With the hype surrounding AI, it’s hard to know what news matters to today’s DTC wine marketers.
I suspect most of us tried using AI for content creation a couple of years ago.
But what has AI done for wine marketers lately, besides confusing us with too many models and few pragmatic uses?
The good news is that, amid the usual noise about AI condemning us to a life of misery, the last few months have provided wine merchants with a new generation of valuable survival tools in the form of powerful AI Agents.
AI Wine Marketing Agents offer merchants a competitive edge during troubling times
What the Heck is an “AI Agent?”
Leading business productivity tools – including Salesforce, OpenAI, JotForm, and Zapier – now offer their unique interpretations of “AI Agents” that can amplify the results of any sales or marketing team.
Intriguing use cases in the wine industry include AI-powered sommeliers, social media assistants, DTC marketing management, and public-facing chatbots, all of which are empowered to represent your brand and assist customers on your behalf.
Why Use AI Agents?
Outside of the wine industry, successful retail brands such as Sephora, Domino’s, and 1-800-Flowers all report double-digit gains when using AI-powered customer service agents, including reduced product returns, increased average order size, and higher online sales revenue.
But, with costs ranging from free to $20K/mo – coupled with training expenses and a steep learning curve – it’s hard for most wine merchants to know where to start evaluating the potential benefits of adding AI Agents to their DTC marketing mix.
That’s why we performed a preliminary investigation for you…
FINDING THE Best AI Agents for DTC Wine Marketers
All wine merchants are driven by their unique ambitions, interests, and operational constraints. But with DTC sales transactions plummeting nationwide, while typical wine marketers struggle with meager budgets and wear too many hats, our evaluation focused on which AI Agents deliver the “best bang-for-the-buck” for an average U.S. winery in 2025.
Here’s our expert analysis:
OpenAI/Salesforce Agents
Using our “best bang-for-the-buck” criteria, we immediately ruled out OpenAI and Salesforce Agents, because most DTC wine merchants have neither the budget nor time to experiment with $20,000/month AI Agents or tech-heavy learning curves.
If you’re the exception, your organization probably has at least one AI initiative underway.
To propose another AI-powered wine marketing initiative, you can’t go wrong following the generative AI cost equation proposed by MIT Professor Rama Ramakrishnan, here: https://sloanreview.mit.edu/video/getting-payback-from-generative-ai/
Zapier AI Agents
Zapier’s AI Agents, however, offer a compelling entry-point for DTC wineries, especially if they already use Zapier for other purposes.
If you already know how Zapier links multiple data sources to automate high-value workflows, and since the incremental cost/training required to deploy a Zapier Agent is minimal, they’re an excellent choice for AI experimentation.
Their superpower is utilizing AI to make business decisions based on your criteria and then taking action – processing an order, triggering an email, text, or social media post, escalating an issue, or preparing management reports automatically 24/7.
Of all the “affordable” AI Agents released in the last few months, Zapier Agents are the most capable but come with a steeper learning curve.
Jotform AI Agents
Smaller businesses with tight budgets or individual wine marketers looking to leverage AI Agents can’t go wrong by starting with Jotform’s new AI Customer Service Agents, released in February 2025.
Their sweet spot is delivering customer service across multiple marketing channels, including chatbots, mobile apps, voice, email, phone, SMS, Messenger, and more.
Although Jotform AI Agents use ChatGPT to converse in natural language, 100% of their “knowledge” is provided by you in the form of FAQs, uploaded documents/links, and live training sessions where you ask questions and grade the answers provided by your Agent – training them over time, much like your favorite marketing intern.
Jotform’s affordable pricing plans – starting @ $0/mo for five agents – make it easy to justify a thorough evaluation if you’re ready to discover how AI Agents can help your brand and career achieve new heights of success in 2025.
4 FREE Ways Wine Marketers Can Use AI Agents NOW
If you want to dip your toe into the growing sea of AI agents, it helps to align your marketing goals with your agent's strengths. In the case of Jotform AI Agents, their strengths align with four wine marketing use cases:
Answering FAQs posed by website visitors
Telling your brand story
Growing your SMS/email lists
Recommending which wines pair best with food or special occasions
If you or your staff spend time answering common customer questions, and want to explore how AI wine marketing can help you achieve your goals, Jotform’s new AI Agents can open the door to a whole new world of possibilities.
Happy Selling!
About THE AUTHOR
Bryan St. Amant, founder and CEO of VinterActive, holds an MS in Business Management from M.I.T. and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from U.C. Berkeley. His award-winning work has been featured in books, magazines, and seminars, including CFO Magazine, Inc., CNN Money, eMarketing Magazine, Integrated Direct Marketing, Direct Marketing Association, Grapevine Magazine, Wine Marketing Report, Wine Business, and the Wine Industry Network.