Did you know that by 2025, the food and beverage industry is projected to earn more than $105 billion in revenue?
Considering how food and beverages will never go out of style, this is a pretty realistic statistic. One of the key factors accelerating growth within the beverage industry is social media. Brand interactions, advertisements, and user-generated content in the form of posts, pins, and hashtags all indicate people’s ever-growing interest in food and beverage.
Whether it’s Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook or YouTube, food and beverage-related content is at an all-time peak. The fact that over 32% of Tweets mention food and beverage brands illustrates the importance of social media marketing for the industry.
There is no shortage of statistics that show the impact social media marketing has on the beverage industry as a whole. If you simply look at how much traction Starbucks gains on every social platform, you can get an idea of how these interactions and conversations help the business boost its bottom line.
Here are some insights that further elaborate why social media marketing is important for the beverage industry:
Understanding Brand Perception & Consumer Needs
It’s imperative that beverage brands keep a track of how consumers perceive them. Social media marketing generates insights into what people think and say about your brand. By monitoring conversations taking place on different platforms, you can get an idea of what they like, dislike and love.
Using these insights, you can gauge which of your products are being mentioned and in what light. For instance, consider you launch new flavors for your beverage product line. Using social media, you can identify how it’s performing and what people are saying about it. Based on what you learn, you can make changes in the product or your branding message to make it more appealing to your consumers.
Similarly, you can use this data to identify unarticulated consumer needs, consumption patterns and general preferences. This will allow you to come up with new product ideas and marketing strategies.
Improving Customer Experience
Customer service in the food and beverage industry can make or break your brand. Social media allows you to improve the efficiency of your customer service. You can answer people’s questions and resolve queries without the consumer having to wait days to get a response.
In addition, you can use social listening tools to understand consumer feedback. This will not only help you maintain consumer loyalty, but it will boost your online reputation and improve the customer experience.
Social Media Marketing Tips for the Beverage Industry
Understanding the importance of social media marketing for the beverage industry is the only aspect of getting the best out of your digital marketing strategy. The following tips will help you maximize your campaigns and strategies, boosting your ROI and overall bottom line:
Talk to Your Consumers, Not at Them
Optimizing your posts and ads with aesthetically-pleasing visuals and engaging content is a great way to get your message across to consumers. However, this interaction will remain a one-way street if you don’t actively engage with your audience.
For example, brands such as Vita Coco can be seen replying to Tweets and comments on Twitter quite often.
Use their example to get engaged in conversations, answer questions, thank them for positive mentions, and ask for opinions. As far as it is in line with your brand identity, you can even make a few jokes!
This will improve your brand’s relationship with the consumers and encourage user-generated content. With your brand actively engaging with customers on social media, they will be more inclined to write back, mention your brand, or share their experiences. This will elevate your brand presence and also boost your SEO.
Tell a Story
By telling your story, we don’t mean shameless self-promotion. Beverage brands need to share the story that goes behind the label, communicating what makes your brand different and unique and show off your individuality.
If your brand takes part in philanthropic activities, contributes to charities, or is working to become more environmentally conscious, incorporate it into your social media marketing. Some brands also share client and employee stories that connect with their identity and support their overall brand message.
Collaborate
Social media marketing offers great opportunities for forming strategic partnerships with companies and social media influencers that complement your brand. This allows you to access their established social media audience, expanding your reach.
For example, the energy drink brand Bang® Energy maximizes its reach by collaborating with social media influencers on Tik Tok and other platforms. In 2018, three Milwaukee-based breweries collaborated with Harley Davidson to craft a special beer on the occasion of the latter’s 115th anniversary. Another example is of the whiskey distillery, Lagavulin collaborated with Nick Offerman and produced a 40-minute YouTube video where he sat in silence and drank whiskey by a fireplace. Nick Offerman’s fanbase, which hugely stems from his Ron Swanson character on Parks and Recs, made it viral.
Newsjack!
Newsjacking happens when brands take part in topical and trending conversations. Beverage brands can seek relevant topics and share the spotlight. The use of hashtags on social media is especially effective in facilitating newsjacking tactics for social media marketing.
A great example of this was when Ryan Reynold’s Aviation Gin brand newsjacked a Peloton (a bike company) ad that was receiving criticism and backlash on social media. Aviation Gin created an ad in response using the same actress in Peloton’s ad. Within a short span of time, the ad had managed to garner over 7 million views on YouTube and 55.6 thousand retweets.
Tap into the Power of Social Media Marketing for the Beverage Industry
By using these tactics and forming a strong social media marketing strategy, you can gain insights that will allow you to enhance your online presence. It will also enable you to align your brand’s core message as well as your products to what your consumers need and want from the perfect beverage.
This is where the Drink Labs can help you. Combining our expertise and technical abilities, we can help you create a beverage that sparks your consumers’ fancy.