August 18, 2009
Vin65 Announces Tools That Are Easy to Navigate and Will Create Customized Content, Leading to Increased Online Wine Sales.
Abbotsford, BC-August 18, 2009-In an already competitive industry, wineries are now digging deep for immediate solutions in order to survive and prosper during challenging economic times. They don't have time to struggle through learning a complicated web platform just to keep their sites updated, however.
Vin65 has been listening to concerns from its winery customers. Andrew Kamphuis, Owner and Lead Developer at Vin65, and his tight-knit team of four have developed tools that help make winery websites more engaging and user-friendly both for the site visitor and the website's administrator. "Our new tools platform makes it easy for winery website administrators, oftentimes the owner or a marketing person, to keep the site content fresh, engaging and customized. Many of the tools do the work for you," says Kamphuis.
Additionally, the Vin65 platform helps to combat online shopping cart abandonment, a source of frustration for winery websites. "Wineries work hard to capture the interest of prospective customers and drive them to consider purchasing their wines on their ecommerce websites after they've left their tasting rooms. The last thing they want is to lose sales due to questions and doubts about shipping compliance and fees, confusion and apprehension about the check out process and reading messages that aren't tailored to their needs. Upfront shipping rates, upfront coupon messages and specials, one screen check out and enhanced button design make moving through the check out process more efficient and less confusing to customers resulting in increased wine sales."
Selling direct-to-consumer can pay off handsomely with increased margins of between 30-40% saved by bypassing the distributor and retailer channels, according to "Wine Marketing and Sales: Success Strategies for a Crowded Market" by Paul Wagner, Janeen Olsen and Liz Thach. "The current state of the economy and distributor consolidation has made it more difficult for small wineries to get their wines distributed. It's harder now to sell wines over $20 and this is especially true for lesser-known wineries who are not receiving the attention from distributors that they had in the past," says Kamphuis. "With direct-to-consumer sales being much more profitable for wineries, we made
Vin65's winery ecommerce platform a simple one to learn and more likely to lead visitors to complete the check out process. We're a staff of four and answer our phones, respond to emails quickly and can provide our clients with training and support when they need us."
“I’ve only been working with the software for a month or two and feel very confident in editing content, contact info and managing the store. Any problems or difficulties that I have encountered were fixed easily and quickly by the staff at Vin65. They’ve all been great,” said Kevin Murphy, Murphy Vineyards.
Located in British Columbia, Canada, Vin 65's parent company K1 Technology Corp. was founded in November 1999 as a supplier of content management and e-commerce systems for small businesses. It now specializes in providing wineries with solutions for managing their websites including website design, e-commerce, content management and customer relationship management. For more information, call 604-852-8140 or visit www.vin65.com.
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Andrew Kamphuis, owner
Office: 604-852-8140, Cell: 604-613-5343, Email: andrew@vin65.com
Melissa Dobson, Interview requests
Office: 607-377-5318, Cell: 917-816-5424, Email: melissa.dobson@avantguild.com