Twitter Chats: How to Create a Successful Tweet Chat

Are you familiar with Twitter chats?

Wondering how Twitter chats can help market your business?

To learn more about Twitter chats and what they can mean for your business, I interview Pam Moore for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast.

More About This Show

The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner.

It’s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

The show format is on-demand talk radio (also known as podcasting).

In this episode, I interview Pam Moore, founder of Marketing Nutz, an agency specializing in social media marketing. One of Pam’s areas of expertise includes Twitter.

Pam shares why businesses should host Twitter chats and the marketing benefits of running them.
You’ll discover how to get started, where to find participants and ways to promote your Twitter chats.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below!

Listen Now

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, Stitcher, SoundCloud or Blackberry.

Here are some of the things you’ll discover in this show:

Twitter Chats

What Is a Twitter Chat? 

A Twitter chat is a way to get people together at a predetermined time and talk about a subject. Their purpose is to organize conversation and connect people.

Use tweet chats to connect people around a particular subject. 

Image source: iStockphoto

Pam says that if you’re new to social media, and to Twitter specifically, then Twitter chats are a great way for you to learn how to use it. Twitter chats not only allow you to form a deep connection with a community, but Pam has also seen people empower their lives and businesses faster than they thought possible.

When you plan a tweet chat, you can make them formal or informal. You’ll find out why Pam recommends that you have a combination of both. You can also do tweet chats in a series, which can help with your brand’s positioning. With this type of tweet chat, you need to put together a strategy over several months.

One of Pam’s clients, IBM, recently held an event called IBM Connect in Orlando, where they hosted tweet chats with some of the influencers and speakers for the event. The aim of these tweet chats was to generate awareness and excitement for the event, plus drive registration.

IBM used tweet chats for the IBM Connect event.

This particular chat had over 40 million impressions over the course of a few days, and included 2500 tweets. Nearly 600 people took part in the conversation
.
You’ll find out what comes after the tweet chat that is just as important as the chat itself and why you are left with a social asset.

Listen to the show to find out what IBM added to the front and back ends of their tweet chat for IBM Connect.

Why host a tweet chat?

One of the marketing benefits when you host your own tweet chat is that you can start to a build a community around it. You can capture the mindshare of that audience for a specific time on a regular basis. This gives you an opportunity to communicate and support your marketing objectives.

You can build a community around tweet chats. Image source: iStockphoto

Your core goal is to focus on the needs of your audience. When you provide great content, which can bring good people to the community, then they’ll begin to depend on you and want more.

Pam has seen so many people—clients included—grow their businesses and make connections and partnerships. It easily puts you in a leadership role.

Listen to the show to discover how a tweet chat can easily go viral.

How to prepare for a tweet chat

Pam says that the process includes both art and science. As the chat leader, you need to provide some framework, but you don’t want it to look like you have planned everything that you say.

You have to balance structure with flexibility and agility. In a structured-style tweet chat, you have a list of questions. Pam usually creates a list of questions and has a specific topic to talk about.

Pam is the leader of the GetRealChat, which is held weekly to educate and help the audience. As the leader, you can share your expertise and also leave the questions open for the community to answer.

Pam leads the GetRealChat every week.

You’ll hear how you can use tweet chats to grow your email opt-in list and subscribers.

Listen to the show to find out what led IBM to put together a social buzz chat after the tweet chat, and how the company created a social asset.

How to get people to participate live 

When you lead a tweet chat, you need to make sure you work in unison with any guests whom you invite to join you. Don’t ever throw them in at the last minute.

The best way is to get on the phone with guests ahead of time, so you can have that voice-to-voice connection first. If it’s your first time on a chat, then Pam encourages you to be on the phone while on the chat.

You’ll discover why Pam likes to get on the conference call 15 minutes before the chat with everybody who is participating. Behind the scenes, the chats are very structured, but to the community it needs to look completely unstructured.

The way to get people to participate in a tweet chat is to leverage your existing community using your email list. If you don’t have one, then you need to start to build a list.

Build an email list if you don’t already have one.

Pam likes to do some market tipping to let people know about the chat.

The most important thing is to make sure your content is good. You can also reach out to some key influencers within your community and get them to partner with you.

You’ll hear the story behind how GetRealChat came about.

A lot of different tweet chats have arisen from the GetRealChat, created by people who came in 3 years ago and hardly knew how to tweet or retweet. These people now lead their own communities and some even work for Pam and her team.

Listen to the show to find out how long a chat should last, and what you need to do to make it succeed.

How to find tweet chats

If you’re new to tweet chats, then head over to the GetRealChat blog to see all of the transcripts from Pam’s tweet chats.

Pam recommends that you use the TweetChat platform. Once you enter the specific hashtag, it will automatically filter all of your tweets for that hashtag. It will also add the hashtag at the end of your tweets, so you don’t have to.

TweetChat will add the hashtag at the end of your tweets.

Listen to the show to find out how we use TweetChat at Social Media Examiner.

Common mistakes to avoid

Pam says that if she were to do it all over again, she would structure her chats more from the start.
The objective of tweet chats is to serve and help people. So if you see it start to take off, then you need to think about monetizing your platform.

IBM is a client of Pam’s because they approached her to participate on her platform and to communicate with her audience. You’ll hear the reasons Pam set up the GetRealChat blog.

Make sure you have a platform for your audience to go to.

When you first start out, you need at least 10-20 people on a chat. It’s about quality over quantity.

Pam has always tried to focus on quality, and to ensure that people feel part of the community. You need to keep the people who care about it really engaged, because they are the heartbeat of the chat.

It’s better to have 100 people who are interested in your content and communicate within your chat on a monthly basis than it is to have 500 who are just tweeting or retweeting because they want to become famous and be part of the hashtag.

You’ll discover how many questions you should have ready and why five is normally not enough.
Listen to the show to find out what turns up the dial on the viral nature of a tweet chat.

The strategic use of retweets

Pam says that when she runs a tweet chat, she has windows open for TweetChat and HootSuite.
You need to make sure you know the key players in your community and give them some social love. Some of the best ways you can do this is to:

• Notice when they ask questions
• Greet them as they come in
• Share relevant content they tweet

Another thing you can do is welcome people back. Pam has people in her community who over time have stepped up into a welcoming role. People just want to be acknowledged.

Listen to the show to hear why Pam doesn’t consider influence score when replying to people.

Tools to help manage a tweet chat

Along with TweetChat, there are a few other tools available to help you manage a tweet chat.
You can use a platform like Storify to help manage your tweets. Tweets can be collected within Storify and then shared in a blog post.

During tweet chats, you or a colleague can favorite some tweets in a separate Twitter window that you know you’ll want to pull into a transcript. This will make it much easier for you to go into Storify, do a search and pull up those tweets.

Use Storify to turn your favorite tweets into a transcript.

To create the transcript, it’s simply drag and drop. Storify then shows you what your transcript will look like.

You need to install the WordPress plugin for Storify on your blog, and once Storify gives you the URL for that transcript, you can easily embed it within your blog post.

The WordPress Storify plugin allows you to embed your tweets into a blog post.

Hashtracking is another tool that Pam loves. It gives you real-time insights for your hashtag.
Some of the measurement features include:

• The reach of your hashtag
• How many impressions you are getting
• How many people participated in the chat
• How many tweets were sent
• What other hashtags were communicated

You’ll discover why Hashtracking is a very powerful tool when you have sponsors involved in your tweet chats.

Pam believes that if you are new to tweet chats, these tools are all you need to get started.

Check out the full podcast episode with Pam Moore.

Listen to the show to hear what you can view in the Hashtracking transcript.

Other Show Mentions

This week’s podcast is sponsored by Social Media Marketing World.


Social Media Marketing World 2014 is our physical mega-conference, which is set to return to San Diego, California on March 26, 27 and 28.

The conference features more than 80 sessions in four major tracks: social tactics, social strategy, community management and content marketing.

If you want to see the excitement for this conference, check out our hashtag #smmw14.

If you enjoy networking and a key part of your business strategy is to meet people who could possibly become business partners, strategic alliance partners or future customers, you will love this conference. We have integrated networking in so many different ways.

1. Bingo on opening night
2. Walks/runs in a morning
3. Opportunity after the opening keynote
4. Dedicated networking space
5. Dedicated networking ambassadors

Be sure to check out more about the conference.

Call in and leave your social media–related questions for us and we may include them in a future show.

Key takeaways mentioned in this episode:

• Connect with Pam Moore at The Marketing Nutz or at Pam Marketing Nut.
• Check out IBM Connect and the hashtag for the event.
• Use TweetChat for Twitter chats.
• Check out Jessica Northey, a country music artist who runs a tweet chat at CMchat.
• Look at the GetRealChat blog for transcripts of Pam’s tweet chats.
• Try Storify to manage your tweets.
• Install the WordPress plugin for Storify, so transcripts can be embedded in a blog post.
• Use Hashtracking to gain real-time insights into your hashtag.
• Learn more about Social Media Marketing World 2014.
• Contact Emily at emily@socialmediaexaminer.com if you are interested in corporate sponsorships for Social Media Marketing World 2014.

Help Us Spread the Word!

Please let your Twitter followers know about this podcast. Simply click here now to post a tweet.
If you enjoyed this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast, please head over to iTunes, leave a rating, write a review and subscribe. And if you listen on Stitcher, please click here to rate and review this show.

Ways to subscribe to the Social Media Marketing podcast:

• Click here to subscribe via iTunes.
• Click here to subscribe via RSS (non-iTunes feed).
• You can also subscribe via Stitcher, SoundCloud and Blackberry.

What do you think? What are your thoughts on creating Twitter chats for your business? Please leave your comments below.

5 Ways to Grow Your Twitter Reach

Are you struggling to grow your Twitter following?

Do you want more people to see your updates?

If you’re a small business, it can take a while to build up your Twitter followers and that can be frustrating. You may wonder how other companies grow quickly and how you can replicate their success.

In this article you’ll discover five ways to jumpstart visibility for your Twitter profile and tweets.

#1: Follow Twitter Basics

Before you do anything else, be sure you understand a few Twitter fundamentals. You can increase your tweet exposure with just a few tweaks:

• Don’t start tweets with @username. Starting a tweet with @username restricts its visibility to only you, the person you’re tweeting and any mutual followers. Your reach is automatically cut short!
  

  Starting a tweet with @username limits your reach.
  

  
  

  Here’s an example of a tweet crafted to put text before the first @username to give this tweet a wider reach.

  
  
• Don’t use more than three hashtags in any one tweet. Too many hashtags in a tweet makes it look spammy and reduces your tweet’s shareability.
• Don’t over-tweet about yourself or your products. The 80/20 rule applies on all social platforms. The 80/20 rule means you spend 80% of the time interacting with and promoting others and 20% of the time promoting yourself and your products.
• Provide as much value as you can. Listen to your followers and the people you follow. What are their pain points? How can you solve those? When you share relevant, interesting tweets (without over-promoting), people see you as an expert and may recommend you to others as an important resource.

#2: Promote Your Twitter Profile Everywhere

Use your other social profiles to tell people about your Twitter handle. Add your Twitter username to the About or Contact sections of Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and any other social profiles you use.

On your website or blog, be sure you have social sharing buttons to make it easy for readers to tell others about your content.

Configure your social sharing button to auto-populate your Twitter username when someone shares an article.

Plugins make it simple to install and customize sharing options and expand your reach by adding via @yourusername every time someone tweets content from your site. This simple customization gets your Twitter handle in front of hundreds of users you may not have reached otherwise.

#3: Cross-Promote Your Giveaways

Giveaways always drive more traffic, visibility and engagement. Take advantage of that by creating a Q&A giveaway that requires entrants to give their answers by tagging you on Twitter and using a specific hashtag.

Extend visibility of your Twitter profile by cross-promoting campaigns using hashtags.

The hashtag is easy to track and ensures you don’t miss part of the conversation. Requiring users to tag your @username ensures a wider audience sees your handle. Be sure to engage with any users who respond or use the hashtag—it’s just good etiquette and you’ll reach even more people.

When you’re ready to promote your giveaway, post the question to all of your social accounts. Start with the platform that has the most engagement, then share across your other social profiles. Don’t forget to share on Twitter!

#4: Interact With Niche Influencers

Whether you’re offline or online, networking is a tried-and-true method for extending your reach. If you haven’t started networking on Twitter, now’s the time.

If you’re truly listening on Twitter, you’ll be able to tell who the influencers are in your niche—those are the people with whom you want to establish a relationship. Remember, the influencers don’t have to be national in scope, they can be important locals as well (e.g., the newspaper editor or local newscasters).

Start a Twitter conversation with a few of the influencers in your niche and add as much value to the conversation as you can. The more interesting you are, the more likely it is that an influencer will respond to or spread your message.

The Fort Collins, CO band @FierceBad has a modest 683 followers, but has established a relationship with the amazingly popular @newbelgium (New Belgium Brewing, also in Fort Collins). When Fierce Bad released a new video, New Belgium Brewing tweeted it out to their 187,500 fans—quite a bit bigger audience.

Influencers can attract huge attention for you on Twitter.

#5: Find Allies in an Online Community

If you think you’re alone in trying to build Twitter exposure, think again! There are lots of communities for people just like you who want to network.

These communities are generally built around niches, so it’s easy to find one where members share your interests. Shared interests mean it’s easier to find good content to send out to your followers (remember the 80/20 rule!). Since sharing is usually (but not always) reciprocal, you’re benefitting too.

Most online communities are free to join and welcome new members with open arms. Here are 10 communities you can join to increase your exposure on Twitter:

• BizSugar
• Blokube
• DoSplash
• Klinkk
• Inbound.org
• List.ly
• ManageWP.org
• Social Buzz Club
• The Writers Social
• Triberr

BizSugar posts have a Tweet button and the tweets from this community can add up.

You’ll find that many serious marketers have a strong presence in multiple online communities like these because they realize the overall value. Joining the same communities allows you to connect with those influencers (and expand your Twitter reach) on a larger scale.

Conclusion

Whether you’re starting a brand-new Twitter profile or you have an established profile that’s struggling to develop a larger following, you can increase Twitter exposure.

Make sure you’ve got the basics down, then move on to connecting with influencers, sharing interesting updates and joining relevant communities.

What do you think? What’s been your biggest challenge with getting exposure on Twitter? Do you have advice for others? Let us know in the comments.

Twitter for Business: How to Use Twitter to Grow Your Influence

Do you use Twitter for your business?

Are you wondering how to use Twitter to grow your online influence?

To learn how to best use Twitter for your business, I interview Joel Comm for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast.

More About This Show

The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner.

It’s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

The show format is on-demand talk radio (also known as podcasting).

In this episode, I interview Joel Comm, author of numerous books including Twitter Power 2.0 and So, What Do You Do? He’s also the host of The Joel Comm Show, a business podcast.

Joel shares how he uses Twitter to grow his platform.

You’ll learn how to grow a quality Twitter following, and which types of content work best.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below!

Listen Now

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, Stitcher or Blackberry.

Here are some of the things you’ll discover in this show:

Twitter for Business

So, “What do you do?”

Joel explains how he asks questions and helps people discover what their core is.

This can include passions, talents, skills, abilities and personality, which are used to bring value to the world around them. This is how you find ultimate fulfillment.

Listen to the show to find out the importance of starting a conversation.

Why marketers should pay close attention to Twitter

Joel explains how Twitter is still relevant. They have 200 million active users every day, which is really impressive when up against Facebook’s 1 billion–plus accounts.

The thing that made Twitter cool in the first place is its simplicity. It remains relevant because it’s where people gather. Joel calls it the virtual water cooler.

Twitter is where people gather.

Twitter is a place for short conversations, which can be extremely powerful and relevant.

Joel says that the water cooler strategy is to engage. You’ll find out the two different ways that Joel engages on Twitter and why significance is so important.

The most essential part is to be authentic. You can connect in the moment, which can be greater than you might imagine.

Joel describes how pictures are an excellent use of Twitter. He likes to tweet from Instagram and can post from his Instagram account to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr andFoursquare, all at the same time.

Twitter only allows 140 characters, so when you use pictures, it can be a lot of bonus words. Even mundane pictures can get a lot of interaction.

Listen to the show to hear an example of a picture that Joel used that made him realize there’s a lot of power in mundane tweets.

How Joel uses Twitter today to grow his platform 

Joel has started to check out more of what people on his stream have to say and thenreshares their content. He does this more than tweeting his own original content. It’s the giver mentality.

A couple of Twitter’s strengths are the retweet and the favorite. They’re great opportunities to focus on the value that others bring.

There are days when Joel doesn’t tweet at all. Other days, he can get 5 or 6 tweets in. It all depends on what’s happening that particular day. You should never just tweet for the sake of tweeting.

When it comes to a tweeting strategy, you’ll discover why it’s important to be true to yourself and be aware of the types of businesses Twitter works best for.

Listen to the show to find out why Joel generally uses the standard retweet over a customized retweet.

How to grow a quality Twitter following

Joel advises starting with absolutely nothing. If you are new on Twitter and don’t know where to begin, Joel recommends you start with a hashtag that is in an area of interest. The next step is to discover people who are talking about your personal or business interests. As entrepreneurs, there is typically an overlap of the two.

Once you start to follow people, you can then bring value to the conversation either through a retweet or a reply. A great way to engage with people is to ask questions and then wait for the answer. When somebody posts a question that you think you can answer, go for it.

A lot of people don’t stop to think about how they engage. To increase your follower base organically, you need to be able to relate to people and bring value to them.

Back in June 2009, Joel wrote an article entitled “Fourteen Types of Tweets,” which explained the different ways to engage with people on Twitter.

Joel describes how the hashtag drives search on Twitter. When you use a hashtag before a word or phrase, it gives a common base from which to look for content. Twitter is a 24-hour news outlet. The hashtag allows you to find content.

Listen to the show to find out why Joel looks at Twitter as the biggest nonstop party.

The strategy of following others

Joel explains why he doesn’t like to prescribe a single approach to using Twitter.

When he first started out on Twitter, the mindset was to follow people back who followed you. It was the respectful thing to do.

However, when Joel reached 70,000 followers, he soon discovered that Twitter became unusable. People you want to follow get lost in the shuffle.

You’ll find out why Joel did something controversial in November 2009, and wrote a blog post about it.

Joel went from following 70,000 people to 917.

Joel explains that you should never use Twitter as a billboard. You need to engage with people on a human level and bring value.

It’s extremely important to reply to other people, as it shows them that you are a real person and you care what they have to say. Zig Ziglar said years ago, “People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.”

Listen to the show to discover how you can use Twitter to drive traffic back to your primary channel and why Joel thinks it’s a huge mistake to use third-party sites to build a platform.

How to use Twitter to get exposure for your blog post, podcast or YouTube video

Joel explains that not only does he have a blog, he also has a number of websites. For example, Joel’s editor at WorldVillage finds infographics that are of interest to Joel, which then allows him to retweet them.

Joel retweets infographics from WorldVillage because it adds value for his followers.

It’s content that he shares from one of his sites. The content doesn’t talk about him; it brings value to the conversation. If people find it of interest, they will ultimately end up on one of his sites.

Listen to the show to find out how you can use Twitter to make the sales process easy.

How to optimize your Twitter profile across all third-party apps and mobile devices

Joel is a big believer that you need to have consistent branding across all of your platforms.

Twitter is unique in that it gives you more real estate to play with. You have your profile picture and the background, which allow you to do some clever things.

Joel believes that as long as your profile works on the main Twitter app, then you’ll be OK for mobile, as Twitter will resize it for you.

You’ll find out why it’s impossible to get your profile to work across all mobile apps.

Listen to the show to find out the importance of having a good photograph and bio description to populate across every different Twitter client.

Why marketers should pay attention to Klout

Joel explains that when Klout first started, the advice was for you to connect your Twitter account with them and they would be the arbiters of how much social influence you had.

Their algorithm will assign you a number between 0 and 100. It tells you how much influence you have for keywords and in niches and markets.

Joel’s Klout score is 83.

You’ll find out why most people thought it didn’t mean anything when it first came out and why Klout has now gone from saying “We are important” to actually beingimportant.

In today’s age of influence marketing, big brands want to find influential individuals who can share the brand’s message. Joel believes you will start to see more of this.

You’ll hear how companies use Klout Perks to get influential people to talk about them in a positive way.

Listen to the show to find out about what happens once you have connected your account.

Discovery of the Week

I’ve recently started to use my personal profile on YouTube and have discovered theYouTube Subscribe button.

You can embed a YouTube Follow button directly onto your website and then with a click of the button, a blog reader can become a subscriber to your YouTube channel without leaving your blog/website.

The button is very similar to the one you see that allows someone to become a one-click fan of a Facebook page or to become a follower of a LinkedIn page.

The YouTube Subscriber button.

It’s really cool. I suggest you go ahead and give it a try.

Call in and leave your social media–related questions for us and we may include them in a future show.

Listen to the show to learn more and let us know how this works for you.

Other Show Mentions

Social Media Marketing World 2014 is our physical mega-conference, which is set to return to San Diego, California on March 26, 27 and 28.

The conference features more than 60 sessions in 4 major tracks, which include social tactics, social strategy, community management and content marketing.

People are coming from all over the world. At this year’s conference, people came from more than 31 countries and dozens of people came from Australia.

Here are some of the countries that will be represented: Norway, United Arab Emirates, France, Germany, Australia, Denmark, Spain, Mexico, New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, India, Peru, Panama, Venezuela, Brazil and the UK.

As you can see, this is truly a global conference. We are expecting to see 2000 marketers in San Diego, doing nothing but living and breathing social media and having a lot of fun and connecting with fellow marketers. So be sure to check it out.

Key takeaways mentioned in this episode:

• Connect with Joel Comm on his website, Twitter and LinkedIn.
• Listen to The Joel Comm Show.
• Check out Joel’s books: Twitter Power 2.0 and So, What Do You Do?
• Listen to the podcast with Ric Dragon, Social Media Science: How Behavior Impacts Social Media Marketing.
• Try TweetChat to see chatter around a particular hashtag.
• Read Joel’s articles: Fourteen Types of Tweets and I Purged My Twitter Account.
• Learn more about Zig Ziglar.
• Head over to WorldVillage to see the type of content Joel shares on Twitter.
• Discover more about Klout and Klout Perks.
• Try the YouTube Subscribe button on your blog/website to build your YouTube subscribers.
• Email Emily at emily@socialmediaexaminer.com if you are interested in corporate sponsorships for Social Media Marketing World 2014.
• Learn more about Social Media Marketing World 2014.

Help Us Spread the Word!

Please let your Twitter followers know about this podcast. Simply click here now to post a tweet.

If you enjoyed this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast, please head over to iTunes, leave a rating, write a review and subscribe. And if you listen on Stitcher, please click here to rate and review this show.

Ways to subscribe to the Social Media Marketing podcast:

• Click here to subscribe via iTunes.
• Click here to subscribe via RSS (non-iTunes feed).
• You can also subscribe via Stitcher and Blackberry.

What do you think? What are your thoughts on using Twitter to grow your influence? Please leave your comments below.

How a Winery Uses Social Media to Increase Sales and Brand Loyalty

How can wineries use social media to increase sales when the law prohibits them from giving away product samples?

Whitehall Lane, a 20-year-old Napa Valley winery run by the Leonardini family, has hit on awinning social media formula that pays dividends in both increased sales and brand loyalty.

Wineries face special challenges in promoting their business on social media. The federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, known as the TTB, considers social media “advertising,” and regulates what wineries can do.

The regulations primarily affect Whitehall Lane in two different ways. They cannot run contests that give away wine, and they must monitor user-generated content for anything that might promote irresponsible drinking.

“We don’t fool around with the TTB regulations,” said Katie Leonardini, direct sales manager for Whitehall Lane. But that hasn’t stopped them from successfully using social media to grow a loyal fan base outside the tasting room. This in turn has increased both wine club membership and direct sales. Here’s how they do it.

Whitehall Lane Winery uses Instagram as one way to foster brand loyalty.

Organization: Whitehall Lane Winery

Social Media Handles & Stats

• Website
• Blog
• Facebook – 4,150 followers
• Twitter – 3,898 followers
• Instagram – 432 followers
• Pinterest – 265 followers

Highlights

• Direct sales have increased month-to-month with no increase in tasting room walk-ins
• Wine club member sales increased 39% from September 2012 to September 2013
• Wine club member retention has increased to over 99% each month
• Wine dinners at partnering restaurants sell out, and wine club signups at the dinners have increased dramatically

Whitehall Lane started using Facebook and Twitter in 2009. They’ve since expanded onto Instagram, Pinterest and a blog within the last year and a half.

By keeping an eye on their brand while experimenting through trial and error, they’ve hit on a social media formula that reaches beyond the tasting room by: 1)partnering with complementary brands, 2) rewarding loyal fans and 3)educating and telling stories vs. selling.

Partnering With Complementary Brands

Contests and giveaways are standard tactics on social media for retail brands. But TTB regulations prohibit wineries from giving away alcohol. Whitehall Lane has overcome this challenge through some creative thinking.

Leonardini identifies complementary brands that fit with their objectives for contests. The winery has given away wine glasses and cookbooks, for example. They’ve also done giveaways with Whitehall Lane estate olive oil.

Whitehall Lane partnered with Govino glasses for this Instagram contest.

Finding complementary brands is a way for wineries to do giveaways.

Whitehall Lane also retweets content on Twitter and likes Instagram photos of complementary brands that promote tourism in Napa Valley.

Whitehall Lane liked this photo on the Instagram feed of a Napa Valley inn.

Rewarding Loyal Fans

Whitehall Lane does not run contests on social media to get new followers. They run them to reward existing fans. “It’s never a refer-a-friend type of contest,” said Leonardini.

They would rather use contests to collect email addresses of current fans for their database than inflate follower numbers with people who aren’t true fans of their brand. Whitehall Lane also does not advertise on Facebook.

Whitehall Lane rewards fans with special promos and contests.

“All of our fans are genuine,” said Leonardini. “Whitehall Lane isn’t about hundreds of thousands of fans, it’s more about the quality and the conversation,” she said.

The winery also rewards fans informally by liking their photos on Instagram and giving shout-outs on Facebook and Twitter. In return, fans naturally share Whitehall Lane content.

Whitehall Lane reposted this fan's Instagram photo to their own feed.

Reposting and liking Instagram photos informally rewards fans.

Whitehall Lane gives shout-outs to fans on their Facebook page.

“We’ve found that when you have genuine, authentic followers, you don’t even have to ask them to RT or share your posting, because they’ll do it on their own,” said Leonardini.

Whitehall Lane finds that fans naturally share content that resonates with them.

Their focus on growing a fan base organically has an added benefit—they almost never have to remove user posts or comments for spam or encouraging alcohol abuse. This makes it much easier to comply with TTB regulations.

Educating and Telling Stories vs. Selling

When Whitehall Lane first started using Twitter, they would search for people who were asking which Napa Valley wineries to go to or who had checked in at another winery. They would then tweet with a 2-for-1 offer to come in to their tasting room.

It did bring in traffic. “But they were people looking for free tastings,” Leonardini said. Although numbers in the tasting room went up, sales did not follow. They decided to change their Twitter strategy.

Now the winery uses Twitter primarily to educate fans about food and wine pairings and share facts about Napa Valley and winemaking. The interaction they receive tells them this is what their followers want.

Whitehall Lane finds that educational tweets are what their followers want.

“When we tweet something that’s educational, we get an average of four to seven retweets,” said Abbi Whitaker of the Abbi Agency, a public-relations firm that works with Whitehall Lane.

Educational tweets get more retweets and favorites than promotional ones.

The winery has also started a blog where they post recipes, updates from the winemaker and harvest notes. Though blog subscribers are fewer than they would like right now, they’re focusing on consistency and quality content and believe the numbers will follow.

“We’re not just going to buy a list and shoot out our blog to them,” said Leonardini. “We want it to grow because people want to [subscribe].”

Results: Successful Wine Dinners and Increased Wine Club Sales

Subscribers to Whitehall Lane’s wine club get three to four shipments of wine a year; the club is a big part of the winery’s business. But they were getting calls from subscribers, often after three shipments, asking to cancel. When asked why, subscribers would often say they loved the wine, but they belonged to three wine clubs and had to let one go.

“We’ve been able to greatly reduce that [problem] because of social media,” Leonardini said.

Whitehall lane encourages club members to follow them on social media. “Even though they live in North Carolina or Nebraska, they get the feeling that they’re still here in touch with us, and our retention rate has changed dramatically,” said Leonardini.

Whitehall Lane uses social media to make wine club members feel connected.

The winery also partners with fine restaurants across the country to put on wine dinners. The dinners are not a new idea. What’s new is the response they now get.

Because of their social media following, restaurants now approach them about helping to promote the wine dinners. RSVPs are now up to the point that the dinners sell out—a win-win for the restaurants and the winery.

“Wine sales at these dinner events now exceed a busy Saturday in the tasting room during the high season,” Leonardini said.

In addition, the number of wine club signups at the dinners has increased dramatically. “It’s a whole new outlet for us,” said Leonardini. “Previously the only venue to sign up club members was through the tasting room, but now we can sign them up at these dinners throughout the country.”

Over to You

Despite federal advertising regulations, Whitehall Lane has found a way tosuccessfully use social media with tangible results to their bottom line.

What do you think? Is your business in a regulated industry? How have you used social media to increase brand loyalty and sales? Include your comments and questions below.