Social media is confusing. I should know, I work in the field. There are so many different options when it comes to the different social media tools out there, it is nearly impossible for a business to know where to focus time and efforts.
I recently read an article written by social media expert, Frank J. Kenny in which he equates social media to a sales funnel. In his article, he explains that social media is a good tool to get prospects deeper into the funnel:
Social media is awesome at top and middle funnel work. One post could be seen by hundreds of your customers and prospects. They may share it with their friends, adding more people into the top of your funnel. They don’t know much about your product or service but at least they know your organization exists.
So that makes sense, right? You can use social media as a tool to build brand awareness.
Get people out there to know that you exist. After all, the world is a big place, both on and off-line, so if you don’t tell people you are out there, how are they going to know?
But, you do have to be careful. You can’t get into a cycle of shameless self-promotion. That doesn’t do anyone any good. And it only takes a few times of blatant, hard-core sales for prospective customers to turn away from you and jump onto the next bandwagon.
So now what?
To me, the key is to find those who will be your brand evangelists. The ones who will talk about you to their network. Interact with that person – through Twitter, Facebook or where ever that person(s) may be. Provide more than just information about your brand or company, also provide tidbits of information, factoids, helpful articles, etc. Things that show you are more than just a product, but an important part of your prospect’s life.
Frank J. Kenny summed it up nicely in his article:
To build relationships with your target market, you provide value upfront and share your organization’s story, what it is and what it stands for. If there is a connection, they move down the funnel.
This is all great and good, but how does this relate to wine?
Quite a bit, actually. When I first started this blog, I jumped right in with criticism on how wineries were not engaging with their audience, that they were not using Twitter appropriately, only to realize that I was still a Twitter-novice, and it is a whole lot harder than it looks.
But let’s look past Twitter or any social media tool for the moment and look at the target audience for any given winery. The obvious, of course, is wine drinkers. But think about how broad that audience truly is: basically, you are looking at any one person who is of drinking age, that likes wine. Maybe you can segment by income, maybe you can’t. And what social media channel does this broad audience use. Well that truly depends, doesn’t it? I think Facebook and Twitter are pretty safe bets, but what about Pinterest, Instagram, etc. Beyond that mess, you have the other layer of audience: the media, the influencers to your core audience.
So what should a winery (or any business really) do?
In my humble, yet honest, opinion, I think a business should pick a few social media channels and test the results. But you have to go all-in. You can’t stick up a few ‘pins’ or tweet out just a few articles and expect success. Invest the time to keep a few of these channels updated and set goals and benchmarks. If you aren’t reaching these goals, then it is time to drop that channel and try another. But do be patient, everything is going to happen tomorrow.
The other key, is finding those brand evangelists. The ones who love when you interact with them on Twitter or Facebook, etc., the ones who turn around and tell all their friends about you. Keep them close. Remember, their loyalty will see you through the hard times too.
Wrapping this all up in a few words: breathe, select, embrace and wait.
Take a few deep breaths (maybe drink a glass of wine) and really learn about your audience. Select a few social media channels that may help you to reach your audience. Embrace these social media channels fully and be patient with the results. And don’t forget about those brand evangelists, they are kind of like groupies, and groupies are gold. After all, there seems to be groupies for everything, and I mean everything, so there will be groupies for you too.
The Splendid Grape 