Social media experts join EWBC line-up

Two social media experts will be taking the keynote speaker slots at this year's Digital Wine Communications Conference.
 
Taking place on November 9-11 in Izmir, Turkey, the conference is designed to help the drinks industry improve their digital wine communication strategies.
 
The first keynote speaker will be UK-based photographer, videographer, social technologist and mobile media maker Christian Payne.
 
Originally a professional photographer working for UK daily newspapers, Payne diversified to explore both new and social media and has spent the last seven years experimenting with social networking platforms, as well as documenting the plight of Iraqi refugees for the United Nations; video blogging for the British Council in Pakistan and working alongside Reuters on political projects with UK politicians Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg.
 
Payne will be speaking on the subject of wine writing and storytelling, and how online and mobile technologies have enabled communicators to become authoritative sources on their chosen subject.
 
France-born Pierrick Bouquet is a NYC-based wine marketeer. His experience includes developing social media marketing strategies for French wineries, managing US exports for leading French wineries and working with US-based French French wine distributors.
 
Bouquet also co-founded New York-based digital marketing agency ablesocial.com, catering exclusively to the food and wine industries. During his presentation at the conference, he will reveal the results of his recent online study, drawing conclusions about the evolution of social media usage and its effects within the wine industry in France and the US, over a three-year period.
 
Bouquet and Payne will join a number of other speakers at this year's EWBC, including American author and winemaker Randall Grahm; British wine journalist and author Andrew Jefford; José Vouillamoz, a leading DNA expert who is collaborating with Jancis Robinson on her new grape book; and Dr. Patrick E. McGovern, an American scholar and author of Ancient Wine: The Search for the Origins of Viniculture.
 
UK wine experts Tim Atkin MW and Charles Metcalfe will also take part, leading the Grand Terroir Experience, a tasting which presents a broad range of wines from Turkey and neighbouring countries.