How Social Media can Increase Family Farms and Other Agribusinesses Sales Opportunities

By: Sarah Howard

In recent years, there has been a significant push for agribusinesses to change their marketing strategies and implement social media into their daily tasks to further generate consumer outreach and profit margins. There have been many well-known, established agri-businesses that have been pioneers intaking the first steps into the newest agri-marketing strategies.

From days of traditional mass media marketing to more current social media marketing strategies, and regardless of their leadership, family farms are still the backbone of agricultural production and often encounter obstacles in selling their products, particularly when confronted with competition from more prominent and well-established farms.

It is often said that the agricultural industry lags in adopting new marketing strategies, but social media has created a new realm of possibilities for small family farms to enhance their visibility and connect with more prospective customers by separating themselves from their larger competitors.

It seems that everyone is on social media – even farmers who want to frequently connect with family, friends and colleagues or to find general news and information about products and services that can help them improve their farming operations. And with that being said, a farmer or anyone directly involved in production agriculture can better implement their time on social media by starting to advertise and promote their agricultural products in a targeted and strategic manner.

The integration of social media marketing has become an increasingly important aspect of modern marketing strategies, as social media platforms have become ubiquitous in people's daily lives. By leveraging these platforms to connect with customers and build brand awareness, businesses can create a strong online presence and drive sales and can ultimately lead to increased brand recognition, customer loyalty, and all of which contribute to overall profitability.

It also allows businesses--specifically small family farms--to create personalized, two-way communication with their customers, which can lead to a deeper understanding of their needs and preferences and further educate and inform the public about the agricultural industry.

It also requires significantly less investment to start marketing through social media versus traditional mass media marketing techniques focused on reaching potential customers through print media, radio and television advertisements which are often expensive and require a lot of resources to execute effectively.

In the initial steps of developing a social media marketing plan, it is important to identify your goals, define your target audience, choose the right social media platforms, and then create a content strategy that aligns with your brand. You can get started in social media marketing by:

1. Establishing an online presence and developing your brand voice. The first step to increasing your sell opportunities through social media is to establish a strong online presence. This means creating accounts on popular social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and regularly posting updates about your farm and products. You also can create a website or blog to share more detailed information about your farm, its history and its products.

2. Use effective visuals. Social media is a highly visual medium, so it's essential to share high-quality photos and videos of your products and everyday content. This can help potential customers get a better sense of the quality and uniqueness of your products. It would be wise to invest in a good camera and lighting equipment to capture your products in their best light.

3. Engage with your customers and audience. The more followers and friends that interact with your page and posts, the more likely it is to be seen by others and generate more potential customers. There is a multitude of ways to generate customer engagement either through creating a video from a comment on a previous post or asking your followers to be more interactive in your posts by asking them their preferences or giving promotional incentives.

4. Be professional. There is a large disconnect between agriculture and the public, but more and more consumers have a continued interest in food production and often have questions about how their food is grown – partly due to non-expert influencers. Therefore, it is crucial that farmers are prepared to answer these questions in the comments section of their social media posts and be professional and educational with their responses. This provides an opportunity for people to learn more about agriculture and create a positive first impression of their farm.

5. Remember to focus on farm sales (not followers). It can be easy to get caught up on trying to increase your follower count for perceived credibility and consumer outreach, but you want to turn that into sales and revenue for the farm. It would be better to have fewer followers who purchase from you rather than hundreds of followers who never buy anything. Be sure to focus on content that directly and indirectly leads to sales and make it clear how customers can purchase from you.

Now you may be thinking, “Yes, I know, social media is a great marketing strategy. But what if I operate row crop operation or market cattle to the feed yards rather than selling directly to the consumer?”

This is a great point, but social media marketing does not have to be solely for a farm that has its own storefront. You can make great amounts of profits from creating engaging social media content as a form of entertainment and informative information while still promoting your brand image.

It is becoming more and more common for the younger generations in the family farms to start a social media account with a large following and focus on producing video content that will engage the audience and generate income through sponsorships or by reaching many viewers.

These accounts will often do a daily vlog of their activities and show what is happening at the farm. This simultaneously is a form of entertainment and allows for the public to receive information about agriculture directly from the source. I personally am a total nerd about agriculture and so enjoy watching daily vlogs from farmers and learning about their agricultural practices.

There are many local family farms and agribusinesses that have had great success in using social media as a marketing strategy in their business plans.

In West Point, Georgia, Lily Hill Farm sells USDA-Inspected beef directly to the consumer both locally and nationwide. She was able to save the business aspect of her family’s farm and generate over 85,000 followers on social media through her marketing techniques.

Triple R Farms in Lowndes County, Alabama, is a diversified row crop operation that focuses on creating vlogs for their YouTube channel showing what it takes to successfully farm corn, cotton, soybeans, and wheat in Alabama and has gained a respectable number of video subscribers.