January to May WR Update

I wanted to give you all a quick review of what we’ve been up to, for the first 5 months of the year. Many of you are not involved in our events, nor do you attend seminars, so you may not realize just how much we’ve got goin’ on!

Winter WINEland – 1750 tickets sold

Varietal of the Month – reviewed Viognier from 6 members

New Blogs: My Life Before Wine part 1  & Want to be a Wine Road Ambassador

Tasting at Google SF with: Wine Road, Dutton Estate, Emeritus Vineyards & Char Vale Winery

Added “Family Friendly” as an online search for our wineries – 14 members listed – YOU can add yourself any time.

Wine Love Wine Trail – 100 tickets 🙁

Varietal of the Month – reviewed Winter Whites from 6 members

New Blogs: The “In” Crowd  & Lesser-Known Varietals

New Members – Leo Steen Wines and The Stavrand Russian River

Started our Facebook group “Wine Road Member Chat’, but very little engagement. We will reach out again.

Barrel Tasting – 1770 tickets sold

WISE Training, Building your Wine Club = 42 Wine Road member attended

Varietal of the Month – reviewed Merlot from 7 members

New Blogs:  My Life Before Wine/ part 2

Tasting at Google SF with: Wine Road, A. Rafanelli, Amista Winery and Pedroncelli Winery

Updated list of Walk-Ins Welcome wineries – promoted with campaign with SFGate and SF Chron, 7×7 and on social

Created (and shared) list of winery Easter Hours

Elections were held for our Wine Road Board of Directors

New Members: DaVero Farms + Winery, aesthete winery & farm, Quivira Vineyards

WISE Training – Next Level Sales = 59 Wine Road members attended

Varietal of the Month – reviewed Grenache from 7 members

New Blogs:  Seeking the Quintessential Zinfandel &  Exploring the Ultimate Wine Tasting

Moved all of our event ticketing to CellarPass

Spring Wine Trail – 147 tickets sold

Met with 20 member wineries to discuss annual events and brainstorm format, pricing, theme etc – for each

Walk-Ins Welcome 1/2 page ad in Hemisphere’s Magazine (United Airlines 14 million passengers a month)

Banner ad for the month on VIA Magazine online – Walk-Ins Welcome – link to list

WISE Training – Generating Revenue, Beyond the Tasting Room – 39 Wine Road members attended

Connecting with Sonoma County Tourism, hosted by Wine Road, at Balletto Vineyards – 16 attendees

Posted our 200th Wine Road Podcast – that is monumental!

Varietal of the Month – reviewed Rosé from 6 members

New Blogs: Engaging Your Senses: Wine & Art along the Wine Road:

NEW format for our online Event Calendar – an actual calendar, along with updated searches (thanks to a members suggestion)

Summer Wine Trail – sign-up begins – tickets on sale June 6th.

Added LODGING to our online Google Map – this makes it easy to see where your lodging is, in relation to the wineries you want to visit.

Our Wine Road Ambassador program continues to grow, we’re seeing 3-4 new ambassadors a week these days. We are now up to about 250. They include staff from our winery and lodging members as well as guests that visit on a regular basis, wine educators from around the country, somms and locals who just want to know more about us. Sonoma County Tourism will soon be adding our program to their Accredited Hospitality Professional program.

We currently have just over 100 Wine Road Insiders. This program has been a struggle to grow. Debbie has been working with CellarPass to streamline the sign-up process and to better showcase the winery and lodging offers. Stay tuned for updates.

EVERY Tuesday we update the featured, Winery, Lodging and Wine on our home page (Visit – Stay – Sip)

Since January we have highlighted (in this order);

VISIT – Winery: Papapietro Perry, Dutcher Crossing, Trione, La Crema, Korbel, Roth Estate, Landmark, Spicy Vines, Dutton Goldfield, Saini Vineyards, Mengler, Martorana, Carlisle, D’Argenzio, Mill Creek, Dry Creek, Seghesio, Foppiano, Char Vale, Dutton Estate….

STAY -Lodging: Hotel Healdsburg, h2hotel, Harmon Guest House, The Piinschower, Hampton Inn, Belle de Jour, Vintners Resort, boon hotel, Healdsburg Inn, Geyservile Inn, Best Western, Hotel Vinea, The Gables, Holiday inn, Inn at Occidental, Bella Villa Messina, Hotel Healdsburg, Hilton Garden Inn, h2hotel, Harmon Guest House, The Pinschower, Hampton Inn, Belle de Jour

SIP – One Specific Wine From: Rockpile, Idelwild, Selby, Baldassari, Mangler, Viszlay, Emeritus, Ektimo, Sonoma-Cutrer, Woodenhead, Soda Rock, Carol Shelton, Locals, Moshin, Char Vale, Porter Creek, BACA, Twomey

VIA Magazine – digital version, leaderboard banner ad May – to promote Walk-Ins Welcome.

360,000 impressions per month – 25-34 demographic

Hemisphere’s Magazine – April & May, 14 million passengers per month – we ran 1/2 page ad – Walk-Ins

Visit CA

Sonoma County Tourism – online Inspiration Guide – Wine Road has the inside front page 3 million page views

We also have a 1/4 page ad on their printed map, 460,000 maps printed.

SF Chronicle & SF Gate – online and their social, Walk-Ins Welcome

Additionally – Event Specific Ads; $17,000 for Wineland, $22,000 for Barrel Tasting, and $6000 for Winter & Spring Wine Trails combined = $45,000. 

Adding social boosts, direct email and misc smaller ads – we have invested approx. $90,000 in paid advertising from Jan-May

Growth Natives – this is the team behind our website updates – meta tags for every page and photo, updating all pages for better SEO. Repaired all 404 pages, moving recipes to WineRoad.com from auxiliary site for better exposure. Seeing 8K or more NEW visitors to our site every month, averaging 150,000+ impressions every month.

Printed map – we continue to have requests for our printed map, via our website and from Visit CA, which we mail every Tuesday.

We HAVE to show off our podcast stats…  We’re circled in RED, so you can see where we stand in the large pool of podcasts. We’ve been at it for 8 years, with a new show every other Thursday. YOU could be on the show, just email Liana@wineroad.com, so she can schedule you in.