Social Media in the Brewing World

The Yazoo Brewing Company, based in Nashville, Tennessee, has seen some very significant success in using social media to brand their brews. The local craft brewery has thousands of friends and followers on Twitter and Facebook (including us, of course) and has four star reviews on Yelp to go along with their nearly 4000 check-ins on Foursquare. 

Neil McCormick, Yazoo Brewing's Marketing Manager and resident social media guru, offered up some advice on how to make the most of social media platforms to brand your small business.

1) Try a personal touch. Rather than investing in a large firm to manage your social media, update internally whenever something is going on. Keep your followers up to date and engaged.

2) Use a hands-on approach. Don't sit back and wait for people to specifically call upon your social media platforms. Make use of the search features on twitter to see what people are talking about in your industry, and then join the conversation.

3) Careful dialogue and more. McCormick advises not to shy away from being funny or addressing negatives in public forum, but do so with caution. Always remember, "there's a human on each end of that interaction." Also, don't find yourself being one-dimensional in your social media voice. There are many social media platforms out there for a reason; use them to your advantage.

4) Next Up: Pinterest. Pinterest is an exciting new opportunity for small businesses to gain more exposure through social media. Pinterest allows for a streamlined interface that puts more information in front of users without having to dig through searches, links, and websites. McCormick says that he likes Pinterest based on its ability to translate the vibe and personality of his brewery and the people who work there.

For more information, please check out Sarah Stansbury's original article from The Tennessean here.

Strong Growth for U.S. Breweries

The Brewers Association (BA) recently published some very promising statistics for the first half of 2012. According to BA, dollar sales were up 14 percent in the first half, while the volume of craft beer sold had climbed by 12 percent. It was quite an impressive first half as an estimated 6.0 million barrels were sold by craft breweries. 

If that wasn't enough to prove that craft continues an incredible upward trend, check out the infographic below, showing the highest brewery count in the U.S. in the past 125 years!

The US brewery count has grown by 350 breweries since June of 2011, and has added numerous jobs to the economy. Currently, the craft beer industry contributes approximately 104,000 full and part-time jobs. Furthermore, the trend continues to grow as 1252 craft breweries are in planning phases, up from 725 only a year ago.

For more information, please visit the Brewers Association here.