by Tim Elliott on August 24, 2008
In the future, I think most wineries will not submit their wines to the critics at the Wine Spectator, Wine Advocate and other wine publications. And this will not be due to the chance of getting a bad score but because those scores don’t influence their consumers. Sure, some wine collectors follow scores and make their buying decisions based in part from them but most wine consumers could care less about scores.
In today’s market scores are only important within the trade where distributors use these as sales tools when convincing restaurants and retailers to carry a wine. Since smaller producers don’t receive as much support from distributors these days, they are increasingly turning to consumer direct marketing in their sales efforts. As wineries strive to connect directly with customers online, more will choose to sample wine bloggers.
The latest winery to go down this path is Sonoma’s Rodney Strong Vineyards with a pre-release sampling of their new Rockaway Cabernet to a few wine bloggers, myself included. I think this effort will get some attention in the wine industry not because this is something new — wineries such as Stormhoek and Twisted Oak have been doing this for years — but because they chose to sample bloggers before established wine critics and the wine is an allocated, mailing list only offering.
Sampling programs are effective in gaining awareness of a new brand quickly or exposing an existing brand to new consumers who increasingly are turning to the internet for their information. Google “Rockaway Cabernet 2005” today and you’ll get two full pages of positive reviews from several leading wine bloggers. If they had chosen to sample established wine critics, they would have no coverage in place 2 weeks before the wines’ general release. And because both Wine Spectator and Wine Advocate are behind subscription logins, search engines will not pickup their reviews when posted weeks or months later.
Not only does Rodney Strong get immediate coverage before the release of this $75 wine, they also are inviting a discussion about the wine directly with their perspective customers. I think this is a trend we’ll see other well known and boutique producers follow once they see the results here.
More information about Rockaway can be found here and my review, with links to the other bloggers involved, here.
Photo by Joe Roberts, the 1 Wine Dude
by Tim Elliott on July 9, 2008
As wineries explore social media, one of the decisions to be made is sampling wine bloggers. Like the traditional wine press, positive reviews from bloggers can provide good content for customers searching for your wine online. But a bad review can be damaging and continue to show up years after the review was posted.
Since wine reviews are subjective, wineries risk negative reviews every time a sample is sent out so making the call on bloggers is similar to traditional wine critics. My rule of thumb is if you sample critics then also sample wine bloggers and vice-versa. But it’s not always so clear cut and there might be good reasons to only sample bloggers.
The most successful wine brand to follow this strategy is Stormhoek. Three years ago they started sampling bloggers and did not submit any samples to critics. The result was a global conversation about their brand and an increase in sales as these online blogger recommendations got people to try their wine.
The thing that made Stormhoek such a compelling story was that it delivered surprisingly good value in it’s price category. Although South African wines had a market position, particularly in the UK, Stormhoek wines tasted more like they came from Australia or New Zealand. European bloggers began posting about these wines and the next year similar results were realized as the brand was introduced to U.S. consumers.
But what makes the Stormhoek story interesting from a marketing viewpoint is they didn’t target wine bloggers in their outreach. Instead, they sent samples to any blogger who requested them and sponsored “geek dinners” and other technology events where they supplied the wine. In effect, the wine became secondary to the discussions at these meet-ups.
So what the folks at Stormhoek really did was sample their potential customers and not actively seek reviews from wine bloggers. Think of it as an extension of the winery tasting room.
But sampling potential customers may not be cost effective for all wineries so other tactics such as sponsoring parties or events with bloggers is another way to get the online conversation going. I’ll be exploring this strategy in a future post with a case study.
by Tim Elliott on July 1, 2008
For wineries wondering how to tackle wine education to Millennials a good example is presented here by internet celebrity and entrepreneur Kevin Rose and Wine Library TV’s Gary Vaynerchuk.
In the space of seven minutes they talk about how to open a bottle of wine, the best corkscrews to use, how decanting wine improves the experience and quite a bit more. All in an easy to watch, entertaining conversational style. This is a lot more accessible than Andrea Immer’s approach a few years ago that is still followed too much as the blueprint for wine education on video.
(Note: aggregator and email readers may have to click back to watch this YouTube video. Also, if you don’t like Gary’s style, definitely DO NOT watch after the credits roll here.)
by Tim Elliott on June 19, 2008
A post over at Mike Duffy’s Winery Website Report blog reminded me to post about the popular Twitter micro-blogging-messaging service and how it relates to wine marketing.
For some wine bloggers, Twitter remains somewhat of an enigma; super popular with tech bloggers, the service has spawned a growing wine community over the past year or so. Some use it as a chat room, while others post tasting notes or share links.
But I think Twitter has a lot more potential for a winery to exploit that Mike touches on in his post:
5. Once a week, tweet (that is, send) a special promotional code to your followers for free shipping, an 10% discount, a limited availability wine, a rubber chicken, whatever…
6. See what happens. If you like the results, do more of it. If not, experiment a bit. You cannot fail, only learn, my young Padawan.
Or you could up the ante, Gary Vaynerchuk style and give away something. Wrist bands, coasters, pens or something else seemingly insignificant with your brand stamped on it (along with your website address, of course). If you post it, they will come. And they will give you their name, postal address, email and phone number in return. Think of it as another way to build your direct mail list.
It’s also surprising how many website or blog visits you will get referred from Twitter. This is because of it’s search engine indexing ability that works the same as a blog does. The more you Twitter, the more indexed your winery is and, over time, the more visits you will get. And for those who don’t want to make the commitment of a blog, Twitter is a good place to start.
Give it a try; all you have to loose is a bit of your time and you will likely see more traffic to your websites as a result.
by Tim Elliott on April 13, 2008
Jeff Lefevere posted a great cartoon over at Good Grape yesterday that I’ve included here. But the point of his post really hit home with me since I live 2,000 miles away from Napa and Sonoma.
What is interesting about taking advantage of a hub airport in a major Midwestern market is that I can get on a plane and be having lunch in Napa Valley the same day. Telecommunications, particularly VOIP services like Skype, means I can have a local Sonoma phone number and conduct video conferences with clients. Being on instant messaging clients like AIM means I’m just a few seconds away if I’m in Minneapolis or Healdsburg.
But the point of “geoarbitrage” is I can live in a large house in the country, send my kids to the best public schools in the U.S. and have money left to stock my wine cellar. Our house in Sonoma would probably sell for almost $2 million and what we could afford for the same mortgage payment in Napa would be about 25% of the square footage we have here (forget the 1,500 bottle wine cellar, etc.).
All this means that I can work for the same rate or less than resident wine consultants and have enough money to be on-site in California, Oregon, Washington or New York when necessary. I’ll be out for a week in Northern California starting on April 23, so if you’d like to meet, just call me or send me an email.
Yes, I really like this geoarbitrage thing 
Cartoon by Jeff Lefevere from Good Grape: A Wine Manifesto
by Tim Elliott on April 11, 2008
A couple of years ago, I wrote a series of six posts over on Winecast about why wineries should blog. You can read them here, here, here, here, here and here. Looking back on them now, I think I missed the core of why a winery should consider blogging: building meaningful relationships with customers online.
So here are the top five reasons why a winery should blog:
- Blogs are very easily updated with a web browser; no software or design skills required.
- More frequently updated content on your website improves your search engine position.
- Blogs enable direct, two-way conversation between the winery and customers via comments; think of a blog as a customer research and service center.
- Speaking in a human voice online creates a closer bond with customers; a blog is like a front porch or tasting room.
- It’s very inexpensive; you can start with free services like Wordpress.com or download the software for your server for free.
I think most wineries don’t blog because they are not sure what to write about each day. The best winery blogs focus on business, education and/or winemaking. Many also respond to what others have written in the growing wine blogosphere which often leads to bloggers linking back in their posts. These incoming links are what search engines value as a link implies authority for the search term.
All you have to do is devote an hour a day to reading wine blogs and/or writing about your winery. This is not in the same format as a report or advertisement but more conversational, like writing an email to a friend. After a few weeks, you will develop a routine and find your “voice.” To sample some of the best winery blogs, click on the links below:
I also maintain a complete list of winery blogs on my wiki (please add yours, if I missed it).
Cartoon by Hugh MacLeod of gapingvoid.com
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