Web Marketing and Consulting - Portland, OR
The quickest way to get quality Facebook fans (likes) is to a) buy ads on Facebook or b) run an awesome contest. Let’s discuss contests.
The good ol’ days of saying “Like my page and be entered to win” are over. You need to run your contest through a third party app, like the popular Wildfire, or have a web services company (like us 
) create one for you. If you don’t, you put your page at risk of being shut down. Yes, there are still many pages doing things the wrong way, but it’s our opinion that you should always follow the rules.
Don’t let this deter you. In fact, there is a huge benefit to this: In addition to getting new likes, you are gathering EXTREMELY VALUABLE INFORMATION like name, email address, home address, phone number, how they found out about you, etc. This info is gold and can be used later for email and direct mail marketing efforts.
The key to a successful contest is to “wow” your fans (and potential fans). If you give away a t-shirt, nobody is going to care. If you give away something expensive, unique, and/or exclusive you’ll get a much better response. And, if you think creatively, you may not have to spend any money on prizes. Because many of our clients are in the wine industry…
Ten Things a Winery Could Give Away
- A gift certificate to be used in an online store or on site.
- A reservation to the next winemaker’s dinner.
- A private winery/vineyard tour and tasting.
- A private dinner with the vintner/winemaker, be it on site, at a local restaurant, or via Skype.
- A “Be a winemaker for a day” prize.
- A chance to work crush and have dinner with the crew (free labor, too
).
- An iPod Nano (or two) with the winery’s name engraved on it.
- An iPad with the winery’s name engraved on it.
- A stay at a local inn or B&B (opportunity here for cross promotion) / a gift card to a local restaurant that serves your wine.
- Tickets to the IPNC Passport to Pinot, DHWX, or Pinot in the City.
As you can see, a little bit of creativity combined with a moderate budget could lead to an amazing contest response. For an example, check out the current Archery Summit contest.
The two most popular types of contests are sweepstakes and photo submission.
- Sweepstakes: The user fills out the form and is entered to win.
- Photo Submission: The user snaps a photo (of whatever you determine) and sends it in via a contest app on Facebook. It can then be judged by you or voted on by others on Facebook.
You can get as creative as you want in this process but know that the more complicated you make a contest, the lower the response rate will be.
If you want your contest to be successful you need to publicize it. Here are some ways to do that.
- Send out an email newsletter at the beginning, middle, and end of the contest.
- Put it on your website and/or blog about it.
- Post about it on Facebook every few days.
- “Send an Update” to your fans on Facebook.
- Post on any other social media that you’re using (Twitter, etc.).
- Make sure your staff knows about it and is telling customers.
- Have a computer set up in your tasting room with your FB page up so visitors can easily enter.
- Take pictures of people entering the contest so you can post about it in a creative way.
- Use your, and your staff’s, personal friend network to promote it.
- Be sure to take photos, live Tweet/FB when the winner redeems his/her prize (eg, at a private tasting).
Let’s assume you are giving away an iPod Nano, a $100 gift certificate to your store, and a private tasting with the winemaker. We charge between $250 and $750 for the custom contest app. Let’s go with a super awesome fancy one at $750. The Nano is $150, and the gift cert. is $100. Time with the winemaker is free. You run the contest for a month and get 1,000 entries. That comes out to $1.00/lead. You also earned hundreds of new Facebook fans and received a lot of attention on social media. Not a bad deal at all!
In addition, each time you run a similar contest (say twice a year) you are sending it out to a larger base making each successive contest more successful and therefore cheaper.
With a little creativity and a bunch of promotion a Facebook contest can not only up your fan (like) count but can provide you with valuable insight into your customer base and give you something to post about on a regular basis. What’s more, your contest doesn’t have to cost you a lot if you offer up your or your staff’s time to create an exclusive experience for the user. Just remember to think it all through before you go and launch it.
If you have any questions or comments, please post below! I welcome your feedback.
Are you a Willamette Valley winery owner or employee? Then, you should know that Willamette Valley Wineries failed this weekend at social media. That’s right. We’re giving you guys an “F”, and not even two months after the big Social Media Conference held by the Tasting Room Managers Network. Oh, the shame .
Haven’t a clue how or why you failed? After all, you tweeted that you were open. You shared a few photos on Facebook of your event. You may have even made a video of the weekend. Let me break it down for you:
- You are a winery that makes a fantastic product.
- Wineries in the immediate area make an equally fantastic product.
- You want your winery to be the one people choose.
- When the quality is the same, people choose based on price point and/or great customer service.
- Since price point isn’t really negotiable, you need to go with customer service.
- Twitter, when used correctly by businesses, is a customer service tool.
- Not a single Willamette Valley Winery used Twitter as a customer service tool over the Memorial Day Weekend Winery Open House.
How do I know this is true? Because I baited the Willamette Valley Wineries over the weekend with the following tweets:
Can you guess how many wineries reached out to me? Zero.
This leads me to believe that wineries still don’t understand the power of Twitter. Sure, many are hopping on the Twitter train and broadcasting, but few are actually engaging. And none seem to be engaging correctly, because, if they were, there is no way they would have allowed my tweets to have gone unanswered. No way.
So, without further ado, here is how wineries need to be using Twitter to bring in and (dare I say) steal customers from other wineries:
- When your tasting room is open, search Twitter (search.twitter.com) for hashtags (#) people may be using while wine tasting in your area. For example, #WillametteValley #winetasting #pinotnoir #Oregonwine, #ORwine, etc.
- Also search the names of nearby wineries, by both Twitter handle and full name (e.g. @sokolblosser and Sokol Blosser). Full name is important because Foursquare check-ins that are sent to Twitter are in full form. If you don’t have time to search a lot of wineries, go for the more popular ones with large ad budgets.
- When you find someone in your area, send them a tweet. Sweeten it with a deal. Include a map link, so your new customer can find you. For example, “@AliSchubert Visit us today for free tastings. Ask for Brad. http://bit.ly/ms0XVq.” Note, deal making is a blast. Offer a taste of “something special”, or 20% off, 2-for-1 tastings, or a free tour of the winery.
- When your tasters arrive and ask for Brad, the introductions have already been made. Show them a great time. Make them feel special. Make them customers for life. Better yet, make them brand ambassadors.
- Follow up with the customer on Twitter, AND occasionally check in with him via non-wine related tweets. Make sure that when he returns and/or when his friends ask for recommendations of wineries, yours is on the tip of his brain.
Now, a demonstration of how this works as the customer.
- Hey, look at me. I’m in the Willamette Valley tasting wine. I want people to know about it, so I shall tweet my adventures.
- Hey, look at that! Because I receive tweets via text message, I was just instantly notified that a nearby winery is offering me free tastings if I ask for Brad. That sounds like a deal. Awesome, there’s a link to a map. Thank you!
- Arrived at the winery. Announced my arrival via Twitter so all of my followers know where I am. I also checked in via Foursquare and Facebook, just for kicks.
- That Brad is really a great guy. And, wow, what fantastic wine. I’m definitely buying. Perhaps I’ll even join the wine club.
- I will tweet (and, perhaps, even blog) about my awesome winery experience when I get home. When people ask for a recommendation, I’m definitely telling them to go to Brad. I can’t wait to return.
Now, will every experience be a resounding success? No. But it does happen. It happens quite a bit.
We know wineries are incredibly busy over the Memorial Day Weekend. But, why not bring in that extra body whose job it is to totally focus on social media. When they aren’t scooping up and meeting tweeters, they can be snapping photos, providing virtual tasting notes, and sharing experiences as they happen. Yes, it’s one extra body to pay, but, if that person brought in one lifetime customer, they would more than pay for their time.
Here are some real tweets (found after searching a handful of terms) from the weekend. Consider them missed opportunities.
Social media isn’t going anywhere. It may come in different forms in the years ahead, but this new way of reaching out to customers over the internet is here to stay. And, while all Willamette Valley wineries failed the Twitter test this past weekend, I guarantee it will not happen again.
So, if you are a winery owner, or if you work in a winery, it’s time to get involved in the world of Twitter. If you don’t, then don’t be surprised when your tasting room is getting fewer and fewer visitors while your tweeting neighbors have full parking lots.
Update: We’ve received a number of calls from WV wineries regarding this post. Many are asking about our Twitter services. Here’s the deal. We can train wineries on Twitter. We can even tweet for them for a period of time to help their establish their tone and following. However, the goal is that the winery does its own tweeting. This is for two reasons.
Of course, we’re happy to talk to anyone who calls about any of our services. 503.941.0660.
After the success of Rick Bakas’ #calicabs twitter tasting there has been much interest in similar events for other regions and varietals. We are happy to be part of the first ever Washington Merlot (#wamerlot) Twitter tasting which will happen on March 25th between 5pm and 7pm PST.
If you’re not familiar with the concept of a Twitter tasting, just think of the good old days (c. 2001) of chat-room tastings where a winery’s customers would all sign in and taste wine along with the winemaker on AIM (or some now irrelevant service). Well, the year is 2010 and chat-rooms have been replaced by Twitter. In this case, the goal is to get some delicious Washington Merlot into the hands of as many people as possible and then have them all talk about it on Twitter between 5pm and 7pm PST on March 25th.
For those of you worried about the juxtaposition of something “social” yet seemingly done in a dark room in front of your computer, do not fret. Many wineries will be hosting TweetUps during the event where you can meet up with some real life Twitter-folk and tweet from your laptop or phone, while of course engaging in some real-life conversation and sipping some amazing wines.
For more information about the event, please visit @drinknectar‘s website: http://drinknectar.com/.
If you are a winery and would like to participate, please check out the information here.
Oh, and we’ll both be there…well, here, but there. Can’t wait!
It seems people were thinking hard about social media over the holiday break, as some FANTASTIC social media articles and blog posts have been published this week. Below you will find a list of the writings we considered to be the best of the best (thus far).
1. Pepsi Chooses Social Media Over Super Bowl (Media Bullseyse) – If you’re only going to read one article about social media this week, make it this one. Just as the title suggests, Pepsi is redirecting its Super Bowl fund to a Super Social Media campaign. In other words, “It’s been decided that they would rather be talked about in a positive light by millions than have their ad seen by millions of people, even it is the Super Bowl”. Cool move, Pepsi Co.
2. Why Social Media is Still a Red-headed Stepchild (Web Worker Daily) – So true, it’s almost painful to read. Highlights reasons why there is so much resistance from PR and marketing departments regarding social media.
3. How to Say Stupid Things About Social Media (The Guardian) – “Why do people care what I ate for breakfast?”, is a common comment we’ll hear from Twitter skeptics. This article explains why…and they don’t care what you ate for breakfast, so there.
4. 91% of Companies Used Social Media in 2009 (Simply Zesty) – Nice analysis of stats released by the Center of Marketing Research at UMass.
5. 3 Helpful Social Media Marketing Predictions for 2010 (Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide) – Jeremy liked this one so much, he wrote a full analysis of it here, that is equally important to read.
6. Breaking Up in a Digital Fish Bowl (NY Times) – This one doesn’t have anything to do with social media and business, but it is a fascinating read about dating (and breaking up) in the age of Facebook. So happy I’m married. So happy.
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It’s time to join the conversation.Features
$29.99
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Included in Lunabean Media’s “Social Media Training Kit for Small Business” is everything we offer in our small business media training sessions with the exclusion of our happy faces. Training comes in the form of Downloadable PDF documents and several easy-to-access training videos.
Whether you are completely new to social media or you just aren’t getting the results you need with your current social media campaigns, this Training Kit will help you!
Included you will find:
Social Media Strategies for Small Business (eBook – PDF).
This manual provides an overview of social media, best practices, brand reputation management, how to measure success, and most importantly over easily executable social media marketing ideas that you can use at your small business to engage customers, build a fan base, and create brand evangelists.
Facebook for Small Business (eBook – PDF).
Twitter for Small Business (eBook – PDF).
From our e-mail newsletter sent 10/29/09
Have you picked up your copy of Gary Vaynerchuk’s “Crush It” yet? While some may find benefit in the book’s motivational “live your passion” pages, we’re recommending it to our clients because of Gary V’s sagacious approach to social media.
Most people receiving this e-mail have already expressed to us interest in social media. Some of you have embraced this new marketing opportunity and are beginning to reap the rewards. Others remain a bit hesitant.
To those who have already embraced social media, Gary V will continue to broaden your awareness of your social media reach. New promotions will come to mind. New platforms will be introduced. To those who have remained hesitant, we believe Gary V can alleviate your social media fears while assuring you that any time spent in the world of social media will be greatly beneficial to your business or organization.
Finally, we’re recommending this book to you, our clients, because Gary V chooses, in many instances, to play the role of photographer, wine shop owner, restaurant manager, real estate agent, non-profit organizer and public relations manager. Since so many of you fall directly into these categories, and so many more fall into closely associated categories, we felt obligated (and excited) to share this book with you.
Again, if you want the motivation, it’s there for you. However, if you’re like us, you’ll want to focus on the social media sections. It’s a quick 120 page read, and spending the afternoon absorbing it may forever change the way you think about your business…and that’s a great thing.
For Borders Rewards members, feel free to use this 40% off coupon if you choose to buy from Borders.
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It’s time to join the conversation.Features
$29.99
|
Included in Lunabean Media’s “Social Media Training Kit for Wineries” is everything we offer in our winery social media training sessions with the exclusion of our warm bodies. Training comes in the form of Downloadable PDF documents and several easy to access training videos.
Whether you are completely new to social media or you just aren’t getting the results you need with your current social media campaigns, this Training Kit will help you!
Included you will find:
Social Media Strategies for Wineries (PDF).
This manual provides an overview of social media, best practices, brand reputation management, how to measure success, and most importantly over 20 easily executable social media marketing ideas that you can use at your winery to engage customers, build a fan base, and create brand evangelists.
Table of Contents
Facebook for Wineries (PDF).
Facebook is a powerful tool for wineries, but you have to know how to use it effectively. This manual covers every detail of Facebook from creating a Fan Page to adding custom applications to creating a Facebook ad. Most importantly it details the type of content to post and how to effectively post it. In addition, it includes best practices and 7 how-to videos that will save you time and help to focus your efforts.
Table of Contents
Twitter for Wineries (PDF).
Twitter provides wineries a unique opportunity to not only engage their customers but, perhaps more importantly, to listen in to conversations about their wine and the industry in general. The problem is there are many misconceptions about Twitter and many wineries get overwhelmed by the plethora of Twitter options and opinions. Our Twitter manual for wineries explains Twitter and teaches you how to use it. You’ll be retweeting, tagging your tweets, and using Twitter advanced search faster that you can say #TTL (Twitter Tasting Live). In addition, it will teach you how to search effectively, create a following, and use tools that will help to manage and simplify your Twitter efforts. This manual also includes 2 how-two videos (Twitter basics and advanced practices).
Table of Contents
