Clarity key to developing brand loyalty

Developing an emotional connection with consumers, consistency and clarity of your brand message is key to developing loyalty. That was the overriding message delivered to the drinks trade by key speakers at the Wine and Spirit Trade Association’s annual conference yesterday.

Members of the panel included Jon Forsyth, founde of adam&eveDDB, Karen Jones CBE, founder and chairman of Food & Fuel Ltd, Sam Linter, MD and master winemaker at Bolney Wine Estate, and Kristof de Wulf, co-founder and CEO of Insites Consulting

Entitled “loyalty and how to inspire it”, the conference saw leading figures in the world of business and wine discuss their beliefs on loyalty, following a report by the WSTA that four out of five wine drinkers have little or no loyalty to a particular brand. 

Sam Linter, managing director and winemaker at Bolney Wine Estate, admitted that building brand loyalty, particularly in the wine trade, was “difficult”, but that her company had succeeded by being a local, “homegrown” product, imbuing this unique selling point in its branding.

Develop a brand story

Emphasising the need for a strong brand story, Linter said: “Our family’s heritage started back in 1972 and we have sold our story well. We work really hard on that story and having a personality. Having something that our customers can actually buy into, is one of the most important things you can do. We have worked very hard on that and it has been successful.”

She added: “For us it’s our values and that ethos that we always make sure comes across strongly in our brand. We try to be consistent which means always trying to have the product available and making sure the quality is there and that we are developing quality so customers know something new is on the way and are excited about the product.”

Encouraging engagement and conveying a consistent and clear message about what your brand is was also raised as an important factor to developing loyalty.

“If you are not clear and can’t genuinely describe what it is you do in a couple of sentences there’s no reason your customers should understand and engage with it”, said Karen Jones CBE, former CEO of the spirits Group and founder of Café Rouge.

“I’ve always believed in value driven products but I increasingly believe in values driven products”, she added. “If you have your values and are clear and that’s imbued and shot through with sincerity, I think that’s really important.

Consistency is key

Kristof de Wulf, co-founder of Insites Consulting, pointed toward Red Bull as an example of a brand that had achieved brand consistency, reliably known for its tagline “Red Bull gives you wings”. de Wulf compared this to Pepsi, which has changed its tagline some “25 times over its 25-year history”.

While acknowledging a brand’s need to develop and evolve, de Wulf highlighted consistency in a brand’s message as key to engaging with consumers, particularly in a world where there is so much choice on offer.

Referring to the preferences of the four generations; the baby boomers, generation X, generation Y and the emerging generation Z, de Wulf said: “I assumed the youngest generation (Z) would be concerned about the environment and sustainability, but they care the least, it’s all about them. The baby boomers, the older generation, cared most. Generation Z is very much into luxury products. They really appreciate that. And it’s about personalisation as well. It’s about having an experience thats suited to the needs of one person. The bar is being raised day after day.”

The Bolney Wine Estate

Speaking more widely on brand messaging, de Wulf said: “It should be cross generational and it’s about how you offer value to people. It might be a tweak for each generation but in the end it’s about being relevant to all of us unique individuals in different ways and make that work for one brand – that’s the challenge.”

Online sales growing

The online wine market and effective use of social media were also highlighted as growing areas of importance, particularly for the wine trade.

Only yesterday, the latest Wilson Drinks Report confirmed that UK online wine sales had increased 9% by volume and 11% in value in the past three months, with sales of sparkling wine driving this trend. Sales of sparkling wine other than Cava and Champagne achieved strong growth increasing 16% by value. In comparison, both Champagne and Cava saw sales fall back 5% in the first quarter of the year.

This fits with Bolney’s recent success online, with Linter confirming that online wine sales had “grown by 20 to 30% year-on-year in the past few years”.

Despite this success, Linter admitted selling wine online had been difficult in the past. She explained the estate was now looking at further avenues to boost revenue, citing vineyard tourism as an exciting new area of growth.

“What we have tried to do is look at the vineyard tourism and open it up more. We have got several domain names and so people looking at hen parties and things like that, we have tried to catch people. That makes us money but also people come along and visit us, you can buy a voucher and give it as a gift but also you can get an added sale of wine.”

Social media

Highlighting the importance of social media, Jones lamented that a lot of people “still don’t listen to the social media conversation going on around them about their brand”, despite it being “so easy”.

“It’s really important just to see everyday what people are chatting about”, she said. “As with any feedback there’s generally no smoke without fire and if people aren’t talking about you enough or in the wrong way you definitely want to know about it.”

Echoing Jones’ thoughts, Linter added: “I check Twitter every morning and monitor TripAdvisor. We do get negative comments, everyone does. But there is generally no smoke without fire. We can have a look at it a and see what we can do about it. Sometimes it’s nothing but sometimes it’s just a little tweak. Social media is hugely hugely valuable and ignore it at your peril I would say.”