Last Updated on June 24, 2021 by

When working to market your winery online, it can be tempting to be dazzled by improved web traffic. New orders, higher page views, or new members in your wine club all can be signs that your marketing efforts are working and your wine is gaining traction with a new consumer base. It’s definitely worth celebrating.

However, once you’ve seen some uptick in traffic, you still need to dive into the analytics data for your website. This needs to be done in order to complete the picture of where your digital customers are coming from. Getting into the numbers helps you find your next direction.

Where Do Digital Customers Come From?

Digital customers are occasionally typing your website into their web browser. They’re looking for your wines when they already want to order them. If this is the case, the data in your web hosting site or through a program like Google Analytics will show that. However, lots of website traffic comes from other places, including:

• Organic searches, where people look for keywords like “wine Oregon” or “local chardonnay wine”. Your website comes up in the search results. 
• Social media posts, such as links in your Instagram or Facebook pages.
• Third-party blogs, such as reviewers who have linked to your website after enjoying a bottle of your wine.
• Pay-per-click (PPC) advertisements that pop up in search engines when the right keywords are chosen.
• Email newsletter links can be tracked so that you know which exact newsletters have prompted customers to click through and purchase. 

Digital customers leave a trail, through the links they click. This helps you connect the dots as to where your customers are coming from. If it turns out that one particular Instagram influencer has fallen in love with your wines and is sending traffic your way, that’s key to know. If your own blog posts are popping up in organic searches for wine lovers and drawing in new customers, that’s important as well. 

Three Reasons This Data Matters

There is a core reason why knowing where your digital customers are coming from is important. That’s because it helps you do what you’re already doing well and do less of whatever is not working. The world of digital marketing shifts very quickly. So, frequently reviewing your analytics data helps you see the shifts as they happen. That means noticing if a particular source of customers is drying up and another is taking its place. It also allows you to track numbers from the launch of a new campaign through to when it has run its course.

More so than with print advertising in the past, or advertisements like billboards, it’s possible to directly link some customers to the way they found out about you. Here are three ways you can capitalize on that data.

Hone Your Advertising and Marketing Spend Carefully

Whether you’re looking to sponsor articles on blogs or social media posts or build out your own winery’s blog, you want to allocate your money to what really reaches your target market. Testing a few different advertising and marketing strategies in succession and recording how they impact the traffic to your website allows you to spend more on what is working and cut strategies that aren’t capturing much attention. 

You want your advertising and marketing budget, to go to the highest possible return. Both in terms of human resources and ad spend. Knowing the sources of your customers can help you shut down spending on anything that isn’t currently working.

Learn From Both Low and High ROI Campaigns

If you make sure to test new possibilities before launching large or expensive campaigns, you’re likely to learn just as much from low-ROI campaigns as from the big success stories. You may discover, for instance, that one of your social media accounts is getting much less traffic than an account on another site. Look at resources on what kinds of users exist on each platform. Perhaps you’ll learn that your product appeals to a different socioeconomic group, age group, or location in the world. All this information comes from following where your digital customers come from.

Make sure that each campaign includes time for debriefing and understanding what lessons can be taken from the project. Even campaigns that underperformed for you can offer key questions and potential brainstorms for the next campaign. Ask the question, “what does this data say about who might be a better fit for us?”

Replicate and Iterate on What Works

On the other hand, when you discover that a particular source of customers is bringing in more traffic, you can push that success forward in future campaigns. This source may include your email newsletter or a particular organic search keyword. You can replicate success: if you discover that readers love your how-to series on identifying great wine, you can expand it with more how-to articles. A great example of a supplier with a how-to article is InnoVint’s article “5 Problems in the Winery Costing You Time and Money (and How to Solve Them).” Their article addresses common issues in wineries and suggests how you can fix them. To hear more about Innovint, check out their episode on Legends Behind the Craft podcast.

You can also iterate: if you realize that local keywords are sending lots of organic traffic your way, you can look at ways to capture local views through social media and PPC as well.

How Identifying Customer Sources Promotes Future Growth

The key is to start identifying what it is that differentiates a particular source of digital customers. What is prompting a high ROI for your marketing or advertising content? You won’t simply do the same thing over again, but by delving into the data, you can infer what kinds of future efforts would achieve similar levels of success.

The best part? You can keep honing in on your target markets through continual re-evaluation, replication, and iteration on your successful marketing efforts. Digital data shows you the way to new markets as well. Keeping a diverse stream of digital customers coming in allows you to be part of new trends before they take off with your competitors.

Ready to start tracking where your digital customers come from? Barrels Ahead is the marketing agency with the track record you need to see growth and maximize ROI on your efforts. To learn more and speak with us today,  contact us.