Naked Wines

Naked Wines is an online wine subscription platform supporting independent winemakers by offering consumers high-quality wines at competitive prices, without supermarket markups. Their growth model hinges on cost-efficient customer acquisition and precise targeting.

With the critical Christmas and New Year period looming, they came to Involve Digital with a challenge: drive new customer subscriptions under $30 CPA. If we could meet this metric, the budget was uncapped.

It was not easy. Subscription fatigue, January resolutions (teetotalism) and advertising volatility over the holiday season presented real risks. This campaign would require strategic audience segmentation, platform-specific media buying and performance-driven optimisation from day one.

Our strategy was built on three key pillars: intent-driven prospecting (targeting audiences most likely to subscribe on first interaction), granular audience segmentation (creating distinct micro-audiences based on demographic, psychographic and behavioural data), and flexible budget allocation (dynamically adjusting spend towards the highest-converting audiences and creative variants).

We implemented promotional offers including $100 and $50 discounts, backed by a wide creative mix showcasing the winemakers' stories, exclusivity of the wines, and the purpose-driven mission of supporting local producers. Creative and copy emphasised quality and value vs supermarket wines, exclusivity and direct support for winemakers, and discovery of new artisan wines.

Rather than treating "wine drinkers" as one broad category, we identified high-performing cohorts including women aged 40 to 45 in high-pressure professional roles, gift purchasers during the holiday period, and lapsed wine subscription users seeking better value. This structure allowed faster optimisation, reduced wasted spend, and built a scalable growth engine rather than a one-off campaign.

When the post-New Year CPA surged to $90 due to shifting consumer intent, we restructured the campaign within 24 hours, reactivating only the most efficient segments to restore profitability.

Target CPA was $30. Initial CPA within 48 hours: $14. New Year CPA spike: $90. Post-optimisation CPA: $28. Final overall CPA: $20.67, which is 31% better than target. 4,362 subscription sales attributed to the media campaign.

From October to December, our granular campaign structure, rapid optimisation framework and audience insights enabled Naked Wines to hit their subscription goals, even during the most volatile time of year.

The client's final comment: this was the first time they had full control, flexibility and confidence in scaling a campaign without sacrificing CPA. The most profitable media performance they had seen all year.