There’s been a lot of buzz about social media sites on the Web like Facebook, MySpace, You Tube and Twitter. Like so many engaged in food production or operating a small business, at Jowler Creek Vineyard and Winery, we were concerned about diving in. Would we have enough time? What would we talk about? And who would really be interested in seeing and reading updates on what we’re doing?

But after getting a camcorder for Christmas, we decided to post a few videos of us pruning grape vines on YouTube for our family to see. Surprisingly, those two little amateur videos have been viewed more than 10,000 times by individuals.

This, of course, begs the question, “So what?” We can honestly say we’ve seen benefits for Jowler Creek. Case in point: Last year, a gentleman viewed our pruning video and sent an e-mail to see if he could come and learn more firsthand. That initial contact via YouTube has evolved into an invaluable friendship and a source of volunteer labor. Our retired, urban neighbor now works in the vineyard 5- to 10- hours a week—therapy for him, free help and a trusted business adviser for us!

Since there was such an interest in our videos, we’ve now posted additional videos on harvesting, our use of miniature Babydoll sheep to “mow” the vineyard, and how we bottle and package our product. The feedback and questions we get from viewers gives us insight into what people think and gives people a chance to interact with us virtually.

We then decided to create a Facebook page and start a Twitter account. So far we have 775 friends on Facebook and more than 100 people following us on Twitter. We regularly post 140 character updates to let our “friends” know what we are up to in the vineyard or winery. We are finding that there is genuine interest in how our product is produced.

If you’re new to the social networking playground, don’t be intimidated. You don’t have to figure it all out at once. Start by using one of the most common social-networking platforms. Once you’re comfortable, then broaden your net.

Keep in mind that there is synergy in effectively sharing and gathering information from several platforms at once. We show people our operation via video on YouTube, we quickly update and inform people with Twitter and we can develop effective two-way interaction with friends on FaceBook.

Recently, blog author Jenny Vergara talked about our farm and winery in her blog, “The Making of a Foodie.” Having never met us, she saw our YouTube video, tried our product, commented via Twitter about a problem she had with our product, received feedback from us almost immediately to solve the problem and ultimately recommended to others visit our Web site and to try our wine.

The resulting blog post provided us with all the validation we need that time spent in social media is worth it.

Editor's Note: Jason and Colleen Gerke, Farm Bureau members in Missouri, own and operate Jowler Creek Vineyard and Winery. This post was published as a guest column written by the Gerkes in the August 2009 issue of Foodie News.