Polly Hammond

As the Founder and CEO of 5forests, Polly Hammond bridges the gap between strategy and execution in the wine industry, driving innovation through digital marketing solutions. She spends her days not only consulting, writing, and speaking about impactful trends but also rolling up her sleeves to implement effective digital marketing solutions for 5forests' clients.

Graphic reads: the Wine Marketer's Radar, Search is changing. Culture is misunderstood. Strategy is underrated. Social is overrated.

What Wine Brands Get Wrong About Strategy, Culture & Social

This week, I’m recording from Verona! What better place than one of the world’s largest wine fairs to look at a few trends and tensions that wine needs to know but may be missing—from consumer expectations around search and relevance to the misuse of “culture” in strategy to a growing disconnect between what marketers say…

Graphic reads Data overload kills strategy, influencer budgets soar, Coke revives personalization, the funnel is dead.

Wine Marketing Trends: Data Overload, Influencers & Funnels

Today, four timely updates from outside the wine world, each with real implications for how we plan, influence, and connect with today’s wine buyers. First up from the Drum… Data overload is killing strategy. This is super important for wine. Too often, wine marketers have thought that data equals reports and dashboards. We track open…

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Celebrating a Decade of Innovation, Dedication & Growth

In 2015, 5forests was founded with a single goal: to help wine sellers navigate the complexities of the digital age. Ten years later, we’ve become the global wine marketing agency recognized for bridging strategy and execution, delivering measurable results, and empowering our clients to connect meaningfully with their customers. What started as a small, fully…

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Why Wineries Hire Fractional CMOs Instead of Marketing Staff

It’s no secret that the wine industry is in the middle of a rough patch. Consumer behavior is shifting. Younger generations aren’t picking up wine like we expected. Sales are sluggish. And while the internet is full of “hot takes” about what to do next, most of them overlook a basic truth: You can’t market…

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The #1 Winery Website Trend for 2025

Every time I see a wine marketing agency gush about how the future of winery websites is all about flashy animations, bold colors, and maximalist design trends, I can’t help but cringe. The internet isn’t a toy—it’s a tool, a tool that needs to work as hard as you do. At 5forests, we’ve spent the…

Dark Background with Text reading The Art of The Brief

How to Write a Winery Digital Marketing Brief That Works

Why Wineries Need Better Marketing Briefs Editor’s note: What follows is a full transcript of our video, “How to Write a Winery Digital Marketing Brief That Works.” It has been lightly formatted for clarity, but all content reflects the original recording. In a digital landscape where every detail counts, the difference between a successful marketing…

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How To Find a Wine Marketing Company You’re Sure to Love

Here’s a familiar scenario: a winery hires a marketing agency, months of work go by, and then the project falls flat. That’s where we often come in—called in to untangle what went wrong and set things back on track. And let me say, we’re sympathetic to both sides. Agencies generally want to do great work,…

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PESTEL Factors and Their Impact on Business: An In-Depth Analysis

The PESTEL framework—which stands for Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental, and Legal factors—is a comprehensive tool for analyzing the macro-environmental influences that affect business operations. A PESTEL analysis helps organizations identify external factors that could impact their performance both negatively or positively. By systematically examining each element, businesses can develop strategies to leverage opportunities and…

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Why PESTEL Matters (Yes, Even in Wine)

The wine industry loves a good acronym, and today, I want to talk about one that gets tossed around in strategy circles and LinkedIn comments but often overlooked when things get “real”: PESTEL. Politics, Economics, Social, Technology, Environment, and Legal factors—each one capable of changing the course of our business with a single policy announcement…

Young blond woman with bright red lips, wearing an orange strapless dress. She is looking up at camera and surrounded by glasses of wine.

The New Rules of Influencer Marketing for Wineries

As influencer marketing for wineries evolve, brands face high stakes in balancing authentic engagement with strict compliance. Here’s what every winery needs to know.

Ideas Are Cheap

We live in a time when everyone’s got an idea. Scroll through LinkedIn or sit through any conference, and you’ll hear countless grand visions and brilliant plans of how to change the world of wine. I see people get caught up in the fantasy of what could be—building castles in the sky with no foundation.…

Email Marketing Mistakes Wine Brands Should Stop Making

In this episode of Headtraining, Polly talks about the common mistakes wine brands make with their email marketing campaigns and how to avoid them. From prioritizing social media over email to missing mobile optimization, she dives into practical tips and strategies that can transform your email marketing game. If you’ve been struggling to make the…