Join an expected 200+ wine tourism professionals for the third annual Wine Tourism Conference, scheduled for November 13-15 in Portland, Oregon. This year, the conference will be even better with a pre-conference excursion, additional workshops, a post-conference wine-pairing dinner, and the first-ever Great American Wine Festival.
5 Most Common Mistakes Wine Websites Make
This is a guest post by 2013 Wine Tourism Conference speaker, Andy Hayes.
Do you remember when we didn’t have the Internet? You had to call your mom instead of Googling for the answer, and to find out about a winery you either hit up the yellow pages or got a brochure from your travel agent. Oh, how times have changed….
I think we all can agree that to be in the wine business, you need a web presence, even if it’s just your address and phone number. But some wine websites are better than others. Here are the 5 most common mistakes that I see in my travels.
Awesome. Or maybe not.
5. Those fancy flash widgets need to go.
Apple is mostly the reason that those flash animations that you paid so dearly for are now useless. I say mostly because now, most smartphones can’t display them. Nor can people who arrive to your site via Facebook – that’s important too, right?
Honestly, I never liked Flash anyway – it takes a long time to load, and the custom graphics were always confusing to navigate. Ditch all those custom animations and simplify – a great photo with a bit of text is better anyway.
Doing It Right: Vincent Wine Company here in Portland just has a simple WordPress site. It might not be exciting,but nobody is going to complain that your site is too simple, trust me.
4. I need you to be more specific.
On a recent wine trip to Walla Walla, I had a difficult time organizing our tasting room visits because half of the wineries had no clear hours displayed on their site. And then, one of the wineries that was a personal fave had really confusing info about their wine club membership – it asked for my birthday and credit card, but didn’t tell me how much it costs!
Consumers are savvy, and they don’t have time nor inclination to email you to ask questions. Get clear and specific about your offers, or like me, they’ll take their business elsewhere.
Doing It Right: Tallavera Grove, one of my favorite Australian wineries, has details galore on their site – all neatly organized between the tasting room, restaurant, special events, and more.
3. Speaking of specifics, contact details belong on every page.
You should have contact details for your business on every page of your website. That includes email, phone number, and address (if you are appointment-only, I understand not having the address, but still…). You’d think this would be obvious, but I remember being lost in the Livermore Valley looking for a winery that had no address on their website, and no one was answering the phone – because the site’s phone number was outdated.
Doing It Right: Da Ma has their tasting room hours & a phone number on the right side of every page, and the address is at the bottom of every page.
2. Tell me about your wines – but don’t make me work.
Your product is wine (or something wine-related), so make sure you’re telling me all about it. Many wine sites make customers choose between product lines or series that are very confusing – how am I suppose to know, as a new customer, if I want to learn about your ‘Salmon’ Series or the ‘Chateau’ Vintage?
Instead, break it down for me. If you have wines great for a dinner party, great, show me. If you have wines great for a newbie wine lover, great, show me. If you have wines perfect for a splurge or gift, great, show me.
Doing It Right: Pairings Portland mostly use video on their website, but if you’re coming to Portland, visit their shop to understand the kind of experience wine consumers deserve. People shouldn’t just buy your wine based on which label image they like the most.
1. Show me some personality, would ya?
The wine industry is one of the most personable industries out there, and yet I can’t tell you how many cold, un-personable wine sites I have seen. If your about page doesn’t tell me your story and have photos of you, I have to wonder what you are hiding. How about some creativity?
Doing it Right: Follow Chocolate Shop on Facebook to get an idea about how personality and branding go hand in hand. You don’t have to like sweet wine to see how much their customers like what they do, and their site pulls in a feed of the tasty stuff they share on Facebook.
About the Author:
Andy Hayes is a creative web producer based in Portland, Oregon and is the founder of Plum Deluxe, a website decided to life’s luxuries big and small. Andy will be leading the 9:30am breakout session on Friday, Nov 15 titled “Live Website Critiques”. Come join us in Portland this November and have your website critiqued by Andy in person!
5 Reasons to Attend the Wine Tourism Conference
The 5th annual Wine Tourism Conference
1. Conference Content & Agenda
There is an amazing line up of industry players and experts gearing up to share their insights into wine tourism, inspire you and your team, and give you valuable take aways that you can go back and implement at your winery immediately. Please check out the conference agenda for full details.
2. Tasting Room Marketing & Social Media Workshops Added
Some of the most popular and engaging sessions at previous Wine Tourism Conferences has been about DTC (Direct to Consumer) sales and Social Media strategy. We felt that each topic deserved more time, and so we have added optional workshops on Wednesday, Nov 13.
The Tasting Room Marketing – Increasing Visitors & Sales workshop will be led by a power trio of players: Dixie Huey of Trellis Growth Partners, Michael Kelly of Sokol Blosser winery, and Brent Johnson of Vin65.
The Social Media workshop will be led by Andrew Healy of 3 Rock Marketing – a Napa based Social Media marketing firm for the wine industry.
3. Networking & Learning from Peers
What industry event brings together wineries from across the country, wine tour operators, winery associations, and tourism associations? There is a great collaborative spirit at the Wine Tourism Conference, and some of the best things learned come from open discussions and sharing by attendees.
4. Wine Tourism is a Growing Industry
The concept of “wine tourism” is growing world-wide, and regions around the world are organizing efforts to increase wine tourism to their areas. The US just celebrated it’s first “Wine Tourism Day” this past may, and governments like Australia are creating substantial initiatives to drive tourism to their wine regions. The Wine Tourism Conference is the best way to understand the trends in wine tourism in order to increase visibility and winery visitorship.
5. Great American Wine Festival
The 1st annual Great American Wine Festival is scheduled directly after the Wine Tourism Conference on Saturday, Nov 16. This inaugural event will showcase wines from across the US to over 350 consumers. For information on how to exhibit your wines, please email us.
Are you a WTC alumni? Do you have any points to add to this list?
Zephyr Adventures is Hiring
Zephyr Adventures is hiring for the position of Conferences Logistics Manager, responsible for running our six annual conferences:
- Wine Bloggers Conference
- International Food Blogger Conference
- Beer Bloggers Conference
- European Beer Bloggers Conference
- Fitness & Health Social Media Conference
- Wine Tourism Conference
This includes the following responsibilities:
- Determining dates and locations for conferences for the following year so we can announce them on-site, including conducting surveys of our alumni, seeking bids from local partners, and negotiating with hotels
- Making sure our sponsors are well taken care of and adequately prepared for the event
- Writing blog posts about sponsors when that benefit is included in their package
- Creating and sending pre-conference packets to attendees, speakers, and sponsors
- Communicating with speakers and sponsors in advance of each conference to make sure they are informed and prepared
- Managing on-site operations of all conferences, with the help of the other Zephyr employees during the event itself
- Wrapping up conferences including sending out surveys to attendees, speakers, and sponsors
- Potentially helping to organize the Great American Wine Festival or Wine Tourism Day
This job is not for everyone. You get to work from home – but that means you have to be really self-motivated and self-directed. You have flexible work hours – but that means you have to be really tuned in to your email and able to respond to our sponsors, speakers, hotels, and other parties very quickly and efficiently. You get to work in very cool industries – but because we run six conferences, you have to be super organized.
This is not a high-level job nor a low-level job. We are looking for a smart, efficient, organized, and fun individual who is looking for a good job with a fun company working in a bunch of amazing industries.
If you are interested to learn more about the job or to apply, please visit our Conferences Logistics Manager Application.
WTC Sponsorship Helps Build Wine Tourism Contacts and Partnerships
The Wine Tourism Conference was created with two goals in mind:
- To support the community of wineries, wine and tourism associations, lodging providers and tour operators in the promotion of their respective business
- To foster collaboration between all sectors of the tourism industry to help the industry grow as a whole
In turn, the conference depends on sponsorship from the industry to make the event possible. The Sonoma County Tourism Bureau was a major sponsor in 2012 and Travel Oregon and the Oregon Wine Board are major sponsors in 2013. However, the WTC also has smaller sponsors and we asked Monica Rosenthal, Executive Director the Lake County Winery Association, her thoughts about sponsoring the event for the second year in a row to gain the perspective of an organization not tied to the host location.
“We were an event sponsor for the first WTC held in Napa last year and we were pleasantly impressed with the program, the speakers, the topics discussed and the networking opportunities not only with the media present at the event, but also with the attendees,” says Rosenthal.
In terms of long term value for an emerging wine tourism destination such as Lake County, Rosenthal felt the conference was well suited for delivering “…contacts and connections; relationships in and around the region and in regions outside of California.”
Additionally she added that “The objective of our association is to bring awareness to the Lake County wine industry and to build tourism in our region and sponsorship of the conference appears to be a natural fit.”
“Participating at the Wine Tourism Conference has value to our marketing program because of connections we make at the event with tourism partners, media, and press and the sharing of new ideas, concepts and marketing strategies that we can utilize to enhance our tourism program in our region.”
Aside from benefits gained by sponsorship, Rosenthal found the Panel of Tourism Industry Leaders to be most illuminating part of the conference. “It was enlightening to discover what others are doing in the tourism arena and to bounce around new ideas.”
We the organizers of the Wine Tourism Conference mostly hope those of you involved in wine tourism choose to attend the conference each year. Your presence is important. However, if you would like to put your business or organization a step ahead as a leader in the wine tourism movement, please considering sponsoring the conference.
For information on sponsorship opportunities for the 2013 Wine Tourism Conference in Oregon, contact Reno Walsh reno@zephyradventures.com for more information.
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