By looking at feedback we receive from our clients through social media and review sites like TripAdvisor, we’ve learned a surprising lesson about the top priorities for travelers visiting a winery. Almost all reviews highlight a casual, relaxed and welcoming atmosphere.
These are all excerpts from tripadvisor reviews we’ve received in the past year or so. I think TripAdvisor is more than just a new arm of marketing/PR. These reviews are really helpful because they give amazing insight into the psychology of our visitors.
A recurring theme that leaps out of our reviews is a focus on feeling relaxed, welcomed, and unpretentious. Some reviews include detailed accounts of visiting the winery, tasting from barrels, looking at vines, and other more technical aspects of the tour. But virtually all the reviews talk about atmosphere, hospitality, friendliness, relaxing, and so on.
This was an exceptionally important realization. We were very focused on providing good information, great wine, good tasting conditions, and so on. Of course, these things are important, but we now learn that putting your guests at ease is even more crucial. The wine doesn’t have to be at exactly 17 degrees centigrade and served in finest crystal. But you do have to be smiling, welcoming, and fun to be around.
All that said, it is really important that the wine tastes great. The quality of the wine is mentioned in virtually every review. And literally everybody who ate my mom’s cooking at the end of the tour has mentioned how good she is in the kitchen. So food is exceptionally important.
The point of this post is to share surprising lessons from TripAdvisor reviews. We’re not surprised that people want good food and wine.
We were sort of surprised at how much of the reviews are devoted to explaining that we are nice people. Being friendly and unpretentious is super-important!
Since I know a lot of really friendly people in the wine trade, and because I’m pretty confident about my wine knowledge, I had forgotten how intimidating this world is. And a lot of our visitors share horror stories about visiting wineries and wine shops where the wine tasted great but the service was awful. Usually these stories focus around a person who clearly knows a lot about wine and serves delicious wine, but treats the visitors like dirt just because they’re not as knowledagable or rolls their eyes at simple questions. And even if these stories constitute a minority of wine experiences, they scare people to death!
A quick look at our reviews reveals that people are really worried that the atmosphere won’t be relaxed or welcoming. And so they are very pleased to discover it is!
So don’t be a jerk! Smile a lot. Remember that nobody is born knowing a lot about wine. And even very well educated people don’t know everything. And smile again. Your guests will appreciate it!
Aside from smiling, there are a few things we’ve started doing differently because of this discovery.
We were already doing simple stuff like smiling and being nice. But taking these extra steps has resulted in even better feedback and even happier visitors. And I assume this is how we got so well ranked on TripAdvisor!