I have a friend who has a wine company. They sell wine deals online. Simple.
But his whole business is based off the emails they send out.
If the email is interesting and makes people want to buy wine, he makes money.
If it doesn’t, he’s stuck with thousands of dollars of unsold wine. (perhaps I can help finish some) ;) ;)
So he sends out several emails a week about wine, and asked me the same question I hear from a lot of people with email lists:
“But what do I wriiiiitttee about???”
He thinks because he’s only selling wine, he’s running out of interesting stuff to talk about. “NONSENSE!!!” I screamed at him as I slapped him across the face!
I went on to brag about how I could personally find at least 50 interesting emails IN THE NEXT 2 MINUTES to send out to his subscribers that would also help sell lots of wine.
Currently his wine emails go out purely with deals, kind of like this:
| Dear wine list subscriber,
Here is a wine deal that we have acquired. It is First Press brand Cabernet Sauvignon. You can buy it here for $40 a bottle:
|
Instead of making this email (sent to thousands of people) just a straight promotional email to jam some product down their throat, why not add some value to them instead?
This way they will look forward to your emails, and trust your emails, and be more likely to BUY from your emails.
Instead of slapping a promotion in their face, how about we give them some really good information like this sample email:
| Ok, here’s a trick I learned from serving wine for 8 years:
“Wine is first tasted by the eyes, and second by the mouth.” This is important because you can improve the “taste” of your wine by presenting it differently. Cool huh? In all my years as a wine taster, I’ve figured out how to make wine “taste” better to people by presenting it differently. So here’s two cool things you can do to make your wine experience more enjoyable, in particular for the Cabernet Sauvignon we’re got today (these are great tactics to use at your next dinner party)! So for the First Press wine we’ve got today, I would use this script with my guests: “Ok everyone, this is a Cabernet Sauvignon from First Press Wineries in Napa Valley. The grapes they use are picked later than the regular harvest, so put your nose in the glass and take a slow & deep breathe of the wine. You’ll smell a “deep texture” which essentially means a dark grape flavor. Since this is a Cabernet Sauvignon wine, it will have a higher level of what wine makers call “bitterness”, which means it goes really well with salty cured meats. If you all take a sip of the First Press wine and eat a slice of imported pepperoni, you’ll see how well they compliment each other.” For a Cabernet Sauvignon wine like today’s special, serve with Bridgeford Pepperoni. You can get it at most stores, it’s about $12 a log, and you just slice it up before a party, and people LOVE this stuff! But mainly, it compliments First Press Cabernet Sauvignon like a glove (It has a salt capacity of .3%, and so does the First Press Cabernet Sauvignon). Whenever you pair a wine and meat, people rate the wine higher than simply drinking it alone (and have a more “full” experience)! YOU’RE DONE! 1.) Simply explain the flavors. 2.) Serve with a salted meat that compliments the wine. A simple trick to make your (and your guests) wine experience much more full. Just so you know, we have the First Press Cabernet Sauvignon on sale today, and only 120 bottle left. So if you grab a bottle (or 5) now, you get a $70 bottle of wine for only $20. This is a helluva a deal, and you can save this email and use the exact script above at your next event, and end up with very delighted guests! You can buy the First Press Cabernet Sauvignon at a 75% discount by clicking the bottle below:
Neville P.P.S. Seriously, if you haven’t had a First Press cab with Bridgeford Pepperoni before, you’re really missing out on one of my favorite pairings! |
Now wasn’t that a better email than simply sending out the promotion?
It helps make people DESIRE your product and want to buy it on the spot.
Now my friend doesn’t think it’s possible to send out so many emails about wine and still keep it interesting. WRONG.
Let’s just rattle off some suggestions right off the top of our heads for email ideas:
–The best wines to drink with turkey during Thanksgiving.
–The best wines to buy and let age in the closet.
–How swirl your glass of wine properly and sniff it.
–3 ways to serve your wine all fancy-like.
–What the heck is a wine decanter?
–How to drink a Pinot Grigio.
–How Italians drink their wine.
–Say this traditional Italian toast at your wine party
There’s literally endless amounts of great emails we can send out, and still relate them right back to the products we’re selling.
As for now, I’m off! Me and Noah took a workcation for a few weeks, and we’re currently in Bangkok and found a place to watch the SuperBowl (at 5:30am)!!
With Noah in Bangkok:
As we nerdily work on laptops whilst watching the SuperBowl, I’m working on this email ABOUT emailing……and he’s working on a new AppSumo plugin that smart-detects how to capture the emails of people coming to your site. You can check it out here:
https://www.appsumo.com/list-builder/
By the way, we saw those “big riots” going on in Bangkok right now. In person is was more like a concert and market, and looked like a big peaceful music festival. #mediamanipulation
Adios!
-Neville – Kopywriter who teaches kopywriting
P.S. I have a Google Doc full of emails I can write out at any time, it might be helpful for you to make a document with all these ideas also!