Convince Me

By Rob Bralow, Wine Post Editor

About half a year ago I wrote about how there are certain social rules for the various social media networks that everyone seems to be on. You have your twitter social norms, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. Everyone has their own policy and if you want to know mine, go back and click on the link to my other blog post ("I am only sort of social").

Having seen a good start to it in 2009, which I am sure will only continue in 2010, Facebook has become one of the key centers of social media... ness. Everyone is there already, which means wine companies are beginning to make their presence known. Of course it is not only wine companies, but beer, spirits, toys, clothes, airlines, and "My Skool Need More Attractive Girls/Boys."

I am not sure what that last one is trying to sell, but there are over 600,000 people who are buying it. And I am sure all of them are edumacated.

With all of these new fan pages there is a flood of people trying to build their audience through their friend network. At any given time of my 1,102 friends there are about 200 that will always join/fan/do whatever I send out. It is how I started my own funny page where I post anything I find funny (I like funny). If you are a friend of mine on Facebook, you probably know what I am talking about, although my sense of humor is somewhat juvenile.

So the deluge continues and with it there becomes a dilution of importance. It then boils down to one important thing that most of these companies are missing.

Convince me.

I am waiting to be convinced, begging for it actually. I have so many people sending me things that only something that stands out will really catch my attention. There needs to be a reason for me to become a statistic in your marketing plan. Reasons can be very simple, such as: I know someone that works for you; I was sent a bottle of wine from your winery that I liked; I attended an event of yours; you are running a contest where I could win a corkscrew (well maybe not, I have plenty of those). This entire blog post was started because someone who is a friend of mine on Facebook asked be to become a fan of an organic winery in Dry Creek Valley. I have never been there, never tasted the wines, and never really had it in my mind to be added to the list of people receiving updates from them on Facebook.

My point is that asking me to be a fan of yours (or your company) is great. But I am getting fan requests from hundreds of people and companies. Now you need to go the extra mile and make me not only want to be a fan, but make me want to bring all my friends along with me.