It's fair to say that Untappd is a hugely popular resource for craft beer lovers and can be a great way to reach our customers. There's a whole lot to like about it!
It can also be frustrating as hell.
So I figure, we talk about what we as brewers and salestypes like and dislike about it, then maybe point Untappd this direction, and then everyone's lives get better. Hooray!
I'll start:
Things I like:
- Greater access to information to consumers about my beers. ABV, IBU, descriptions... Provided I add that for each and every new beer we make. Which I don't. Because ain't nobody got time for dat. But still. The More You Know...
- Interaction: It's nice to be able to Toast people who like your beers. I like you too, cheers mate!
- Lets me know when my accounts have tapped my kegs. The. Single. Best. Thing. About. Untappd. Period. That is, for small brewers irritated that a bar has been sitting on their keg for six months. I also like to know which of my accounts get the most Untappd activity, because I'm more likely to offer them some weird one-off if I know people will talk about it and appreciate it.
Things I don't like:
- The 1-5 rating system. Statistically, the vast bell curve of us will end up with a 3.6ish. It's meaningless. Unless:
- Astroturfing, thumbing the scale, releasing the Army of Internet Flying Monkeys, etc.. Goose Island's Bourbon County has a 4.79 avg across three thousand people. Three thousand people can barely reach 51% agreement during an election nowadays, let alone a near-unanimous vote on a beer. It's like Grandma always said "Three people can agree on a pizza, if two of them are dead." And seven Goose Island barrel beers on the Top Rated page? Is there some enormous Midwest Bourbon County Cult I am unaware of? In which case, by all means, "Bourbon for the Bourbon God!!!" (Please don't hurt me...)
- Feedback can be good but let's face it, this is the Internet. I like hearing that people like my beers, and I REALLY like hearing if people think something is wrong with any of them. One "Meh" I'll ignore, but a pattern starts developing and I take a look. Maybe one of my accounts needs a talkin' to. Maybe I've got a faulty keg stem out there. Or a batch went out with wonky carbonation or something. Thanks for the tip, Anonymous Stranger! Gold Star!
What I don't like is "This Belgian Wit is too black and roasty." or "Worst. Beer. Ever. Just like 95% of my other reviews." Which gets to the heart of the matter, and a fundamental rule of the online world: People are Terrible.
Just terrible. Don't get me wrong, individuals are great! In fact, some of my closest friends are individuals. But People...yikes!
Being a social media app, Untappd necessarily has to rely on People. And as we know, People are terrible. I had a check-in today, from two states away, of a Squid Ink IIPA, (Yes, it had real squid ink in it. Don't judge me.) that I brewed once, for Strange Brewfest two years ago. If you're still drinking it, it's because you lined your pockets with grocery bags and secreted it away, waiting, waiting, just waiting for the day two and a half years later you'd drink it in a bar in San Francisco. Or maybe you just confused it with some other brewery's beer. Or most likely, pudgy little drunken fingers:
I'll check in on the Untappd account and find about eight different entries for the same beers, because drunk fingers attached to drunk People seemingly can't be bothered to look up the beer list before misspelling in their own brand new entry for a beer that either doesn't exist, or is off by one letter from the real one. So the big problem is: why is it up to the breweries to clean up this mess? Because if I don't, my beers are still there for everyone to see, and if someone should wish to honestly rate a beer, and I do nothing, they must first weed through the World's Worst Spelling Bee in order to find the truthiest looking listing. Or worse still, from a marketing standpoint, they jump on one of the worst ones because it's first on the list, and the whole hateful cycle continues. It's like Oscar Wilde said, "there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." I have to believe that the larger breweries have wide-eyed and fresh-faced marketing interns out there spending their entire day fixing this sort of thing, but unfortunately all my interns are busy building our new Weather Dominator.
So here's my suggestions, and the rest of you Probrewers, please, add more:
If a brewery has claimed their account, start limiting the public's ability to add new beers. Not cut it off completely, we don't always make a new profile for each weird one-off beer. (See: Things I like #1) But perhaps a popup screen of "This sounds a lot like these beers: x, y, z" or "Have you checked the official beer list?" before a new one is added. Then give the brewery a reasonable timeframe in which to yay or nay it before it automatically is posted. Case in point.
If a beer is checked as "Not In Production", for the love of Bilious the Oh God of Hangovers, put in a popup "This beer is no longer in production, are you sure that's what you're drinking?" Sometimes it might be: "Why yes, Untappd, this can of Vintage 1977 Billy Beer tastes terrible. The World Must Know!" But more likely it's "Derp, my finger slipped. Sorry."
If a brewery has a brewery account, why do I have to ask Untappd to merge all the drunkenly misspelled beer names for me? The merging process in general could be faster and cleaner. Why do I have to give you a reason? Just let me do it, or do it yourself somehow, but above all make it easy, and make it instant. I'm sure there's some fiendish way to game the system that you're trying to prevent, but surely you can back-check that if it ever becomes a problem?
So like I said, Untappd is a great, great app. But like so many, many new internet wonders, someone out there has made my life more complicated without asking me first. And every month it's a new one. "Hey why aren't you on Drunkle(tm) yet? Get with the times old man!"
And I'm like, "Yelp has recommended the following places for you to shove your smartphone..."
Git off my lawn you kids,
Russell
It can also be frustrating as hell.
So I figure, we talk about what we as brewers and salestypes like and dislike about it, then maybe point Untappd this direction, and then everyone's lives get better. Hooray!
I'll start:
Things I like:
- Greater access to information to consumers about my beers. ABV, IBU, descriptions... Provided I add that for each and every new beer we make. Which I don't. Because ain't nobody got time for dat. But still. The More You Know...
- Interaction: It's nice to be able to Toast people who like your beers. I like you too, cheers mate!
- Lets me know when my accounts have tapped my kegs. The. Single. Best. Thing. About. Untappd. Period. That is, for small brewers irritated that a bar has been sitting on their keg for six months. I also like to know which of my accounts get the most Untappd activity, because I'm more likely to offer them some weird one-off if I know people will talk about it and appreciate it.
Things I don't like:
- The 1-5 rating system. Statistically, the vast bell curve of us will end up with a 3.6ish. It's meaningless. Unless:
- Astroturfing, thumbing the scale, releasing the Army of Internet Flying Monkeys, etc.. Goose Island's Bourbon County has a 4.79 avg across three thousand people. Three thousand people can barely reach 51% agreement during an election nowadays, let alone a near-unanimous vote on a beer. It's like Grandma always said "Three people can agree on a pizza, if two of them are dead." And seven Goose Island barrel beers on the Top Rated page? Is there some enormous Midwest Bourbon County Cult I am unaware of? In which case, by all means, "Bourbon for the Bourbon God!!!" (Please don't hurt me...)
- Feedback can be good but let's face it, this is the Internet. I like hearing that people like my beers, and I REALLY like hearing if people think something is wrong with any of them. One "Meh" I'll ignore, but a pattern starts developing and I take a look. Maybe one of my accounts needs a talkin' to. Maybe I've got a faulty keg stem out there. Or a batch went out with wonky carbonation or something. Thanks for the tip, Anonymous Stranger! Gold Star!
What I don't like is "This Belgian Wit is too black and roasty." or "Worst. Beer. Ever. Just like 95% of my other reviews." Which gets to the heart of the matter, and a fundamental rule of the online world: People are Terrible.
Just terrible. Don't get me wrong, individuals are great! In fact, some of my closest friends are individuals. But People...yikes!
Being a social media app, Untappd necessarily has to rely on People. And as we know, People are terrible. I had a check-in today, from two states away, of a Squid Ink IIPA, (Yes, it had real squid ink in it. Don't judge me.) that I brewed once, for Strange Brewfest two years ago. If you're still drinking it, it's because you lined your pockets with grocery bags and secreted it away, waiting, waiting, just waiting for the day two and a half years later you'd drink it in a bar in San Francisco. Or maybe you just confused it with some other brewery's beer. Or most likely, pudgy little drunken fingers:
I'll check in on the Untappd account and find about eight different entries for the same beers, because drunk fingers attached to drunk People seemingly can't be bothered to look up the beer list before misspelling in their own brand new entry for a beer that either doesn't exist, or is off by one letter from the real one. So the big problem is: why is it up to the breweries to clean up this mess? Because if I don't, my beers are still there for everyone to see, and if someone should wish to honestly rate a beer, and I do nothing, they must first weed through the World's Worst Spelling Bee in order to find the truthiest looking listing. Or worse still, from a marketing standpoint, they jump on one of the worst ones because it's first on the list, and the whole hateful cycle continues. It's like Oscar Wilde said, "there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." I have to believe that the larger breweries have wide-eyed and fresh-faced marketing interns out there spending their entire day fixing this sort of thing, but unfortunately all my interns are busy building our new Weather Dominator.
So here's my suggestions, and the rest of you Probrewers, please, add more:
If a brewery has claimed their account, start limiting the public's ability to add new beers. Not cut it off completely, we don't always make a new profile for each weird one-off beer. (See: Things I like #1) But perhaps a popup screen of "This sounds a lot like these beers: x, y, z" or "Have you checked the official beer list?" before a new one is added. Then give the brewery a reasonable timeframe in which to yay or nay it before it automatically is posted. Case in point.
If a beer is checked as "Not In Production", for the love of Bilious the Oh God of Hangovers, put in a popup "This beer is no longer in production, are you sure that's what you're drinking?" Sometimes it might be: "Why yes, Untappd, this can of Vintage 1977 Billy Beer tastes terrible. The World Must Know!" But more likely it's "Derp, my finger slipped. Sorry."
If a brewery has a brewery account, why do I have to ask Untappd to merge all the drunkenly misspelled beer names for me? The merging process in general could be faster and cleaner. Why do I have to give you a reason? Just let me do it, or do it yourself somehow, but above all make it easy, and make it instant. I'm sure there's some fiendish way to game the system that you're trying to prevent, but surely you can back-check that if it ever becomes a problem?
So like I said, Untappd is a great, great app. But like so many, many new internet wonders, someone out there has made my life more complicated without asking me first. And every month it's a new one. "Hey why aren't you on Drunkle(tm) yet? Get with the times old man!"
And I'm like, "Yelp has recommended the following places for you to shove your smartphone..."
Git off my lawn you kids,
Russell
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