For many craft breweries, the go-to marketing option usually involves buying advertising space – whether it is in print publications, on the radio, on billboards or on websites. That might have made sense just a few years ago, but the surging popularity of social media now means that craft beer brands have a powerful new tool in their toolbox. With that in mind, here’s a brief look at how social media marketing can be used to boost your beer sales.

Facebook

The starting point for any craft beer brand needs to be Facebook. Think about it – Facebook has more than 2 billion monthly active users worldwide, and it has become the most popular social media platform for young millennials as well as Baby Boomers. In short, everyone is on Facebook, and you need to be on Facebook also.

There are a lot of different ways that you can leverage your corporate Facebook page without actually buying ads. For example, you could simply post news from your brewery about new beers, a new taproom menu list, or a new team member. Or, you could post updates about a new sale or promotion. This is perhaps the most effective and high ROI way to use Facebook – it’s the equivalent of distributing a flyer in everyone’s social media feed, alerting them of a new sale or promotion. Plus, since fans can “like” your post, that also ensures a certain amount of viral buzz and traction for your offer. It’s the digital world’s version of “word-of-mouth” advertising.

Instagram

Arguably, Instagram is the preferred social media platform of choice for the younger generation, so if your core demographic skews young, you will want to make sure that you have an active presence on Instagram. The most common way to leverage Instagram is simply sharing photos of your brewery, new beers that are available, or events that you recently hosted.

The real reason Instagram is so popular with craft breweries, though, is because it enables you to tell “behind-the-scenes” stories about what is going on at your brewery. Using a combination of photos and videos, you can show who is making your beer, how it is made, and why your brewery is different from any other. There are a variety of different ways you could go with this. Using the video streaming functionality of Instagram, you could host interviews with members of your brewing team. Or, using the “Stories” functionality of Instagram, you could literally offer a “day in the life” chronicle of what it is like to work at the brewery.

In a similar way, you could use Instagram to celebrate your customers and fans. If you scroll through the Instagram feeds of many craft brewers, for example, you’ll see plenty of examples where they are re-posting photos created by their fans. And they are celebrating the true brand ambassadors – like the beer drinker fan who wore a T-shirt from your brewery to an exotic location in the world, or a beer drinker fan who hosted an epic celebration with your beers.

It is actually quite important to identify and then celebrate these brand ambassadors, because wholesalers, distributors and retailers will sometimes take a look at your social media profile, to see what kind of “buzz” you are creating in the local community. From their perspective, they want to be working with craft beer brands that already have a lot of marketing momentum around them.

Social media influencers

Speaking of brand ambassadors, it is also quite important to cultivate what digital marketers now refer to as “influencers.” These are the types of people with tens of thousands of followers and fans on social media, as well as the type of “media-friendly” appearance that makes them great for inviting to local events.

For example, say that you are planning on hosting an upcoming event at your brewery, and you are aiming for maximum turnout and coverage of the event. You could just hope for the best, and send out regular emails and print mailings to your customers. Or, you could decide to partner with local social media influencers. Since they have tens of thousands of followers, a single Instagram photo or a single blog post could result in all kinds of positive results that eventually translate into higher sales. If they are invited to attend an event, they can photos and videos online, and perhaps even interact with fans in real-time. It’s an easy way to boost the profile of any event, and all at a very affordable price. While some celebrity influencers now charge outrageous fees, you can probably find a local beer blogger who is willing to post updates for the cost of a free bar tab.

Snapchat

While Snapchat appears to be losing popularity to Instagram, it does present a number of unique ways to get the word out about your craft beer brand. For example, Snapchat offers what is known as “geofilters” – these allow you to create a customized filter (i.e. overlay) that users can apply whenever they snap from your location. The user’s smartphone automatically detects the presence of available geofilters, giving users a quick and easy way to create a customized and unique photo. You can literally turn your brewery into a place “to see and be seen.”

Smartphone apps

Finally, you need to turn your attention to the growing number of smartphone apps that are based on the needs of the alcohol beverage industry. For example, Waitr is a restaurant on-demand food delivery platform that connects restaurants and customers who want to order food. Waitr now has 2500 restaurant partners, more than 100,000 customers and is available in more than 100 cities. Realizing this, Crying Eagle Brewing Company decided to create a special edition beer (A Nice Pear) specifically for users of Waitr. The idea is simple – any time a customer orders a restaurant meal, he or she can combine it with an order for Crying Eagle beer. Brilliant, right?

As you can see, the use of social media marketing is really only limited by your imagination. At one time, social media was primarily viewed as a “brand building tool” and nothing more. Now, however, social media platforms are making it easier than ever before for brands to use them as sales-building tools as well. So, if you are looking for cost-effective ways to stretch your marketing dollars, don’t overlook the many options offered by social media.