Most marketing and sales

experts at wineries see a future when all their customer records are integrated into one database that includes wine club, tasting room sales and Internet orders, but few have reached that nirvana. Instead, many limp along with different systems for each operation, deterred by the complexity, cost and time required to combine them—and by tales circulating around the industry of former problems.

To determine where things stand, Wine Business Monthly surveyed 406 wineries about their tasting room software. In particular, they were asked if they used integrated database that tracked all consumers, not just visitors to tasting rooms, wine club members and Internet buyers. They were also asked if they used this software to segment customers for analysis, marketing or sales.

Just over half (51 percent) did have integrated database, but 20 of those didn’t yet see any significant benefit to it.

Almost as many 45 percent didn’t use integrated customer records but 33 percent wish they did.

Likewise, only 9 percent did extensive segmentation of the customer database with the software, while 31 percent did basic segmentation and 54 percemt didn’t do any.

Lesley Berglund, a Harvard MBA, long-time Internet wine sales entrepreneur and co-founder of WISE Academy, which teaches direct-to-consumer skills, notes that the basic foundation for all consumer direct marketing is data segmentation because all customers are not created equal.

A database will consist of different customer categories, from prospects to first-time buyers to buyers who have bought multiple times to real loyal fans and/or club members.

The key is to speak (tailor your marketing message) to these different categories appropriately. “If you treat your loyal fans and club members as if they are just prospects who have not yet bought from you, they will be insulted,” she notes. “And if you treat prospects as if they are already committed to your brand, that will be confusing.”

“One of the reasons we are so behind as an industry and need to ‘raise the bar’ on consumer direct business is that most wineries do not segment their database and, as a result, speak to all customers as if they are the same. This depresses sales and is frankly just bad manners,” she warns.

She notes a few reasons wineries don’t segment their marketing messages:

•    They don’t understand its importance.

•    They are lazy, can’t be bothered or are stretched too thin,

•    They do not have the systems capability to do so.

She says that getting current customers to become loyal fans requires the ‘Platinum Rule.’ “If the ‘Golden Rule’ is treating others like you want to be treated, the Platinum Rule is treating others the way they want to be treated.”

That means you need to know via a customer relationship database how they want to be treated.

She adds, “If you have your customer data spread out among different systems such as tasting room POS, wine club management systems and e-commerce systems, then you can’t have one whole view of the customer profile and activities.

Unfortunately, most wineries don’t have integrated databases, so they need to choose which will be the primary database and load all the relevant data into it.

For those who have one integrated CRM database and are not really getting benefits out of it, Berglund admits that it is probably because they are not trained or do not have the functional expertise in direct marketing to leverage the power of the system. “ That is one of the many reasons wine industry leaders encouraged us to create the WISE Academy,” she says.

Among those who have been successful is Bernardus Winery in Carmel Valley, Monterey County, California. Stan Rogalsky manages the winery’s tasting room, which is responsible for all direct sales including wine club and Internet. He says they use Elypsis software, which tracks all customers. “It does a great job,” he says. He adds that the same program also tracks wholesale customers. “They’re all part of the same family to us.”

The software includes members of the winery’s club as well as people who just stop by the winery tasting room. The winery attempts to capture all the names, though it can be challenging on a busy weekend afternoon.

In addition to keeping records of customer purchases, the software makes it easy for Rogalsky to segment the members of the database for different promotions. “Locals often buy wine when they visit the tasting room, but they’re also interested in special sales. Many even have us ship the wine rather than coming by to pick it up,” he says.

Having one point of control—this case, the tasting room—helps Justin take advantage of the program’s integration, of course. At many wineries, wine club, Internet sales and tasting rooms operate somewhat independently and don’t always cooperate well.

Bill Heritage is with 5,000-case Heritage Winery in New Jersey, where he manages the consumer VinNow database and is working now with WINS. New Jersey doesn’t allow shipping—even within the state—so the winery’s database is primarily of consumers who come by the tasting room to buy.

It also has outlets, extensions of its license, at several BYOB restaurants and sells to a few local restaurants and liquor stores.

Heritage recently received his graduate degree in marketing, and appreciates the power of integrated marketing. He also spent time in Sonoma Valley wineries, where he said he learned a lot about marketing wine.

Heritage connected the product to the Vertical Response software, which he regards much like the general purpose Constant Comment and allows him to conduct sophisticated marketing. He’s even created customer loyalty cards, which consumers can use at the winery for special deals. “Customers love them,” he said.

Mike Owen of 4,000-case Crystal Basin Cellars in the California Gold Country has been using the integrated VinNow program for three years. He uses the program for the 10-year-old winery’s wine club, inventory, tracking event tickets, shipping, day-to-day transactions in its tasting room—and as a source of information for emailed promotions using Vertical Response.

He just recently starting using its capability on the Internet. The former Silicon Valley CPA says the program forces you to be organized. He seems quite happy with the results.

One typical winery that hasn’t yet integrated its lists is Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, where Sara McNally says the ideal would be to integrate all customer records. There, as at many wineries, one program was in use for accounting, then another was selected for the wine club and still another for the shopping cart used in Internet sales. With the winery’s acquisition by Ste. Michelle Winery, is it now transitioning to an integrated EVT system that winery is installing. Both wineries are relatively large, however.

McNally admits that it’s easier to implement at a small winery, or even better, a new wine company. “Imagine the program crashing on a Saturday afternoon during harvest and shutting down the tasting room,” she warns.

Though progress may seem elusive, there’s little question that more and more wineries are integrating their customer records and using them for more sophisticated markets. As other wineries see their success, they’re likely to join in—but they want someone else to make the mistakes first! wbm

Paul Franson of Napa, California, writes on wine and business.