Wine Online: The Wine Library

Why are 80,000 people watching Gary Vaynerchuk everyday? Because he has figured out the secret sauce for using social media to build brand equity.

Thirty-three year old Vaynerchuk, co-owner of The Wine Library liquor store in Springfield, NJ hosts Wine Library TV, a daily 25 minute video blog. In the videos, Vaynerchuk educates viewers about wines as well as tastes and rates a few bottles. He has had guests such as Jim Cramer of Mad Money and Clayton Morris, anchor of Fox and Friends. Wine Library TV consists of both taped segments and live video blogs. He got the idea for the web show in 2005 when he noticed the web developers for the Wine Library e-commerce site watching online videos about technology. "It was very obvious to me that the platform was going to be huge," says Vaynerchuk. "That led me to think, 'What can I do a show about?' I felt like I owed it to wine to do a show about it. I felt like I could talk to the under 35 demographic, and create wine drinkers out of guys that loved beer and girls that drank vodka. After watching the videos, they'd say, 'Oh, wow! Wines may not be just for jerk-offs,' and become potential customers."

Vaynerchuk says that social media such as Facebook and Twitter are game changing marketing tools; however, they weren't around when he started Wine Library TV. In order to create a community and raise awareness for his show, he built Wine Library TV by leaving comments on every wine blog on the Internet. He'd visit every wine forum and post comments, without spamming, to become part of the community. "The game is to become part of the culture, the blood, the DNA of whatever you're about, not just force feed it," says Vaynerchuk. "That's what I learned through this. You can buy all the billboards on the highways you want, and the New York Times and Star Ledger and Wine Spectator – and we've spent $5 million in advertising prior to Wine Library TV but when you're actually part of the community, it is a whole different world."

Having a legion of fans and being accepted into an online community is one thing, but how does that translate into dollars for the business? According to Vaynerchuk, that's the easiest question to answer. "Dollars are only made one way in America eyeballs," says Vaynerchuk. "The New York Times has a lot of readers and they charge advertisers that want to sell something to those eyeballs. Billboard companies make money because people drive by them and their eyeballs see it. So, for 25 minutes a day, 80,000 people see me, they care about wine, and we can make a lot of money. If you don't think that I can monetize that, then what that tells me is you're not an entrepreneur." Vaynerchuk, who has placed billboard and New York Times ads in the past, finds social media more targeted. Wine Library sells all of the wines Vaynerchuk features on the weblog; however, that doesn't stop him from panning the ones he doesn't like.

Vaynerchuk believes the advantage of online video blogs over regular network and cable TV commercials is that it is focused. He is guaranteed to have an audience of thousands of people interested in his product, whereas traditional media will get millions of people who may not be interested in wine at all. "What people don't realize is that the days of "Who Shot J.R.," Seinfeld, and American Idol are coming to an end, because there's so much content competing for people's time," says Vaynerchuk.

Wine Library is now a $50 million company that does 50% of its sales online. In addition to a successful online marketing campaign, Vaynerchuk attributes his sales to "authenticity and DNA. I'm hyper and excitable and get people pumped. That's a very good thing to have in sales. You pair that with knowledge, and never wanting to harm anybody, and you've got a good formula."