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valley korbel wine blobbers oregon travel tokalon winery not-for-profit jess jackson massale selection wine & spirits magazines kenny shopsin next generation apple the psychology of wine the vintners art australian wine vinexpo jay mcinerney the gaslight anthem the pioneer woman james laube sylvester pinot noir goodguide cornell enology wine tycoon game stavin kelly fleming national wine & spirits kurt andersen " "new world wine" poseurs macari vineyards sette 7 swanson vineyards sunbox eleven wine winery sponsorship champagne sales wine criticism cork'd 2008 vina mar reserva sauvignon blanc randy caparoso wine + music midwest wine culture chimney rock elevage hunningbird wine beaux freres jon bonne the wine case climber white agency nil charlie weis sugar free wine a very goode job 2007 sean minor four bears pinot noir trefethen generation y and wine 2009 auction napa valley sonoma county wine wipes san francisco wine competition clary ranch tim hanni wine bar bets the winemakers tv australia wine fantesca judgment of paris women in wine oregon pinot gris three-tier carmenere wine heist purpose-idea rose wine sales vincellar dominic foppoli discoveries pathfinder 1% for the planet wine industry news negociant wine business monthly 2008 food & wine winemaker of the year eric asimov travel oregon jordan winery amy poehler wine micro sites umami chris phelps vegas wine qpr wines jimmy clausen winery hospitality 2007 forty-five north cabernet franc alpine for dummies 2008 honig sauvignon blanc ed mccarthy wine to relax erobertparker little zagreb wine magazines howard schultz paul mabray wine blogging ethics youtube cheap wine wine bard weds wine dj journey three dollar koala pinot noir reviews chronicle wine klinker brick maria thun bad wine mumm napa slate wine columnist wine pricing wine blog awards 2010 bottle shock movie sketches of spain red bicyclette court paul gregutt trefethen oak knoll cabernet sauvignon zinfandel reviews tasting note desciptors natural 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June 22 2008
The 1st Annual Wine Blogger Conference commences October 24th in Sonoma. Organized by the Open Wine Consortium, led by Joel Vincent with a big helping hand from Tom Wark, and co-hosted by Zephyr Wine Adventures, the three-day event should prove to be a valuable educational and networking event for all participants. And, here’s hoping that material progress comes out of the event, as well—particularly around brainstorming ways to enhance progress.
The elephant in the room in regards to wine blogging is the two-headed monster called “credible monetization.” This, not so coincidentally, is also the area where the most material progress is necessary. Simply, most people that engage in wine blogging want more credibility and they would not mind making a little money from the time spent blogging.
But, let us face it, despite the occasional wine sample, free books from publishers, a paltry Google Adsense check, and the ‘once in a blue moon’ paid ad, the rewards from writing a wine site are much more deeply personal than they are financial.
For whatever reason, wine blogging, unlike other niches like product affinity groups (ex: iPod) and politics (ex: Huffington Post), has not seen the progress forward to legitimacy that is necessary to make wine blogging a truly dynamic force in the marketplace.
I hope that the Wine Blogger Conference is a step forward in making progress towards the goal of creating an influence mechanism that can take on the power wielded by traditional media.
20th century social critic and philosopher Eric Hoffer said, “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”
Wine blogging is ready to become a business and hopefully never degenerates into a racket.
In order to do so, it will not be pretty. There is a deeply rooted philosophical bent towards full disclosure and integrity, two noble notions that are not always simpatico with capitalism, and what makes business such a racket sometimes. This does not even begin to mention and acknowledge the iconoclasm that is inherent to blogging. Wine bloggers are a collaborative and helpful lot, but there are not a whole lot of people willing to take a backseat to another.
This is the Achilles heel of making progress: wine blogger ethos + wine blogger pathos.
Secondarily, the bloody truth of wine blogging is that wine journalism as a niche is controlled like the Third Reich—pick your dictator: Wine Spectator or the Wine Advocate. Neither is going to give any help to the friendly competition anytime soon. In fact, given that Parker started with Ralph Nader as an influence, I think he probably understands the competitive opportunity that blogs wield.
Whether wine bloggers like it or not, I do not anticipate a day in the near future where respect and legitimacy is conferred, therefore, we must make and take our respect. Similar to what Parker did in bucking convention.
I have an idea that I would like to explore in the “Unconference” portion of the event that I think will create a coalition of legitimacy.
Have you ever wondered what value “The Wines of Austria” get out of ads in Wine Spectator? Me, too.
With ad rates north of $30K for a full page and in the $15K range for a 1/3 page ad, do you think that money can be better spent elsewhere, amongst real influencers?
Yes!
Here is the sketch of the idea. Lenn from Lenndevours has done a terrific job with his Wine Blogging Wednesday thematic tasting collective. I would like to see something very similar, but organized like a commerce-oriented cooperative.
Wine Blogging Review Coalition (WBRC)
• Founders of the WBRC invite bloggers with participation limited to 20 bloggers in the first year
• Every participant must complete some form of education by the end of the first year of their participation—either the Introductory Master Sommelier course or Certified Specialist of Wine (CSW)
- A portion of first year blogger earnings are held in escrow and paid upon completion of training at which point the money can be paid to tuition for training by the blogger
• Solicited sponsorship from US-based International wine organizations (and domestic wine associations and wineries, as well)—Wines of Australia, Wines of New Zealand, Wines of Spain, Wines of Austria, etc. to a Wine Blogging Review Coalition web site. Includes advertising on the WBRC site and the blogger tasting participants in addition to participation grants to writers
• Wine reviews are coordinated as frequently as necessary based on specific wine samples from the sponsoring organization. Additional sponsorship fees go into the cooperative fund for the writer participation grants
• All bloggers participating write a review with some common standards for narrative structure and reviewing format (i.e. stars, points, etc.)
• Wine blogger participants are held to no guidelines for the content of their review—they are free to write as glowingly or critically frank of the wine as they deem appropriate.
• All content is published on the blog writer’s blog, the Wine Blogging Review Coalition blog and provided back to the international wine organization for their re-use and re-purpose with some copyright reserved to the author. POS materials are also created for the sponsoring organization’s use.
Really, this takes the core of Wine Blogging Wednesday and enhances it with fair collaboration and monetization in mind. It addresses integrity, it addresses the competence of reviews with the educational component, it creates an organized central body, and it addresses the ability to leverage the review for marketing purposes with the client.
Wineries participating get ready access to influencers, they get wine reviews for PR purposes and they get POS materials to use in the channel.
So, this is what I hope to discuss at the Wine Bloggers Conference, in addition to meeting many friends and peers.
If you have an enhancement idea for the Wine Blogging Review Coalition, which is admittedly only version .5 in development, please feel free to leave a comment for all to see.
June 19 2008
When Robert Mondavi passed away last month, I was taken by the virtual moment of silence that many bloggers offered, seemingly independent of one another. It was a compendium of respectful thoughts paid by people that understand what Mondavi meant to the U.S. wine industry culture over the course of the last 40 + years.
Mondavi was THE figure in U.S. wine, his influence casting a shadow unmatched by any other peer. His family saga creating a tableau for the wine public to watch, a human diorama that, unfortunately, sometimes eclipsed the enormous good he did in bringing wine out of French restaurants and into our homes.
And, likewise, it was with an equal amount of surprise that I saw some bloggers publicly noting that they did not understand why all this attention was being given to Mondavi upon his passing.
Certainly, in many respects, it lessens the credibility of those bloggers in my eyes. To not know and respect Robert Mondavi is akin to calling yourself a basketball fan, but not knowing what Michael Jordan means to the game. Or, perhaps, listening to the Count Basie Orchestra and wondering what the fuss is about Sinatra and the “Rat Pack.”
Maybe these were innocent and benign scribbles. But, as Harry Truman said, “The only thing new in the world is the history you don’t know.”
In a culture short on culture and even shorter on memory, I would urge those that do not know about Mondavi to learn something new.
The Press-Democrat has a nice article on a Mondavi today, reporting on a gathering at his namesake winery on what would have been his 95th birthday, a band playing “Volare,” said to be a favorite of Mondavi’.
In a final honor to Mondavi, I offer another moment of silence and “Volare” from Dean Martin.
June 18 2008
It looks like the French finally decided that their wine doesn’t sell itself. We’ll see how much the last 20 years has aided their indoctrination into good ol American capitalism, not to mention the three-tier system.
According to Wine & Spirits Daily, the French are upping their US marketing budget in 2008 by $2.6M and allocating that spend to on and off-premise promotions aimed at education and trial.
From Wine & Spirits Daily:
Wines of France says it will launch “an aggressive sales promotion campaign” across the U.S., but focus mainly on the key markets of New York metro, Washington DC metro, South Florida, California, Illinois, Texas and Massachusetts. This will include tastings in both the on- and off-premise, as well as a host of promotional materials for all stores backed by French music.
Methinks that there needs to be some economic incentives (Read: Grease money and legally called SPIFF’s) to make sure their POS materials actually find their way to a store. But, maybe that’s just the cynic in me.
June 16 2008
Okay, so I still don’t get Twitter. Be that as it may, I keep trying. In lieu of my understanding, and perhaps because of my naivete, I give to you my version of Twitter—1908 postcard style; a quote from a greek dramatist and the father of comedy some three hundred years before JC.
June 15 2008
I generally keep this site a shill free zone, but business is business and my business is blogging for business.
Try and say that 10 times fast! At the least, while you are trying to say that tongue twister, you can alternately take some sips of free Starbucks coffee, but more on that in a second.
I have made no secret that 2 ½ years ago, when I started blogging, I was a hard-working Brand Manager and then a software sales rep. for a large technology distributor in the IBM channel. I was caught up as a (relatively) young guy in a business populated by people, mostly, at least 10 years my senior. I was still looking for an opportunity that would thrust me out of the Dilbert comic strip and into a trajectory that was satisfying, or at least not soul destroying.
Then I started blogging and my career turned upside down, in the best way possible.
Based on my blog, I got hooked up with a technology company that services the wine industry. At the time, the opportunity to join a start up company with solid funding, IN THE WINE INDUSTRY, was manna from heaven.
While that opportunity to build a direct business-to-business wine buying program was exciting, rewarding and fun, ultimately I moved on, leaving the portion of the business that I was involved in better than when I found it, which is about all you can ask of an employee from an employer perspective. Note to self—it is better to be Henry Ford then the cave dweller that invents the wheel, or the anonymous German that invented the engine, for that matter.
Then in March of this year, I transitioned to a leadership role with Compendium Blogware, a Software as a Service (SaaS) company based in Indianapolis, IN.
Off the road and sleeping in my own bed consistently has been nice, even if my drive to work contains absolutely no vineyard scenery and no KNBR 680 am. So, yes, in a relatively short period, I have moved in and out of the wine industry and now I work for a blog software firm.
Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined this just a few short years ago.
The thing that makes my current employ, Compendium, so unique and valuable is that blogging for business is on a lifecycle similar to the trajectory of email marketing circa 1998. Now, email marketing is ubiquitous. Blogging will be the same way.
However, while Typepad and Wordpress beat each other up for incremental market share trying to figure out the monetization of advertising across all of the citizen journalist sites, nobody is addressing the corporate market—folks that want a solution with light-bodied content management-like capabilities for administrative approval, and an actual way to measure results separate from mindshare and influence.
In traditional blogging, mindshare and influence are critical to success, but in marketing where real dollars are attached to a need for real results, sometimes that “influence” notion is a tough sell.
Compendium solves both of those challenges by including an administrative layer with developing enterprise blog content management capabilities and by also incorporating some secret sauce that aids in search engine optimization for customers. Therefore, it translates that “influence” to actual results.
It is all pretty cool and something I passionately believe in.
That said, our customer acquisition has been strong and steady, but in these Web 2.0 days you want to take the car from 60 mph to 120 mph. Since I lead the client services and support, I am essentially asking you to help make my life busy, very busy.
We want to scale our customer base another 3X this year.
In order to do this, Compendium Blogware and I are offering $50 worth of free Starbucks coffee to anybody that makes a referral to this link.
However, here is the very favorable and positive rub on the referral—that is all it has to be. Who do you know that should be blogging, but is not? Any wineries? Um, I think there probably are a few. So, if you make a referral, you get the $50 Starbucks gift card no questions asked and the referral does not have to become a customer of Compendium, just engage in a conversation to understand how we are different and better than solutions that are optimized for citizen journalists. That is it. It is as close as you can get to a “no-strings-attached, but you get something in return” offer.
We will do the rest and we are confident that once we get an opportunity to talk through the blog landscape and how we approach the business and blogging in general that a client will see the value and the opportunity in becoming our partner.
So, am I blogging for a purpose? You bet I am. I hope are too, please hit the link to help somebody else do the same.
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