Wine Marketing Insights That Work

Wine marketing advice is everywhere, but most of it doesn’t work in the real world. Here, we cut through the noise. These articles are grounded in strategy, data, and decades of hands-on experience helping wineries reach modern drinkers. If you’re tired of chasing trends and ready to market smarter, start here.

A picture of chairs arranged upside down on top of tables. Text is "when on.premise turns off".

When On-premise Turns Off, Real Business of Wine Ep. 4

As lockdowns are enforced from Naples to New York and restaurants put up “closed until further notice” signs, how is this affecting the sommeliers? How are thousands of men and women spending their time, now they are not pouring wine for customers? In Episode 3, we talk to James Tidwell of Texsom, co-head of the…

Young people looking at virtual graphs in a futuristic way. Text reads as "Remote control".

Remote Control, Real Business of Wine Ep. 3

As countries and regions, from Spain to San Francisco declare States of Emergency and lockdown, tens – possibly hundreds – of thousands of wine professionals are having to change the way they work. For our second Live Panel, we share experiences with three leading members of the wine industry, and an expert on digital tools…

Dark smoke as background. Text says "Events beyond our control"

Events Beyond our Control, Real Business of Wine Ep. 2

Our first Live Video Podcast – focusing on the wine world in the face of the postponement/cancellation of all of its major Winter/Spring events: Chengdu Wine Fair, Prowein, Vinitaly, Vinexpo Hong Kong, RAW London… We were delighted to welcome: Ian Ford, former CEO of Summergate, one of China’s top importers, and now heading the Nimbility…

A road that runs until the horizon, and says START. Text on top of that picture says "Making a start"

Making A Start, Real Business of Wine Ep. 1

An honest discussion about what led to the Real Business of Wine series, a content initiative by Robert Joseph, aka WineThinker, and Polly Hammond, Founder, 5forests.

We're screwed scene from 10 Things I Hate About You

How do we sell wine to GenZ?

The oldest of Gen Z turned 21 in 2018. It is estimated that by 2020 (that’s only fourteen months away), they will comprise one-third of the population of the U.S. They have never known life without a cell phone or social media … or school shootings. And they are a force to be reckoned with.…

“Hi Virginia” or "Does your personalization suck?"

“Hi Virginia” and the Problem with Personalization in Wine Marketing

Technology, data, and the interwebs gave us an ability to “personalize” content, which many businesses took at face value: add a name here or there, automate emails based on what someone’s bought or visited, remarket elsewhere to the same people; but, for the vast majority, it simply meant adding someone’s first name to an email…

A love letter to old friends: how to revive a dead email list

What the heck do you do with an email database that hasn’t been used in ages? We’ve all been on the receiving end of these emails, the ones where we think, “who IS this?” and immediately unsubscribe. So in typical fashion, I’m going to take the “real human” approach to this conundrum. But first, let’s…

Creating delight and building connections

I’ve decided to eschew the crappy list-ification that you’ll find littering Google when you search Customer Delight, because while those lists might give you some very middle-of-the-road places to start, they don’t help you shift your thinking. Delight is a way of looking at communication and marketing that needs to be embraced by everyone on…

photo of sunset taken through airplane window

30 days of Instagram ideas for wineries

Need a little inspiration for your social media posts? Sign up for our bi-weekly newsletter and get the news and updates you need, straight to your inbox. It’s the best darned news you’ll read all week. 30 days of Instagram ideas

GDPR for Wineries

GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation. It is the new data protection law in the EU, it comes into force in May 2018, it has serious penalties, and it applies to data collected about EU citizens from anywhere in the world. This means that pretty much every winery site anywhere needs to care about…

Social Media for Wineries: Sure, You Could Keep Doing It The Hard Way

This article has been updated for 2024. We don’t know a single winery who doesn’t find social media to be a big ass chore. All the platforms, all the formats, heck, even just producing content for all the different post sizes! And yet, it’s something that we know all brands need. So in this edition…