Finger Lakes Wine Country is organized to promote economic development and tourism in the Finger Lakes region of New York state. Regionally they had a strong presence, but they were having trouble amplifying their message and connecting with a broader audience – especially on their social media channels. The region has many reasons to visit: from its more than 100 wineries, breweries, and distilleries to the natural beauty of its lakes and countless waterfalls to its world-class attractions like the Corning Museum of Glass. Needless to say we had the building blocks for a strong strategy.

After taking stock of what was working and what needed a boost, we decided on a multi-faceted approach. Through a mix of social media content, event planning, design, and video storytelling, we have moved the brand forward and not only increased their overall awareness, social media following and reach, we helped the region get named Best Wine Region in the USA 2 years in a row.

GROWTH: INSTAGRAM FOLLOWERS

Brave World Media has helped organize several events and influencer trips for the region – and was instrumental in bringing TBEX North America Travel Blogger Conference to the Finger Lakes in 2018. See the TBEX case study here.

Influencer Trip To address some of the resistance and skepticism about influencers and influencer marketing, we selected a small group of trusted bloggers to take a 7-day trip covering all 3 wine regions, historic areas, foodie highlights, nature/adventure attractions, and museums.

Results: We hosted an online event which garnered over 6 million impressions and trended on Twitter for over an hour. More than 20 online articles and videos and over 2,000 social media shares (and counting) resulted from our guided, experiential tour.

Women’s Travel Fest To take the message even farther out, Brave World Media represented Finger Lakes Wine Country at the Women’s Travel Fest hosted in New York City.

The 3-day annual travel conference welcomes hundreds of influencers from all over the world. We planned, coordinated, and managed the sponsorship of the Speaker’s Lounge. We designed the space for a “Taste of Finger Lakes Wine Country” experience where we served wine, paired with delicious food while promoting the destination to an audience, many of whom were only just hearing about the destination for the first time.

Over the years, we have made several videos and taken thousands of photos promoting Finger Lakes Wine Country. Here are a few of them.

To commemorate the occasion, we designed posters to spread the word that Finger Lakes Wine Country was named best in the USA!