As social media continues to play a major role in the growth of many international companies, analysts have urged western winemakers to consider spending on influencers to attract customers.
According to The New Zealand Herald, winemakers in the West who want to enter Asian markets, particularly China, should capitalize on the power of social media influencers since this is a dominant trend in the country and other Asian nations.
Social platforms are very dominant in Asian markets, which explains why a lot of luxury and fashion brands use social media to get the attention of consumers. Asian and Chinese people refer to influencers as key opinion leaders (KOLs) and these leaders are trusted by consumers.
Founder of Heller Beverage Advisory and a Master of Wine, Sarah Heller, noted the importance of female influencers in China's wide trade. Statistics revealed that more females are consuming wine in various Asian countries.
During the Sauvignon Blanc symposium held in Blenheim, New Zealand last week, Heller said, "Social media is at an interesting intersection at the moment, in inline with e-commerce."
A lot of companies spend around $7,000 per month for social media marketing. While this is a huge amount for most medium-sized providers, Heller noted that "contemporary retail" is quickly becoming a trend in wine selling. More importantly, the use of influencers has become a great outlet for selling wine in the Chinese market.
The most popular social media influencers that winemakers could collaborate to attract consumers in China are Fan Bingbing, Lu Han, Wanwan Lei, Feng Fan, Vanessa Hong, Fil Xiaobai, and Leaf Greener.
Isabella Ko is another prominent influencer who has helped New Zealand wines to sell in Chinese markets. Ko is the founder of Oh My Dear Wine Boutique and she has created successful social media content to promote western and local wines.
Aside from just photos on Instagram, Weibo, and other popular social media platforms in China, influencers create videos and live streams. These content are then shared with thousands or millions of Chinese followers who have faith in what their influencers have to say.
Meininger listed a couple of popular Chinese influencers who have made a difference in the community of KOLs who seem to have share repetitive content and photo captions.
According to the outlet, Wang Shenghan is one of them. Wang is dubbed as Drunken Mother Goose and the founder of Lady Penguin, an online wine retailer that has a solid following on Sina Weibo, where over 430 million users can access the content she shares.
Winemakers can also try to collaborate with Terry Xu, a regular column writer for Decanter's China website. Xu was trained in China's Bordeaux import market. She holds a good number of certifications and diplomas in the wine industry which has made her a reasonable choice for many western wine brands.
