Engaging in email marketing is widely acknowledged as one of the most effective and successful types of promotional campaigns that any winery can conduct. However, if you are not keeping meticulous track of your results, you may be missing out on opportunities to spot market trends and developments that could lead to considerable sales increases. Here are the key performance metrics over and above open and click-through rates that your winery should be tracking and analyzing:

Club Attrition Rates – Obtaining new club members can prove to be costly and time-consuming. While you continue to build your club, it is important to understand how many of your current members are opting out of your continued missives. This metric will shed light on how successful your club strategy is and will identify the need to revamp your current club operations.

Club Cancellation Reasons – Once you have determined that you have a significant attrition rate, it is time to analyze the reasons why each member has canceled. There are a number of people who will back out of anything sooner or later, but the rest of the cancelers need to be scrutinized carefully. If you are seeing that some of the reasons have to do with elements of your club offerings, it is imperative that you overhaul them immediately to make your club more responsive to the needs of its members.

Varietal Sales by Segment – You are thoroughly segmenting your customer list (right?), so an analysis of which segments are responsible for the varying levels of varietal sales can lead to an illuminating set of results. You may find that your Pinot Noir is more popular with men while your Sauvignon Blanc is the ladies’ first choice; that your Chenin Blanc skews to urban customers while your Zinfandel is a hit in the suburbs; or that your Vigonier appeals to older adults while your Petit Sirah is preferred by the younger set. This data will speak volumes about how you should be fine-tuning your overall marketing approaches.

Case & Dollar Sales by Segment – You should be tracking not just dollar sales but case sales as well by segment. Dollar sales statistics alone can be misleading: After all, a hundred cases of a $5 Moscato produce the same dollar sales as twenty cases of a $25 Bordeaux. Determining exactly which segments are responsible for your overall sales in case volume and correlating that data against the overall dollar sales will allow you to shape your ongoing strategies.

Profitability by Segment – Once you have analyzed varietal, case and dollar sales per segment, you are now equipped to make a comprehensive and accurate determination as to the profitability of each segment. This data is critical to gaining an overall perspective on how your customers are responding to your email marketing campaign. Interpreting this information across all of your segments will show you where you need to concentrate your efforts and which segment battles you’re currently winning.

It is well nigh impossible to have too much information on your customers, as each nugget has the potential to reveal trends or preferences you may not have considered before. All of this data constitutes a treasure trove of knowledge that you can use to build your winery’s sales and brand.