May 04: With the digital revolution taking place at a super fast speed, it is critical to understand now the behaviour of your target audience of tomorrow, the Z generation, born after the millennials( 1981-1995) and then target them for wine tourism or other marketing activities, said Paul Richer, Senior Partner, Genesys Digital Transformation at a seminar during the 10th edition of 1IWINETC Wine Tourism Conference in April 2018 at Hotel Marriott in Budapest, writes Subhash who attended it for the third time
Paul was clear that the present form of advertisement and mobilizing the customer in any business, including wine tourism must change in the near future because the future customers will have different traits and background. These are what are known as Generation Z, born after 1995. Quickly going over the traits, he said they have seen an economic downturn and are aware of global warming, are used to mobile phones and make their own media. They are totally dependent on IT and have limited grasp of alternatives.
They are career multi-taskers and can move seamlessly between organisations and pop-up businesses. They are used to and in fact, addicted to hand-held devices for communications. They are used to online and instant chats on their mobile devices.
Digital Immigrants vs. Native Immigrants
Paul also introduced the concept of Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives to understand the best way to communicate effectively with them. Digital Natives which the Generation Z really are, receive information from multiple sources quickly. They can do multi-tasking and prefer pictures, sounds and videos to text. They’d rather interact in real time and believe in learning that is fun.
Digital immigrants prefer controlled release of information from limited resources, can work on focused task (they are not good multi-taskers) and often prefer to receive information from text. They need greater space for personal introspection. They prefer information logically and in a sequence.
The notion of loyalty is changing in Generation Z with 74% reported in a survey in the UK claiming that they buy more from companies that make it easier for doing business -in the US this percentage is even higher at 82%. An astounding 85% of this generation like to shop around to get the best prices and the numbers are rising continuously. Almost half (44%) believe loyalty is a thing of the past while 40% are happy and comfortable to buy even from website overseas (think Alibaba!)
Voice chats with fellow humans are passé for this generation. Some kids today like to communicate even with their parents and elders through chats and not in voice mode. Conversation through Bots sold through Amazon and other online companies have become extremely important sources of communication. In the world of digitisation, Artificial Intelligence would be the ultimate version of companies like Google, with an ultimate search engine that would understand everything on the web. It would know what you want and would give it to you.
Artificial Intelligence is already at an advanced level and will be a very useful aid in communications. As an example, he cited the example of a Chat bot Concierge in a hotel, that handled the customer’s queries so diligently that guest insisted to leave a tip for her while checking out for all the help extended during her stay!
Giving the example of digital native companies he cited Skyscanner acquired for $1.74 billion, With Uber having a current valuation of $48billion and Airbnb’s worth being $30 billion!
Summarising the Digital World we live in today, he said the future customers would want experiences they could share with others with no geographical boundaries. Artificial Intelligence drives contextual content delivery whereas high bandwidth communications would deliver rich content like video and steaming requiring higher bandwidth.
His advice to the delegates was thus to ensure they have digital presence on the web and mobile phones. But it was important that they were active in disseminating information and interacting with their customers. He stressed that the digital presence should offer a seamless experience for delivery of content and take reservations etc for e-commerce companies. He advised the wine tour operators to be human and tell personal stories.
Paul advised the audience to make extensive use of videos for communications. He told them that it was not only important to be on the Social Media but to be ACTIVE on social media and engage the clients by offering to answer all the queries fast.
True to his Talk , he had interjected videos and slides in his presentations, making it a very thought provoking, lucid talk, one of the most interesting ones that gave a good insight of the potential customers (Generation z) and their traits to enable the audience to adapt to the changes.
Paul Richer is a London-based consultant working as a Senior Partner in Genesys Digital Transformations and can be contacted at paul.richer@genesys.net. You may visit his website www.genesys.net for details.
For earlier Articles on the IWINETC Wine Tourism Conference 2018, visit
IWINETC 2018: 10th International Wine Tourism Conference in Budapest Big Hit
Paul richer was one of the Speakers at the International Wine Tourism Conference held for the 10th time in Budapest, Hungary on April 10 and 11 followed by a tour of the wine regions of Eger and Tokaj. The visits to these regions will be covered in a future Article.
Subhash Arora
The views expressed are author’s own and not this eNewsletter-
delWine and the Article is based strictly on his Presentation-editor
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