ENGLISH LESSONS IN SOCIAL MEDIA — Why do French wines lag behind ?
As a French student freshly arrived in the United-States, I thought that French wines had nothing to envy to American wine brands. I was wrong.
Yes, I can hear you across the ocean dear French wine lovers: what could we possibly learn from a country where you can eat bacon donuts or chicken fried waffles?!
Well, I am not talking here about taste or winemaking… I am talking about Social Media.
Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat…These tools that allow people, companies and other organizations to create or share information, pictures and videos, are everywhere now.
This is a new challenge for companies: try to get closer to your consumers, make them share and talk about you in order to attract new fans or followers, without losing control of your brand image.
And wine brands are no exception.
Generally, people think of wine as an industry that attracts middle-aged or older individuals, when social media is only used by young people. So why should wine brands care about social media?
First, not only young people use social media; even my grandfather has Facebook now. In 2014, 65% of adults aged from 50 to 64, as well as 49% of the adults over 65, were using social networking.
Moreover, according to a survey by the nonprofit Wine Market Council, Millennials -also known as Generation Y- drank 42% of all wine in the US in 2015, that is to say more than the Baby Boomers (30%) or people over 70 (8%).
Plus, this generation likes to share its wine experiences on social media — notably on Facebook, where more than 50% of them talk about it.
Therefore, knowing if your wine brand is good at social media management is crucial !
I was curious to see if there were any differences in the management of social media between a French wine company and an American one. So I decided to compare a wine from Alsace (my native region in France) and a fancy Californian wine :
Domaines Schlumberger:
The Domaines Schlumberger is a French family vineyard established since 1810. They own 140 hectares with 70 hectares classified as “Grands Crus” (Riesling, Pinot Gris and Gewurztraminer). They also proposed rarest wines called “Les Cuvées de Collection” coming from Late Harvest or from Selection de Grains Nobles (noble roots). They produce only 700.000 bottles per year “in order to grant an excellent and irreproachable quality to each bottle”. These bottles can only be found in the best restaurants and cellars all around the world (they export approximately 65 % of their wines).
Beringer:
Beringer Vineyards is the oldest continuously operating winery in the Napa Valley (St. Helena, California). Founded in 1876, the 1,200 hectares of vineyard are owned today by Treasury Wine Estates, an Australian-based global winemaking and distribution business.
The first problem I experienced during my social media research was when I googled the French wine brand. Indeed, if you type “Schlumberger” on Google, you only got pictures from the oilfield services company which has the same name. Even more annoying, when I typed “Schlumberger wine” to be more specific, I first found images of an Austrian sparkling wine also called Schlumberger!
I was pleasantly surprised though by the Domaines Schlumberger’s official website: most of it is also available in English, and I found the contents very interesting. The brand shares a lot of information about their vineyard and the history of the Domaine (videos, photos). You can even download a free app on your smartphone to enjoy an audio-guided visit in the vineyard (only in French unfortunately). And for each bottle of wine you can find information (history, vinification, tasting) but also instructions on what to eat with the wine.
This part is missing on the Beringer’s website which I find more focused on online sales, private events and the wine club. But unlike Domaines Schlumberger, what the American brand didn’t forget on its website are the links to its different social media platforms : Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and google+.
The results speak for themselves : more than 145 600 fans on Facebook, more than 9 400 followers on Instagram, and more than 16 800 followers on Twitter, when at the same time, the French brand struggles with only 2 190 fans on Facebook, 265 followers on Instagram, and 189 followers on Twitter.
Of course, you can argue that Beringer is a larger and more famous brand than Domaines Schlumberger, but even a brand like Château d’Yquem is far from Beringer’s numbers (40K likes), while the majority of French wine brands don’t even have a Facebook page.
Let’s try to figure out how Domaines Schlumberger could try to close the gap by analyzing Beringer social media management.
First, Beringer is really active on social media. There is a post almost every two or three days. The contents are usually made of gorgeous professional photos and videos (storytelling, campaign “behind the scenes”).
The brand also approached the famed photograph and Instagram influencer Murad Osmann in order to create a series of photos to launch their social media campaign.
Thanks to this partnership, Beringer’s posts broke records. People talked about it and shared it with their friends.
The brand is also organizing a contest where you can post your picture on Instagram using the hashtags #BetterBeckons and #BeringerSG to win a trip for two to Beringer Vineyards and some other prizes. They didn’t hesitate to post the information on Facebook and their number of followers increased since the beginning of the contest (plus almost 500 new likes on Facebook since last week).
Don’t let me be misunderstood : Domaines Schlumberger are not that bad at social media management. They post quite often interesting contents (business travels and events) and they just got Instagram since February this year. A lot of other French wine brands are actually much worse. But there are still little things that let me think Domaines Schlumberger didn’t fully embrace the opportunity of social media.
I think it’s a shame they don’t put all of their social network links on their website. As a consumer of their gorgeous “Gewurztraminer” I would say to them : Don’t hide and invite people to follow your brand. Try to connect your different social networks so people could follow you on every platform. And so next time they order wine in a restaurant, they will ask for your brand!
Share about your sustainable agriculture values, your vision of the wine industry. You could even organize a contest, just like Beringer did. You should share your knowledge (e.g. articles about the different varieties of grape just like on your website). Please, show me all the things a nearly neophyte like me should know to be a social success!
When French wine brands will entirely accept Social Media, I am confident that they will do a better job than any Californian wine.
L’abus d’alcool est dangereux pour la santé. A consommer avec modération. Alcool abuse is dangerous for your health consume and enjoy in moderation.
This post was created as part of the Global Luxury Management Program at the NC State Poole School of Management. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
References :
http://nypost.com/2016/02/16/millennials-are-really-into-drinking-wine/
http://www.pewinternet.org/data-trend/social-media/social-media-use-by-age-group/
