The reason I do what I do is because I know how much social media can transform a business. A great social media presence can put you in front of new customers, convince them to leave their couch, and even convert them into fans of your business. The key is creating a social media presence that mimics your taproom experience. It should answer: what you offer, who you are, and why they should visit.

Oftentimes, your profile needs to be able to answer those questions as soon as someone lands on your profile. To make sure you make a good first impression, I’m sharing the strategy I use when performing audits for my clients, so you can know exactly what you need to fix to start capturing the attention of your target audience. 

Your Bio: Who are you? Why should I care? Why should I follow you?

If the only thing in your bio is business hours, you are underutilizing a key part of your profile. Your Instagram bio should give people a clear idea of who you are and what you’re all about. This is where you put in statements that help differentiate you from other breweries or other businesses in your area and let people know why they should come visit you. Your bio should be specific. It should feel unique to you. It should sound like you. 

Going back to those business hours. Unless you have a really good one-liner, I would not recommend putting your hours in your bio, because the space is limited. If your bio does its job, somebody will go hunt down your hours. They will find them. There are plenty of places on Instagram, whether that’s your link in bio or your highlights, where you can add your hours without using up the precious space of your bio.

Your Highlights: The FAQs of Your Profile

I believe your Instagram Highlights should act as the frequently asked questions of your profile. Yes, those questions you already have living on your website. Your highlights are there to introduce people to you. Having your frequently asked questions there is like a level of hospitality in digital form.

It can answer questions like: are you dog friendly? Kid friendly? Big group friendly? You can even have a highlight to showcase your core beers. 

I recommend making your highlights as evergreen as possible. Having highlights that are outdated, or time-sensitive ones, can make your timeline look stale and old. If you focus on evergreen topics, you don’t have to worry about changing them up often. I’ve taken this approach with all of the brewery accounts I’ve managed. You want your highlights to feel fresh and still relevant to how you run your business today.

Your Grid: Your Last Nine Posts Speak Volumes

In your last nine posts, you should have a combination of content that tells people who you are, what you offer, and gives them reasons to visit you. If you don’t have those three things, your feed is likely out of balance. 

Also look at how many posts are promotional versus how many give people an example of what it’s going to be like to sit in your taproom. Are you showing your space? Will people get an idea of who your staff is and what their personality is? Do they understand who the types of people are who come here? Do they understand what it is about you that makes you special?

These are things that go into people’s decision to visit. This is the content that helps convert. People are looking for spaces in which to connect with people. Yes, they might be coming for the beer, but they’re likely also making their decision to visit off a lot of other things, and you want to make sure you’re constantly creating content that helps answer the questions people might have about visiting your space.

This is why it’s important for your grid to look less like a community bulletin board and more like what it’s actually like to be in your space.

Your Captions: Are You Talking to the Right Person?

When you’re looking at individual posts, also review your captions and think about how your audience is going to respond to it. For example, if you have a caption about a beer release that’s really focused on the technical aspects, and you haven’t spent time defining those technical aspects, you could be turning off your audience. Most consumers are looking for what your beer tastes like, and I think having that answer at the very beginning of your caption is important. Then you can dive into more technical language, but make sure to define it for them as you go.

You also want to make sure you’re adding calls to action to your captions. It doesn’t always have to be something that encourages someone to click a link or purchase something or come visit your taproom, it could be asking a question and asking them to comment, share, or save your post. 

Your Comments: Go Beyond “Hearting” and Start a Conversation

Many taprooms are community spaces, and the biggest advice I could give is finding ways to translate that taproom experience online. With that in mind, you want to make sure you’re replying to people, not just liking a post, but trying to think of something fun and engaging to say back.

When you’re responding to someone, think about what they said and what you would say to them if you were sitting in front of them. Find ways to give a good comment, something that will spark conversation or make the person on the other end feel like what they said mattered. Try your best to respond in a very human way when you’re responding to comments.

Auditing your own account is not always the easiest thing to do. If you feel too close to your own account, you can always let someone else give you feedback like, a new hire, an unbiased friend, even a family member who might not know your brewery well, and ask them one question: what do you think this place is like? Don’t guide them. Don’t explain anything first. Just let them scroll and tell you.

Their answer will surface things you can’t see anymore because you’re too close to it. Maybe they say it looks like a sports bar when you’re actually a quiet neighborhood spot. Maybe they can’t tell if you’re kid-friendly, or they assume you’re closed because your last post is from months ago. That gap between what you think you’re putting out into the world and what a stranger actually sees is exactly what this whole audit is designed to close.

Want a second pair of eyes on your own account? I’m looking for one BA member brewery to audit using this exact process for an upcoming feature. If you’re curious what a stranger would actually see when they land on your profile, reach out to volunteer.