Many patios will be closing and more shutdowns could be coming. Breweries are talking about how they plan to winterize their taprooms, but they are missing an important piece of the puzzle.
Regardless of where your brewery is located, you need to winterize your marketing strategy if you want to keep sales coming in.
If you want to survive this winter, here’s what we recommend doing right now.
1. AUDIT YOUR CURRENT STRATEGY
When’s the last time you audited your social media strategy? A social media audit is just as important as your financial audit. You likely audit your finances at least once a year, and you should also audit your social media strategy on a yearly basis, too.
Reviewing your budget tells you exactly where you are missing the mark, and why you aren’t seeing the results you’re looking for. The same logic applies to social media.
If you never take time to review your social media strategy, you’ll never know what’s working and what’s not. That makes it much harder to see the results you’re looking for. So if you want to see results from your social media, auditing is the first step.
2. SET MEANINGFUL GOALS
Where are you now? Where do you want to be? How can social media help you reach those goals? These answers will vary from brewery to brewery.
Being on social media because you have to be isn’t a good enough reason. If you want to succeed on social media, you need to set specific goals and attach meaning to them.
As you’re setting goals, think about why you’re setting them. Setting goals like reaching 7K followers on Instagram without a reason often results in attracting the wrong audience, which does not lead to more sales for you. A better goal could be increasing your following in a specific geographic area because you want to expand to-go sales in that area.
3. CREATE AN ACTION PLAN
If you don’t have a plan to winterize your marketing strategy, surviving the winter will be very challenging. And here’s why.
Getting your audience’s attention is always important, but it’s especially important heading into the winter. The competition is fierce right now, and it’s not slowing down any time soon. So if you don’t create content your audience cares about, you’ll be missing opportunities to attract customers left and right.
Planning ahead is key if you want to survive the next season. When you have a set action plan, you’ll know how to attract your customers online. This means whether you’re promoting a new release, hosting a virtual event, or increasing to-go sales, your customers are tuned in to what’s going on at your brewery.
LET’S CHAT
If you want to know if you’re on the right track and where you’re missing the mark, an audit is a must-have. Then you can create meaningful goals to guide your marketing efforts and an action plan to make it all happen.
P.S. Waiting around until after winter is really, really risky. So if you’re ready to start preparing for whatever’s coming next, send us a message.