he would retire at the end of the year. He will stay on through the end of 2005 to ease the transition.

Prior to his time at Wal-Mart, Fleming spent 19 years at Target working in various retail and merchandising positions and ended his time there as senior vice president of merchandising.

“I’m very excited for the opportunity to lead Wal-Mart’s marketing strategies and efforts,” Fleming told ClickZ. “I hope to bring a unique perspective to this role driven by my experiences in traditional retail during my years at Target Corporation, and online retail at Walmart.com.”