Download - Wine Market Council
PO Box 2012 • St. Helena, CA 94574 • (707) 967-9299 [email protected] • winemarketcouncil.com
Wine Market Council
2010 Social Media
Snapshot Poll
May 23, 2011
Table of Contents
Introduction
1
Highlights
2
Objectives and Methodology
4
Survey Participant Profile
5
Wine Consumer Online Involvement
7
Wine Consumer Wine-Related Internet Usage
9
Wine Consumer Social Media Membership
12
Wine Consumer Facebook/MySpace Involvement
14
Wine Consumer Twitter Involvement
16
Wine Consumer Smart Phone Usage
18
Generational Differences
19
1
Introduction
Wine Market Council is an independent, non-profit trade association of grape growers,
wine producers, importers, wholesalers, and other wine industry businesses working
together to grow the consumer base of the U.S. wine market for the benefit of the
industry as a whole. The council’s mission is to establish the widespread acceptance of
wine as a rewarding part of American culture, and to encourage the responsible
enjoyment of wine by current and future generations of American adults. The means
by which the council is working toward its goal consists of consumer research and an
ongoing national public relations campaign. All research conducted by Wine Market
Council is proprietary to its members.
In the fall of 2010, Wine Market Council conducted an online study that included two
topics of interest to its membership – winery direct sales and social media. These
subjects are especially of interest to small- and medium-sized wineries at an
economically challenging time and a time when social media is gaining in importance to
marketing programs. The results of the social media portion of this study are presented
in this report.
2
Highlights
Reading customer ratings and reviews and maintaining a social networking page are
the top online activities among wine drinker survey respondents.
Core wine drinkers have a higher level of online involvement than marginal wine
drinkers. This was evident in higher rates of both reading and posting reviews of
products and services, reading blogs and online forums, and subscribing to RSS
feeds. In addition, cores are more likely to have published their own websites.
Half of wine consumers seek wine-related information on the Internet, especially
core wine drinkers. Two-thirds of those who use the Internet for this purpose look
for information about various types of wine. Half look up wine prices. Cores are
more apt to seek more specific information about wines and wineries compared to
marginals.
Facebook is by far the most popular social networking site, with seven in ten wine
consumer respondents reporting membership. Fewer than three in ten belong to
any other social networking site tested. Compared to total U.S. adults, wine
consumer study participants have a higher Facebook membership rate, as well as
higher Twitter and LinkedIn membership rates.
Nearly three in ten respondents who are Facebook/MySpace members communicate
about wine using these social networks. They are most likely to communicate about
wines they like or dislike, which is the only wine information category mentioned by
a majority.
One-fifth of respondents are members of Twitter. Of these respondents one-third
Tweet about wine or follow wine-related people on Twitter.
Three in ten survey respondents use a smart phone. Smart phone usage skews
core and male. One-third of these smart phone users use some type of wine-
related, food-related, or restaurant/bar-related app on their phone.
3
Younger wine drinkers, especially Millennials, are more active online, more likely to
be involved in social networking, and more apt to use a smart phone. In addition,
they are more likely to seek wine-related information online and to communicate
about wine using social networking sites.
4
Objectives and Methodology
Wine Market Council’s 2010 Winery Direct Sales & Social Media Study was conducted
online using the web-based survey services of Insight Express. The study was
conducted in September 2010 among 599 wine consumers. All study respondents were
wine drinkers (drink wine at least every 2 – 3 months) and aged 21 years or older.
Gender and generation quotas were used to replicate the composition of wine drinkers
established in the 2010 Wine Market Council Consumer Tracking Study. In addition,
one-half of the participants were core wine drinkers (drink wine at least weekly), and
one-half marginal wine drinkers (drink wine less often than core wine drinkers, but at
least every 2 – 3 months).
Topics covered by the Social Media portion of this survey included:
Social network membership and usage
Online involvement
Wine-related online communication
Online wine-related information usage
Wine- and food-related smart phone application usage
In this report you will find some cases where there is a note for caution due to small
base sizes. In these circumstances, the base size is less than 100, but more than 50.
It should be noted that some results in this report may not correspond with those found
in the Wine Market Council annual wine consumer tracking study due to variances
within the respondent pools and phrasing of questions.
5
Survey Participant Profile
The 599 survey participants were split equally by wine drinking frequency – core and
marginal consumption levels.
Generational/gender splits were established by quota to mirror the generational
breakdown of wine drinkers set forth in the 2010 Wine Market Council Consumer
Tracking Study. By generation, Baby Boomers made up the largest group of
respondents (39%), followed by Millennials (23%), Gen Xers (21%), and those 65
and older (17%).
Just over half of the survey participants were married (56%) and one-third had
children under the age of 18 living in their household (31%).
Some 45% completed at least an undergraduate degree. One-third (31%) attended
some college.
6
Respondents were split somewhat evenly at the $50,000 annual household income
mark. Slightly less than half reported an annual household income less than
$50,000 (47%), and slightly more than half reported one $50,000 and above (53%).
The majority of survey participants were white (81%), while the remaining 20% was
made up of one-half African-Americans (10%), and smaller portions of Asians (3%),
and Hispanics (4%).
Respondents from all states but Alaska, District of Columbia, Montana, North
Dakota, and Vermont participated in the study.
7
Wine Consumer Online Involvement
More than two in five respondents maintain a social networking page (43%).
Nearly the same number are readers of consumer generated ratings and reviews of
products or services (44%). However, less than half that number actually post
reviews (21%).
A significant minority (29%) read blogs or online forms, while fewer comment on
blogs or participate in online forums (17%).
Core wine drinkers are more active than marginal wine drinkers in reading both
customer ratings and reviews (51% vs. 38%), and blogs and online forums (35%
vs. 23%). In addition, cores are twice as likely to post reviews of products or
services (28% vs. 14% of marginals).
8
Less than 10% of respondents are active Tweeters (7%), have their own blog (8%)
or website (7%), or upload videos (9%). More passive are 11% of respondents who
follow people on Twitter and listen to podcasts, and 8% who subscribe to RSS
feeds.
Core wine drinkers are twice as likely as marginals to have published their own
website (10% vs. 5%), and three times as likely to subscribe to RSS feeds (12% vs.
4%).
A full one-quarter of total respondents are not active online at all (25%). Marginal
wine drinkers (21%) are significantly less active than core wine drinkers (30%).
9
Wine Consumer Wine-Related Internet Usage
Half the respondents use the Internet to search
for wine-related information (52%). Significantly
more cores than marginals use the Internet for
this purpose (64% vs. 40%). In addition, more
male respondents (56%) than female respondents
(47%) cited their use of the Internet as a source
for wine information.
More specifically, the greatest number of survey participants search for information
about various types of wines (65%). Half search for information about specific
wines (50%) and look up wine prices (49%). Four in ten look for information about
wineries (41%)
10
The rates of core and marginal respondents who search for information about
various types of wine and wine prices were at parity. However, cores are more apt
to search for more specific information than marginals – the majority look for
information about specific wines compared to a minority of marginals (55% vs.
43%), and nearly half look for information about specific wineries compared to one-
third of marginals (47% vs. 33%).
11
Fewer than 3 in 10 respondents seek information on the Internet about wine regions
(29%), wine ratings (28%), and retailers that carry a specific wine (27%). Even
fewer (15%) search for online sources for a specific wine. Wine-related blogs are
read only by a minority (9%).
There were few differences in the rates of cores and marginals who use the Internet
for these activities. The exception being wine region searches, which cores are
more likely to do than marginals (34% vs. 22%).
12
Wine Consumer Social Media Membership
More survey respondents are members of Facebook than any other social
networking site (71% of cores and 73% of marginals).
Membership dropped precipitously after Facebook, with a second tier made up of
YouTube (28% cores and 27% marginals), MySpace (23% of both cores and
marginals), and for cores, Twitter (22%). Significantly fewer marginals than cores
are members of Twitter (15%).
LinkedIn and Flicker are utilized by smaller groups of respondents – LinkedIn by
11% of cores and 8% of marginals, and Flicker 7% of cores and significantly fewer
marginals (3%).
13
Survey respondents were significantly more likely to be active on Facebook, Twitter,
and Linkedin compared to U.S. adults as a whole. Nearly three-quarters of survey
respondents use Facebook (72%) compared to two-thirds of U.S. adults (66%).
There was a greater gap between survey respondents who are members of Twitter
(19%) and Twitter penetration among the U.S. population of adults (11%).
Although significant, the difference between the proportions of survey participants
and U.S. adults who are members of LinkedIn was less dramatic (10% vs. 7%).
14
Wine Consumer Facebook/MySpace Involvement
Of those who are members of Facebook or MySpace, the largest group, a full 39%,
updates their page daily. The frequency rates of the rest of these users were
distributed somewhat equally among less frequent usage rates, from every other
day (11%) to less than once a week (17%).
15
Of those survey participants who use Facebook
or MySpace (nearly three-quarters of total
respondents), approximately one-quarter use
Facebook or MySpace to communicate about
wine. This rate was higher among cores (38%)
than among marginals (17%).
The most popular type of wine-related information communicated through
Facebook/MySpace is related to wines respondents either liked or disliked (62%).
Information about specific wine likes and dislikes (45%) and wineries of interest
(41%) is also communicated through Facebook/MySpace by a significant minority of
respondents. Over one-third convey information about wine prices and places they
recommend buying wine through these social networking sites (36%).
About one-fifth of respondents discuss restaurant wine lists (22%) and wine regions
(21%) on Facebook/MySpace. Fewer respondents relay information about online
sources (14%) or blogs or websites they find interesting (13%) to their family and
friends. Wine ratings are the least often communicated wine-related information via
Facebook and MySpace (9%).
16
Wine Consumer Twitter Involvement
Tweeting frequency varies among respondents who Tweet (19% of total
respondents1). Some 28% Tweet daily or more often, another 28% Tweet every
other day or a few times a week, and another 26% do so less often than that. A full
18% of Twitter members do not send Tweets at all.
One-third of Twitter users reported they Tweet
about wine (32%).
1 Due to small base sizes, differences between core and marginal wine drinkers were not analyzed.
17
Respondents who use Twitter, on average, reported
following 67 people on Twitter (with outliers
removed). One-third of these respondents use
Twitter to follow wine-related people (31%).
18
Wine Consumer Smart Phone Usage
Three in ten survey respondents use a smart phone (31%). Smart phone rates
were higher among core wine drinkers (41%) compared to marginal wine drinkers
(25%), and men (37%) compared to women (29%).
Of those who use smart phones, one-third
use wine-related, food-related, or
restaurant/bar-related apps (32%). Again,
the usage of these types of apps was higher
among core wine drinkers (39% vs. 20%).
19
Generational Differences
Younger wine drinkers are significantly more involved in online activity than older
wine drinkers. Millennials are the most likely of any generation to have their own
blog (17%), upload videos to either their own website or a service like YouTube
(22%)%, and listen to podcasts (18%).
Both Millennials and Gen Xers are more active on Twitter when compared to older
respondents. These generations were more apt than Baby Boomers or those 65+ to
be active Tweeters (13% and 9% respectively vs. 4% and 3% respectively) and
follow people on Twitter (19% and 13% respectively vs. 8% and 3% respectively).
The 65+ generation was the least inclined to maintain a page on a social networking
site (26%) or post product or service reviews (12%). That is half as likely as
Millennials, of whom the majority maintain a social networking page (52%) and one-
quarter post reviews (24%).
20
It is not surprising due to their greater involvement that Millennial aged survey
participants have a greater presence on Facebook (84%) and YouTube (54%).
Both Millennials and Gen Xers are more active than older respondents on Twitter
(33% and 24% respectively) and MySpace (40% and 31%).
LinkedIn is most popular among Baby Boomers (14%) compared to the oldest and
youngest respondents (6%).
21
Younger respondents are greater proponents of utilizing online resources to find
wine information. Three-quarter of Millennials (67%) and over half of Gen Xers
(59%) indicated they use the Internet to seek wine-related information. Only
minorities of Baby Boomers (48%) and those older (30%) do so.
More than one-third of Millennials (36%) and Gen Xers (37%) communicate about
wine with their family and friends using Facebook or MySpace. Baby Boomers
(20%) and Those 65+ (14%) were significantly less likely to do so.
22
Smart phone use is also higher among younger respondents. Significantly more
Millennials than any other generation are current users (54%). Usage fell off
precipitously between Millennials and other generations (38% of Gen Xers, 25% of
Baby Boomers and 15% of those 65+).