Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/705606
1 0 4 V I N E YA R D & W I N E RY M A N A G E M E N T | J u l y - A u g 2 016 w w w. v w m m e d i a . c o m Customer service. It's a cock- tail party. Don't be wine servers. Roam your events and outdoor ven- ues with business-enabled phones and pads to track orders remotely. This gives you multiple stations for final transactions like add-on sales and club signups. What about out- of-state consumers, trade and media? Have you considered the power of instant live mobile inter- action? Check out Apple Facetime, Google Chat and Facebook Mes- senger. Social engagement. Yo u must be where your consumers are. Make it easy for people to dis- cover you. That means setting up your winery accounts on all social sites. Be sure to "claim" your account, which includes confirma- tion from the site, and optimize your profiles. This should be done on the key social media platforms that wine consumers use, such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and others. Be sure you've included the top-line information that people need on these sites and include links, calls to action and promotion- al codes where applicable. Geographic Location Ser- vices. These websites make it easy to be found. They include Google and Apple maps, Yelp, Trip Advisor, Foursquare and Around- Me. At a minimum, set up and claim your winery accounts like you did on social media. You can track clicks to your website using Google analytics to determine where to focus your attention. Wine apps. Apps like Cork.kz, Hello Vino, Wine4.Me, Delectable, wine-searcher, Cellar Tracker, drync and Vivino are great for market- ing to wine-savvy consumers who research wines, get professional and peer reviews, and need on-the- go points of reference. Programs like Cellartracker offer journaling and inventory tracking. Hello Vino and Wine4.Me have wine and food pairing suggestions. Label scanning. This is effec- tively a game-changing new retail channel to consider. These apps are designed for mobile interaction and online ordering. Paul Mabray of TMRW ENGINE (formerly Vin- e-mails collected? Be mobile to col- lect information from your visitors. Let them enter names, e-mails and zip codes (at a minimum) on a tab- let at the tasting bar. Use a mobile tablet to roam outside to gather information. If you have a sign-up form on your website, have visitors subscribe there. You can even set it up so they'll get a nice, automati- cally generated thank-you note and maybe an offer to visit again. Make sure you have signage for your social media sites and ask for new subscribers. Mobile orders. According to Internet Retailer, an e-commerce analysis publisher, as well as Criteo, a digital marketing consultancy, mobile orders accounted for 30% of all online orders in the fourth quarter of 2015. Because of this increased use, it's important to test your site's mobile shopping experience often and eliminate extra steps that lead to cart abandonment. Sandra Hess, founder of DTC Wine Workshops, says, "What have we learned about consumer demand this past year? Mobile-friendly winery websites, coupled with strong shipping incen- tives and peer reviews, sell more wine online." Mobile POS. Still using knuckle- busters for orders at offsite events? Why not invest in a tablet and even a hot spot Internet connection? Still have a cash register or anchored POS? What happens when every- one wants to check out at the same time? Make it easy for people to buy wine onsite. Offline to online. Use printed materials to drive traffic to your website using scan-ready tags or barcodes such as Microsoft Tag Reader or QR Codes (too bad QR adoption is still low). This includes posters, rack cards, promo cards, shelf talkers, stickers, tastings notes, tech sheets and labels. E-mail marketing. Your e-mail system must be optimized to pres- ent on mobile devices and the dif- ferent versions of both iOS and Android devices. Check out news- letter preview services like pre- viewmyemail (previewmyemail. com) or Email on Acid (www. emailonacid.com). Tank) puts it this way: "Technology is advancing at an unprecedented rate thanks to label recognition software. We've finally found the intersection of functionality and use that makes these apps incredibly relevant to wineries for connecting with their customers and under- standing market behavior at the consumer level." A p p s i n c l u d i n g D e l e c t a b l e , drync and Vivino offer label scan- ning and have tens of millions of users. For example, you can search for a specific wine with Vivino and it can find the wine, offer it for sale on retailers' sites and the winery's store, offer to sign you up for wine club and e-mail and, the next day, send an e-mail reminding you of your interest, including winery store and phone links. The drync pro- gram has a database of millions of wines and can drive incremental revenue for retailers using secure e - c o m m e r c e i n t e g r a t i o n w i t h Apple Pay and Google Wallet. That also means incremental revenue for your winery. Winery e-commerce programs like VinSuite and Vin65 are likely working on integration with some of these apps. For now, be sure to claim and manage your profiles on these app sites, update for current inventory and encourage customers to try the apps and rate your wines. Bottom line: Get help if you need it, but don't be left behind. Be mobile! Carl Giavanti is a winery publicist with a DTC marketing background. He's going on his eighth year of winery consulting. Carl has been involved in business marketing and public relations for more than 25 years; originally in technology, digi- tal marketing and project manage- ment, and now as a winery media relations consultant. Clients are or have been in Napa Valley, Wil- lamette Valley and the Columbia Gorge (www.CarlGiavantiConsult- ing.com/Media). Comments? Please e-mail us at feedback@vwmmedia.com.