Making Wine Accessible w/ Podcasts, Amanda McCrossin & AJ Resnik, Wine Access

As the podcast space matures, it becomes a more meaningful channel to market wines to consumers and create new experiences.  3rd time guest Amanda McCrossin, Host of the Wine Access Unfiltered Podcast, and AJ Resnick, CMO of Wine Access, explain their rationale and experiences in launching and building the podcast and associated wine club.  From celebrities crying on the show to creating a 360 experience with their wine club and podcast audio and video, the Unfiltered Podcast continues to build traction, make wine more accessible, and build Wine Access into a loved wine brand. Detailed Show Notes: Wine Access backgroundLaunched in the late ’90s, it hosted wine retail websites and described wines2004 - offered wines on their platformCurate wines (team includes an MS), tell the story behind every wine, excellent customer service, and technology (powers wine clubs like Michelin Guide, Sunset, Decanter, and Williams Sonoma)Goal - to be a loved wine brandWine Access Unfiltered podcastLaunched in 2020A wine podcast w/ conversations around wine w/ wine, but not about wineReleased every other week, 45 min - 1 hour show lengthThey have done podcast ad buys and have seen successFormat - Season 1 - talk about wine stories, mostly with celebritiesSeason 2 - off more value add, more thematic (e.g., wine regions), added a wine club to drink the wines w/ the show (full 360 experience)Has IG (>10,000 followers) and YouTube (>300 subscribers) channelsListener baseThey assumed it would be the same as Wine Access customersThey found it to skew younger and less wine-savvy, but very curiousAnother way to connect with membersTraction>100,000 cumulative downloadsPast episode performance increases with new listenersHolds people’s attention for an extended period of timeMost podcasts fizzle out after five episodesGetting celebrities on the show“Do you want to drink wine with us?” worked during the pandemicThey did a lot of cold calling, worked with a few producersMore prominent celebrities didn’t always have the best performanceBert Kreischer’s episode was very successful; he cried on the show and then mentioned it and FaceTimed Amanda while on 2 Bears, 1 Cave podcastWine ClubFour wines for four episodes, sent every other month, curated by Amanda10% off all Wine Access purchasesIncludes shipping, can add wines w/ free shipping to shipmentSome wines exclusive to the wine clubQ3 2023 - Unfiltered Wine Club had more new members than any other club that Wine Access runsROIThe wine club helps cover the costThe goal is more brand awarenessRetention through connecting w/ members in a different wayContent creation (audio, video) that can be reusedPodcastingSpotify is bringing new energy to the space with a better listening experience (went from 15% -> 30% of Unfiltered listeners)YouTube has a podcast sectionRepurpose clips for social media is a best practice Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.