By Natalie Payne
Co-founder/editor of Grapevine Magazine
As we get through the beginning of 2024 and work on setting goals in this challenging environment, we need to look at our building blocks. Your software can make or break your growth. There is nothing worse than losing a sale due to lack of organization or failure of your software system. Your wine is great, your passion is there, your tasting room is beautiful. It’s time to bring your system – and your sales – to the next level.
Square, Clover, and Revel have user-friendly POS systems. Winery-specific software, such as OrderPort, has user-friendly POS systems that integrate with your wine clubs, online sales, and customer data.
Prioritize your time. Invest in the right tools to help you achieve the sales your wine deserves. Winery specific software lays the foundation for future growth.
What is CRM?
When considering software options, the single most important element to look for is CRM (Customer Relationship Management). You’ll find that most WSS (Winery-specific software) systems have this.
CRM begins when a customer walks through the door of your tasting room or begins to browse your website.
Once their name and email are captured, CRM tools will begin to gather important details such as customer order history, buying habits, taste in wine, how often they stop by, if they have a pickup order available, and if a card on file has expired.
You can then build a positive customer relationship by updating their card on file, reminding them of pickup orders, making recommendations based on previous visits, or even bringing up relevant conversation based on what you last spoke about.
Great WSS will help you easily achieve a high level of service that turns people from customers into brand enthusiasts
CRM begins at hello
A good WSS will not require customers to purchase anything or join a wine club before allowing you to build a customer profile with a name and email.
Once an account is created, the path of customer loyalty has begun. The customer can join mailing lists, easily log into their account online, join wine clubs, and view order history.
Some helpful CRM features that a WSS may provide on your POS include:
- Complete searchable customer database
- Ability to add custom notes and pictures to customer profiles
- TCV (Total Customer Value): the total monetary value
- COF (Card on File): Store payment information and be notified when a COF expires
- Ability to fulfill and release pickup orders
Ecommerce integration
While meeting your customers in person in the tasting room is always fun, the reality is that e-commerce accounts for a massive amount of sales (49.7% of retail growth in the third quarter was from e-commerce in 2023).
It’s no surprise that it’s important to be online. However, without an integrated WSS, e-commerce can be tricky to handle.
When you use WSS, your POS sales and e-commerce sales are differentiated yet seamlessly integrated.
Say a customer – let’s name him Kevin – comes in one day and browses the wine shop. Kevin enjoys a free tasting and provides his name and email and consents to a mailing list. He leaves the shop empty-handed and a week later an email hits his inbox with a new customer discount to join a wine club – 20% off his first month. He happily joins and sets himself as a “ship” customer. A week later, he ends up in the shop again and requests to pick up his order instead. With the tap of a button, his order is fulfilled, the bottles are accounted for in inventory, his account order history and TCV are updated, and he walks away with his wine club order in hand, excited to share his delicious new wine with friends that night.
Let’s add up those sales made possible by using integrated WSS:
- Kevin’s initial wine club order that he was able to easily change from ship to pickup
- All of Kevin’s future wine club orders
- Any additional orders Kevin makes with his wine club discount
- Any orders made by Kevin’s friends after trying his wine and hearing about his pleasant experience
With a smooth system, the opportunities are endless.
Outreach!
Once you have successfully added a customer to your system, increase your relevance to them by utilizing the WSS marketing tools. Email marketing is key to advertising new wines, events, and sales. Your WSS should be equipped with the ability to build mailing lists, design emails, and send out mass campaigns with a few clicks.
Unique emails you would be able to send with an integrated WSS:
- Run a special red wine release for your top red buyers with a Sales by Product report
- Invite club members to special club only events
- Send an email to a previous buyer of a vintage release
In addition to email marketing, it is important for your WSS to maintain automated communication with your customers. Notifications should go out when a customer makes an action. Examples of this include creating a new account, completing an order, joining a wine club, making a reservation, or forgetting a password.
Analyze the customer. Analyze your impact.
After you send your email campaigns, WSS will provide performance analytics. This will tell you how many recipients the email successfully and unsuccessfully delivered to, and how many people opened the email, clicked on a link, or unsubscribed.
WSS should also provide dynamic reporting tools to provide insights to any part of your business. Examples of reports you would be able to run include:
- Sales – see your top selling wines, offer discounts on least selling wines to increase sales
- Compliance – ensure compliance of your business through all areas including shipping and fulfillment
- Inventory – see how your products are performing in real-time
- Custom – access all data on your business by building any type of report you want
Your WSS should not only have a stable, scalable user-friendly system to keep pace with your winery’s success but should also be continuously innovating, keeping up with the world around us. It’s a good sign if your WSS is adding an increasing number of integrations as it shows that they are respected, have high quality code, and are going to continue to be big players in the future with your best interest in mind. Let them focus on the making your life smoother so you can focus on the important stuff – making excellent wine.
For more information on how to optimize or update your current system, contact Ken at www.woodinvillewineryservices.com.
To see more of Natalie’s articles, check them out at thegrapevine.com.
