What was your journey until taking on this role in the company?
I actually grew up in the company, and after graduating in Viticulture and Oenology, 4 years ago I officially joined the commercial department, dealing with the Friuli Venezia-Giulia, Veneto, Piedmont and Sicily areas. I subsequently obtained a Master's degree in Marketing and Communication, and from that moment I also began to supervise the Marketing Area, together with my sister. We started from scratch, until then the company was not structured in this sense. What made us reflect on this aspect were our customers: for the wine world and its business, image is fundamental, understanding this led us to the choice to dedicate time and energy to communicating a renewed image of Gortani, both towards the external and internal world.
What do you think about social media in the B2B market segment?
Within the B2B market segment it is not easy to use the platforms well and there are not many companies that manage to do it correctly. The widespread tendency among companies is to think that social media is not functional to business, therefore I notice that the entire segment is lagging behind. I believe that digital channels are not used to obtain a direct and immediate result, but rather to promote the company image both externally, i.e. the market, which can be national or international, and internally, with an orientation towards the workforce. Gortani boasts great sharing and emotion on the part of the internal staff when the collaborators see the products created online: there is great employee involvement, this is not a given and therefore we are very proud of it.
Which social network is more suitable for your reality and which is less?
LinkedIn is certainly industry-oriented, at top and middle management, but these are not figures directly related to our business. We are interested in reaching the owner of the winery, who is often not present on this social network. Instagram, on the other hand, was activated mainly for the internal world: Gortani has a rather heartfelt employee advocacy and this social network helps to further strengthen it. The right social network for Gortani is Facebook, which reflects the company both in terms of target and type of communication.
The data shows that having a low number of followers damages the brand image, what do you think?
At the moment I don't think it has much impact on the company's image, social media is used marginally in our sector. Of course, these are vanity metrics that people pay attention to so it would still always be preferable to have a good fan base. At the moment there are no active actions in this regard, so far Gortani has focused on renewing the image, from the catalogs to the website and all the placements to which the brand is connected. Social media is certainly a segment to which we will dedicate ourselves in the coming months, together with all digital institutional communication.
Have you ever collaborated with professionals regarding the social sphere?
In the past we have collaborated with some agencies, but the results were not as hoped. Now the social part of Gortani is managed internally by my sister and me, with the support of a communication agency coordinated by Federica, our operational marketing specialist. The agency entirely manages the brand's communication, therefore not only social media but also the website and the various communication arrangements.
What are the future corporate communication projects?
In recent years Gortani's investments have focused on innovation, energy saving and process modernization. Now the time has come to communicate everything we have done, the results and future projects, with an official and certified document which could be the Sustainability Report.