Insights into Advertising Your Brewery

Lately there have been a lot of new breweries opening up around us. I can’t even express how excited this makes me. It shows that our area of the south/midwest, however you see it, is embracing local beer.

One area that has thrown me off a little has been the amount of marketing that has been contributed to these openings. About a week or two weeks out I’ve noticed Facebook notifications of a new brewery and friends going to the grand opening. While this is a fine strategy, I believe the vast majority of marketing professionals would cringe at the thought that this is where all marketing dollars were spent. Needless to say, we just found out about a new brewery opening last night, which will happen tomorrow. I operate well on a day’s notice, but it’s not a good strategy to believe everyone will.

I certainly buy into the social media strategy. I love all things Internet and I believe it’s a great way to reach a significant amount of your audience. However, I will compliment that comment by stating that doing only social marketing is simply wrong.

I know there’s a lot of marketing aficionados out there that will look at that last statement and go red in the face. But social marketing is not the only strategy for a strong social campaign. In fact there’s not one good strategy for a marketing campaign.

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If you’re looking to market your brewery, whether it’s about to open or has been open for 25 years, you need to look at all avenues and diversify your marketing strategy. Now, this does not mean you do something stupid like take out a billboard on a back road interstate highway, but it does mean to spend time effectively considering all of your options.

I understand that the vast majority of brewery owners are brewers or focused more on beer than they are the business. Owning a brewery makes you a business owner regardless if you want to be one or not. And some good advice I received early in my business ventures was if you’re not prepared for all the pieces of owning a business, you should either reconsider or find partners that complement your weaker points.

Part of owning a business means taking time to brainstorm your marketing strategy. Consider all angles and all possibilities. Track down opportunities to tell your story to local publications, but also support those local publications by marketing your brewery. If you’re doing a specialty release, build a marketing plan around it.

Your marketing strategy shouldn’t just be one thing. And if you’re budgeting for 2017 or building a business plan for a new brewery or brewery growth, you should dedicate some money or resources into your marketing plan.

Marketing is on the front end of your sales strategy. If you have strong marketing, trust me that it will be a lot easier for your sales force down the line.

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