Wine Producers Should Tweet More

Wine Future just wrapped up in Rioja, described as "the largest wine world forum to discuss the current status of the industry," by wine educator Kevin Zraly. At this gathering of almost 1,000 wine professionals, wine social media’s tornado of passion Gary Vaynerchuk didn’t hold back on how he feels. He said that wine producers are missing a huge opportunity to talk to wine consumers via Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms.

From the Decanter.com post: "I don’t give a crap about Facebook and Twitter but I care about consumers," Vaynerchuk told Wine Future’s attendees. "You should be embarrassed if you don’t recognise that this platform allows you to talk to them."

Gary emphasized that his success isn’t due to his high energy, wacky personality and toys he keeps on his table during Wine Library TV, but rather because he’s passionate and he cares.

Love him or not, there are many wine consumers who flock to him, believe and trust Gary to show them the way, gain wine confidence and value their own palates. From the Decanter report, it sounds to me like he’s making it clear as to why wine producers need to get savvy on Facebook and Twitter if they aren’t there already. It’s a huge missed opportunity not to engage with wine consumers.

Similarly, Jeffrey Hayzlett, Chief Marketing Officer at Kodak, described his team’s social media ROI philosophy at last week’s SM2Day conference as: ROI= Return on Ignoring.

Photo Courtesy of (CC) Derek Wilmot. www.derekwilmot.com -http://www.flickr.com/photos/derekwilmot/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0