Kendall Kunelius and Rebecca Dube discuss the importance of marketing for farmers, emphasizing that it should be a key part of their business plan. They compare creating a marketing plan to planning a crop, highlighting the need for strategy, target audience identification, and regular updates. Jennifer Bosco-Webb, an expert in social media, shares her experience in building a personal business and stresses the importance of having a clear buyer persona and a well-planned marketing campaign. She recommends Facebook and Instagram for agricultural marketing, noting their ease of use and community-building potential. The conversation also touches on the value of visual consistency, the role of graphic design, and the significance of understanding return on investment in marketing efforts.
Show notes:
Gold Shaw Farm: https://www.goldshawfarm.com/
Linked In Learning: https://learning.linkedin.com
Udemy: https://www.udemy.com
Fiverr: https://www.fiverr.com
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/
Canva: https://www.canva.com/
UNH Cooperative Extension Events: https://extension.unh.edu/events
Women in Ag Newsletter signup - https://unhoutreach.tfaforms.net/217751?CID=701G0000001AiKCIA0
Jennifer Bosco-Webb – jennifer.boscowebb@unh.edu
Kendall Kunelius – kendall.kunelius@unh.edu
Rebecca Dube – rebecca.dube@unh.edu
Kendall Kunelius 0:08
Welcome to this episode of Shared Soil, a podcast dedicated to creating community, honoring challenges and encouraging personal and professional growth for all people in agriculture. My name is Kendall Kunelius, and I'm a field specialist for agricultural business management.
Rebecca Dube 0:24
I'm Rebecca Dube, and I provide technology and support for Extension. And today Kendall, we're going to be talking a little bit about marketing, more specifically, how to fall in love with marketing. Marketing isn't necessarily a farmer's favorite aspect of it, but it certainly is the most essential. So we want to talk about how we can relate farmers a little bit more to the marketing process and make it a little more enjoyable for them, or see it as a little more of a priority. I want to talk about, first of how creating a marketing plan is actually a lot like planning out your crops or garden. You know, it's in the middle of winter, and everything's kind of dormant, and you're in the room with your whole map out of what you're going to do for your farm for the next year, how you're going to improve, where you're going to lay things out. Well, marketing can have a similarity to that, in that, you know, we always should be part of your business plan. So when you get started with that end goal in mind, or what you want to accomplish with the marketing, what do you want for your business from this effort, you then lay out a map of where you're going to plant your seeds. And in marketing, your seeds could be anything from email to newsletters, local media, signage, maybe creating your own website, what partners you're going to work with; a blog and certainly social media, which is something we're going to be talking about with our guest today. But as you figure out where you're going to put all these seeds, you also want to gather all the materials you're going to need to make these seeds successful. In the case of marketing, it can be your photos of your product, of your land, elements of your farm, maybe even your people; animals, if you're utilizing them, certainly. Along with that, you're going to want copy, or the words you're going to use to describe all of these elements, and the facts that support that. And while you're thinking of this copy, you certainly want to keep in mind what audience you're reaching for. You know, who are you marketing to? Who's best going to benefit from the products and services that you offer, and that can help inform your copy. And then it doesn't end there. You don't just plant seeds and walk away from them, and that's it. You're going to tend to that growth with regular updates and reminders and make sure it's continuing to grow, get healthy, get larger, reach out more. Then hopefully, because all good farmers hope, you reap the rewards at the end. Like farming, what you get out of it depends on what you put into it. You know, there's also, there's always factors out there that you can't control, but from what you do, you can see the benefits improve from that. So certainly, marketing should be the key part of any business plan, and today we're going to talk about marketing with Jennifer Bosco-Webb, who is an Associate Producer for the Extension Marketing Communications department. She has a background in social media and has utilized it to support a business. So Jennifer, can you tell us about yourself, what you do, and maybe tell us some of the key points in using social media?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 3:41
Sure. Thank you so much. So I have experience working with social media on multiple different platforms and for multiple different businesses. Recently, I used it to help build up my personal business, which is a little different from agriculture. It was the lash and skincare business, but I have that experience of building it from the ground up and kind of going through the hurdles that a lot of business owners experience, especially in the early days. There's a lot that goes into social media. I think it's easy to just kind of look at social media accounts and think, "Oh, you're just posting," but a lot of times there's a lot of strategy behind that, you know, the ins and outs of everything that go on behind the scenes, and that's kind of what makes each business special. But the general public doesn't necessarily know all of that. So I think that coming up with a plan - It's funny, because I feel like half of my personality is like, just go with the flow and figure it out as you go, and the other half is like, everything needs to be very strategically planned out, so that I know exactly what to plan for, what to prep, what to do to get to the certain goal. And I think it's really important to do that for social media. I try really hard to have stuff planned out about, say, a minimum of a month out, ideally, three to six months would be an ideal marketing campaign. But I think it's really important to settle on who your buyer persona is. Who are the people that you're trying to market to? What are their interests? What are their values? What are your values, and what makes you excited about this? What made you excited in the beginning to start this business? What did you want to share with the world? It can be really hard to lose that, because as rewarding as social media can be, it can also be extremely draining sometimes. So I think a good rule of thumb that I've had is writing down my "why". Why am I doing this? Why do I want to in the past, when I have my business, why did I want to offer those services to the general public? Because at the end of a hard day, when you're like, "I don't know if I can do this anymore, this is exhausting." The why is what's going to help you come back around and kind of find yourself and get your feet on the ground again.
Rebecca Dube 5:00
Wow. And certainly the why is a big element with agricultural people. That's why they got into it. They have a big "why" for that, and that could certainly be translated into the message they send out to other people. What do you think are some of the platforms that might work best in the agricultural field for farmers, what social media platforms?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 6:29
I think Facebook and Instagram are like the staple platforms for pretty much every business in this day and age. I think a lot of it has to do with the goal of the farm and their target audience. And I think that a lot of farms are going to have - At your core, you're going to have a very similar target audience, but you may have little target audiences that differ from other farms. So I think that Facebook is an incredible platform that people can use to build a community to share events. That's an amazing platform to share events with people, engaging with local customers. And I think that what I have noticed with a lot of people in the past is that Facebook groups becoming more utilized nowadays. They weren't as utilized before, but it's a wealth of knowledge for a lot of people. It's a group where, usually, I would say a majority of the people in those groups, they're all in there for the common good of everybody. So they want to see other people succeed. They want to help people. They want to share the tips that they're really proud of, that they found that helped them through a really hard time, that they wish that they knew beforehand. I think Instagram is a wonderful tool for storytelling and both visually and with words, you're able to add your captions now and longer videos, but I think that in today's society, we're so fast-paced. I mean, if you're out in public, you're looking at people, and they're just, you see their thumbs practically scrolling through their phone. It's just so fast-paced. So if you're able to, if you have that eye, or you're willing to learn how to capture the kind of content that is going to get somebody to pause in their tracks and go, "Oh, that's really pretty. Oh, that's really interesting," then Instagram's a beautiful platform. I checked out Shaw Farm. I'm so sorry. I should know -
Kendall Kunelius 8:26
Gold Shaw Farm, up in Peacham, Vermont.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 8:28
Yes, yeah. I checked out their social media accounts, Instagram specifically. And what I loved is that they they mix a little bit of humor in. They have a lot of animals, and a lot of people are drawn to funny animals. You can have the worst day in the world, and you watch a goat jump off a hay bale, how can you not smile at that? But also really good at storytelling, and they come across as very authentic. I think another thing to keep in mind is that - I know that marketing can get a bad rap for being misguiding and being, just being misguiding and pressuring people into purchasing a product that may not benefit them, and so I think the general public has a lot of trust issues these days. Understandably, I completely understand that. So when I was going through their posts, and I went through them again last night, and I was learning about their backstory, I was learning about their "why", I was learning about the specific animals and why those animals are important to them, the specific services that they offer, or products that they offer, and why those are important to them, and it brought this element of humanity that I think a lot of people are craving nowadays. So I think that Instagram is an amazing platform for that, and Facebook as well. They're very similar in many ways, but I think Instagram is a more visual representation of businesses.
I think YouTube is a great platform for organizations, for businesses that have a lot of DIY content or a lot of visually pleasing content. I catch myself on YouTube channel sometimes just as background noise, because I like the person's voice, and I think that they're informative. And I think that I'll get like a little piece of nugget that'll change my mindset on something.
Kendall Kunelius 10:16
Same, same!
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 10:20
The times have changed. I think LinkedIn is a great tool to connect industry professionals. I think you also have to have - A lot of people don't necessarily have as much of a following. If you're a farmer, you're a busy person, there's no doubt about that. So have you taken the time to build up your LinkedIn profile? It's a little bit easier to build up Facebook and Instagram, because people are going to be more drawn to the visual aspect of that and the more personal aspect of that. So I think if you're in the right industry and you have great connections, or you're looking for certain connections, LinkedIn is a great tool for that. X, formerly known as Twitter, I think is great for pushing news out really fast if you need that. But what I have noticed in the past is that if you're looking for certain tools to get specific amounts of engagement, you may not necessarily get that engagement with X. So very long answer to say that, in my personal and professional opinion, especially for farmers who are either starting out or looking to get their name out there. Facebook and Instagram are the two platforms that I would focus on. If you build up enough content and maybe you have some help down the road, and somebody can focus more on LinkedIn and X and few other platforms, then I think it would be smart to go that route, but that is my personal opinion.
Rebecca Dube 11:44
Are they both fairly easy to learn?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 11:46
Yeah, yeah, they are. And, I mean, it's so funny because I work with social media all the time, and I feel like on any given day, honestly, lately, it has felt like every single day, I go on and I'm like, wow, this is a change. I wasn't expecting this change to this platform or this new feature that came out. And I think that we're so lucky today that you have a mini computer at your hands. So even if you're out in the field and you go to, you want to start posting pictures, because we're really excited about that something, or you have some content that just came to your mind, and you're like, oh my gosh, I really want to put this out there, and you don't know how to do it, YouTube is going to have thousands of really easy-to-follow videos that you can use. There's going to be articles, and I am not ashamed to say that I use them sometimes like that. I didn't even know that this feature was available now, or it is a new feature, and you don't, yeah, you want to save time by finding tutorials.
Kendall Kunelius 12:44
I heard this great quote the other day from someone who's like, into brand building, and he said that everything is content. You may not, you may not recognize it, it doesn't have to be a super flashy thing, but everything is content. And that came to mind when you were thinking about Gold Shaw Farm. I should also put in a quick disclaimer: Extension, doesn't endorse or recommend or, you know, we don't particularly underwrite any specific farm, but we're just using them as an example for this particular episode, so feel free to check them out. But it's not like we are saying, Oh, this is exactly what we want to see on farms. It's just an example for the episode that we're using.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 13:26
Yes, thank you. Thank you so much.
Kendall Kunelius 13:28
So then I also have another question for you. I loved what you were saying about scrolling on the phones, right, and it's, it's so true, and I find myself doing that often. A phenomenon I keep coming across is how do I know that this picture of this tomato comes from this farm? Because there's little ways you're like, oh, this tomato and this tomato are the same tomato, but the way the picture was taken, or the background, there's little things that help differentiate this person's farm from that person's farm, even if they're taking a picture of the same product. And I would think it's the same kind of thing in - you were saying you were in the beauty world with the lash, brow kind of stuff. There's, only so many pictures of eyebrows you can take, only so many pictures of lashes. So how can someone acknowledge? Like a farmer can acknowledge, okay, like, I grow the same three crops as the farm down the road. But how do I differentiate my pictures or my story or my brand through these visual representations from the folks right down the road?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 14:29
That is a very good question. I think that it's so funny because I have that thought sometimes too. Sometimes I'm like, "Jen, just need to trust people more." But I think that finding your brand is very important. I know that the lash and skincare business is completely different from the agriculture business, but it is funny, because I could scroll through social media in the area that my studio was in and see a picture and know exactly who created that picture, who took that picture, because of the style of the lashes that were done, the blurring effect, or the non-blurring effect, the angle in which the photo was taken. So I think finding the style that suits you. I think that it can be really overwhelming for people sometimes too, when you have so many options out there, you have so many: Are you going to use a filter? Are you going to blur stuff out? Are you going to edit it? Are you going to be authentic and just post a raw image? What's your style when you do take photos? And a lot of people, I don't want to say they give up, but they get overwhelmed, because they're like, "I don't even know how to take a decent photo. I have this image in my mind, and I don't know how to take a decent photo with my phone because I can't afford a $1,500 camera." Or maybe you have a nice camera and you just don't know how to use it. There are so many resources out there, like LinkedIn Learning or Sarah Udemy. They have some photography courses. I can send over some preferences on how to take photos. But I think the big thing is hearing out what style you like. And sometimes that comes with playing around too, because it's not just what you like, it's what your target audience likes. Who are, what's the demographic of the group of people that you're trying to reach? Are they going to love fun, artsy photos that make you stop and think? Are they going to want photos that are just of a tomato or just of a sunflower? You don't know unless you try. I've had accounts where I had the account open for a couple years, and then all of a sudden, I just thought, this style does not bring me joy anymore. And I think that people are getting post fatigue when they look at it. I don't think that it is I think they just see it, and they're like, oh, there's Jen again, and just keep scrolling, so I'll switch things up. And I think that that's okay, but I think a lot of it is you just have to try, and you have to play around, and when you find the style that sticks, that differentiates you from the farm down the road, stick with that for a little bit, but know that nothing is set in stone, and social media, especially trends, are constantly evolving. Your audience is also going to be evolving. So it's okay to engage with the community, follow those people back and see what kinds of media evokes an interest. I guess, yeah, when I would look at a photo of a different tomato from different farms within a 50 mile radius, and then learn more about each farm. Then go back and look at all of the other pictures to see, how do those pictures? Are they just like that picture of the tomato that I saw? How are they similar to the other farms in the area? It would be really interesting to see how people in this business are able to differentiate their products from others: the cleanliness of the product or the farm? And that's a question to ask, like, what do you - Sorry, I'm brainstorming here now -
Kendall Kunelius 18:05
We do we do that a lot, keep going, it's part of the magic.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 18:08
So you're trying to find your brand. A lot of it boils down to what we talked about before: your "why" and what do you want to be known for? Do you want to be known for having show-worthy produce and farm that is ethical? What do you want to be known for, and how can you show that? Because another huge part of social media, I find, is it's kind of broken up in different segments. But I think that with social media especially - I mean, when do you go on social media if you're not working, when do you go on social media?
Kendall Kunelius 18:48
It depends. I have some dopamine mines that I go on for Pinterest when I'm like, "Oh, I'm not feeling so hot today. I need to pick me up." That's my Pinterest game. If I'm just bored, probably Facebook. So yeah, I don't know. In the mornings, afternoons, outside of work hours.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 19:09
I think a lot of people, if you're not using social media for work, people are using it to dissociate. I remember one time sitting at a doctor's office with my mom, and I was so bored. I could barely read at that point, and just looking around and trying to find a magazine or a lotion bottle or a Kleenex box or something like that that I could read just to keep my mind occupied. And I feel like social media is the new lotion bottle or magazine that you find on the table, so you use it to keep yourself occupied or to dissociate, or a lot of times people use it to learn too. I recently rescued a bearded dragon. I have never in my life owned a reptile. I have held a handful of snakes, but I have never owned a reptile, and I found a bearded dragon group. And it was more educational than any article that I could find, talking to the people that I rescued her from. I think people use Facebook to keep themselves occupied, to educate and for dopamine hits.
Rebecca Dube 20:15
Sure, and you're also building a community at that point too. If you're a part of that group, you become part of that community?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 20:21
Yeah, I think that with social media and marketing, you're trying to sell your products (obviously with marketing), but I think the biggest thing that people look for nowadays is looking for education. They are trying to learn more about an organization, and they're looking for a lot of times, some feel-good comments, or some feel-good content and/or some place where they can feel a sense of community. Because I'm not the first person to admit that sometimes I will just go into certain Facebook pages or groups because it's a really good feel good place to be, and you just feel a sense of community. It kind of restores your faith in humanity. So when you're creating your brand, when you're trying to figure out what kind of posts, being very heavy on showing the human side of your business, showing your "why", because you're probably not the only person that has that "why", and that shares that same passion and educating people. I'm so ashamed to say, I don't know what most produce looks like right before it's picked. I don't. I should. I don't. So if I could be educated on that, if I could be educated on, what do you do to make your produce as good as it is? What do you do to ensure the highest quality and to ensure safety? What do you do to take care of your animals? What is the process in all of this? That's going to really draw me in, as is really pretty esthetically pleasing content. So those are some huge points.
Kendall Kunelius 22:01
I want to jump into the esthetically pleasing content, because we're very lucky to have Rebecca with us. I always like say this about people I meet in Extension, but you'd never know who you know until you know who you know. And I remember coming into this job thinking, I have these grandiose plans for programs, but the outreach? How do I design the flyers? How do I speak to the audience that I'm trying to attract to these programs? I have university parameters, which there's nothing wrong with having, like, a brand and colors, but I just don't always see the way to put them together and make them look good. And lo and behold, Rebecca has the most amazing graphic design skills. So Rebecca, I would love to transition now into picking up off of everything that you were saying, Jen, about the look, the esthetic, the education, the brand building. But Rebecca, how do you actually put all that together? How do you make it look just right? Tell us a little bit about your experience doing that graphic design element to make it look cohesive.
Rebecca Dube 23:05
Well, that's one thing I really like about marketing, is pulling information together and getting it, imparting it to other people in a way that educates them or gives them some kind of benefit, shows them what the benefits are and how to do that visually, oftentimes; get that information in a graphic sense, which you may do. You have to do that within social media, as Jen was saying, have that really graphic sense of what is going to stimulate someone. How's that going to pull together? But also in your other materials: the signage of your farm, the look of your website, any materials or flyers that you put out as physical pieces or in local media, and certainly having that tie into your social media as well. So having a unified look, and that might be from a particular color scheme you go with, or as Jen was saying, a particular style of your photography that's really going to inform people as to who you are. That kind of pulls it together. And how you're going to take some of that information you have and impart it to people. Are you going to have signage on your farm? Is it a farm that the public accesses? Then you would need certainly more for them if you're having events on it: farm experiences like tours, or pick your own, or workshops or things like that. You're going to want clear and concise signage that is well put together and looks professional, because the more professional it looks, it imparts a certain trust in your business when people go there. Certainly taking the time to work on your website and getting a good look for that. And for that, I would also reach back to Jen to ask as well, if someone is not a graphic designer, or they don't really know how to put together information, or they don't know how to put together, take pictures or copy for it. Are there people they can reach out to to get more help with that? Beyond the DIY, is there another person? We advocate for delegating those tasks that you really don't want to do you don't feel you have the skills to do so you can focus on what your strengths are. Who are some of the people that you can turn to then to get help with that?
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 25:22
There are so many options out there. And I think the number one question is, what is your budget? What's your budget? And then what is your style? I wish I had just like a one solid, one simple answer for you to be like, if you go to this place, they will lay everything out for you. But unfortunately, that is not the case. And this isn't a personal endorsement or anything, it's just, in my experience. I have found, and I have personally used Fiverr there they have freelancers that have a huge scale of ability for people. So if you're not locked into paying more than you can afford at that time. I went online a couple nights ago too, to see if there were any particular groups or forums, especially in the ag industry, that would be able to help and I saw a couple on Reddit. Reddit has some great social media marketing, marketing, and I think there was a group called Ag Marketing. But Facebook, they have a lot of groups too, and there are some people out there that just want to help other people succeed. And if you reach out and just say, hey, here's my business. This is what I'm looking for. This is my budget. Can anybody help me? I have yet to see a post where people said, "No, we're good". Usually people are like, "Okay, cool with that budget we can do this. We'll start this for you right now and then, whenever you're at a place where you can afford more, we'll work on that more you can use somebody else." I think ,too, there are some local, a lot of local Chambers of Commerce have resources for people as well that can help get them in the right place to... Everybody starts somewhere. And not a lot of people start with the means to be able to just throw out this explosive marketing and design campaign. So there are resources like that out there that are free for a lot of people, and there are more affordable options for others. And then if you have extra time, and you're one of those people that just wants to learn how to do everything, like I said, even just Googling classes, but I found that LinkedIn Learning has great courses. And again, I'm not promoting or endorsing anything. What I have found is that LinkedIn Learning has some really helpful courses, and of course Sarah does as well.
Rebecca Dube 27:41
Yeah, and I found with graphic design, while you can if you really want to get the nuts and bolts of it, Adobe products give you Photoshop and Illustrator and things like that. But if you want a very simple, they do it for you kind of aspect that can be free, Canva is another one. And once again, as you said, we don't endorse, we're just giving examples of where you can just play around with Canva and try this, try that. They give you lots of examples and possible things to use that really take up a lot of that grunt work, and you can put together something very quickly. It's going to become your brand and your style, because you choose what you like and what you feel fits your audience. That's what's going to make it your own, is how you put it together. And then you can move forward with that.
Kendall Kunelius 28:25
Yeah, from a farmer's perspective, too, there's a balance, right, that says, is the content I am generating, or is what I'm putting out going to do the job I need it to do, or is it, are people going to like it? And I feel like that's a similar feeling to a farmer selling a product at a farmer's market or wholesaling or retailing. How would they feel when a customer takes a bite of their produce or eats or consumes some of their foods or is enjoying an agritourism event on their farm? There's always an underlying worry I think of do people like what I have to offer? Because I've put my heart and soul into growing this thing. I've put my heart and soul into putting pictures out or advertising this thing. So I guess I want to take a second to acknowledge that you really are, for farmers, especially, you are putting yourself out there entirely, whether it's your product, whether it's your brand, it's yourself. And I do think there's kind of a mental health component to balancing out understanding that some people will never be pleased. Some people just won't like your content, and that is okay. They don't have to. But when you're putting yourself out there and you're finding people, you're building your tribe, so to speak, you're getting your people around you who do like what you have to offer and want to support you, that is when being yourself and being authentic and being true to your brand. And I love Jen, how you're saying your "why" is going to matter to them too.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 29:46
And that was something that I was going to mention, too. The first piece, before I forget, is that less is better, the easiest way to put it. I think a lot of times, people really hyper-focus on, they want their logo, or any signs that they make, to have everything in the logo or sign that they have, and it can become very overwhelming. And this isn't to sound weird, but it can also be very easy to forget. So when you're making something, less is more. Find colors that stick out, find a message that when people drive by and they see that cool sign, or they see that simple sign that is going to resonate with them, they're going to Google later to see what your your farm is about. It doesn't have to be very complicated. A lot of times, the more simple something is, the more easy it is to remember. The other part of that too is that one of the things that I - There's this social media content creator probably five or six years ago that I came across, and his content was intoxicating. I just found myself looking for inspiration and just being absolutely mesmerized. And he did a Q&A session, and people, a lot of people, and it was a large Q&A session, and I would say the same question kept coming up, and it was, how do you make your content so, so addicting? And he was like, honestly, the element of surprise is huge, but the blink test is what I strive for. So when he - In this scenario, it applies to video. So if you're creating video for social media, and you don't know where to cut certain sections. If you have somebody, and you can even use the test on yourself, but you have somebody watch the video, and when you notice that they start, fluttering their eyes to keep their eyes open, or they start kind of like blinking and looking away, that's when you know to cut the video. And then you can go through and edit and then add some more intriguing stuff and ask the person to read it again. And you have to do that a few times to understand, okay, this is the content that gets people addicted to my brand. But I think that that lesson can be translated over to the produce that farmers offer to the public, or the tours that farmers offer to the public. It's never going to be perfect right away, and you hear it all the time, but you just -The lessons will come. It's not going to make everybody happy. 100% of the public is not going to be happy with your product or your service. And that's okay, because the people that are, are more likely to share your product or service with the people in their group who are probably going to like it too, because they have similar interests. And that's how you get that kind of like, I don't want to say cult following, but that's how your brand grows. Because you're right, there will always be somebody that is not happy with something. You could have a product that is by definition perfect, and they will find something that is wrong with it. And that's okay, but I think it's important, especially as you're learning your brand and learning what kind of messaging you want to have out there, it's important to take notes. Don't take stuff personally, much easier said than done, but take notes of people, listen to the conversations that people have, and then use that as a way to grow and to get better or to offer more services. Like, okay, some people like this kind of tour for this reason, some people don't, so maybe we offer another tour. Maybe that's another revenue service to get another group of people in. So yeah, it's hard not to take it personally. And I did not start my business for a really long time for that reason. It has to be perfect. It has to be perfect. And then I thought it was perfect. I started it, and I was like, This is so far from perfect, and I wasted so much time just wanting everything to be perfect when I could have just started it, learned the lessons and grown a little bit bigger sooner.
Rebecca Dube 33:51
Sure, and as you're giving out the "why" in your stories, in your marketing, that's the benefit of it, because you're constantly talking about why you love doing what you're doing. Why you love the farming and why other people may love it as well. And reaching that similar audience who will love it. So that's why you can fall in love with marketing, because you're focusing on what's great about what you do, what you love about what you do, and Jen, we love what you do. So thank you so much for talking to us about some of those ins and outs of marketing that can be a very tricky field, a maze to go through.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 34:30
Yeah. I love marketing because I love that you can really promote something that you're passionate about. You can share that love and that passion with the world, and that usually translates to having other people feel those really happy emotions that you were feeling when you started the business, and just, yeah, that's what I love about marketing, is yeah, you can just, you can share what you love with the world, and it can make a huge difference for a lot of people.
Rebecca Dube 34:54
That's terrific. Kendall, what do you love about marketing?
Kendall Kunelius 34:57
Oh, gosh, this is going to sound like a terrible answer. Well, I guess it just depends on how you feel about money. But I love marketing because I feel like it's an opportunity to really take control of how your dollars are coming into your business. I think that there's a lot of power and value in being able to say "this is who I am, this is what I'm about." I also look at money very differently than maybe some people do, so I want to just quickly explain where I'm coming from when I talk about return on investment: why I think marketing can be a really fulfilling activity for a farm in terms of the dollars that it brings in. I think that everyone has their own inherent value, whether you're a business or you're an individual. That's a personal opinion, not a university opinion, but it does also inform when you are putting your own efforts and content out there. We always encourage, farmers to value your time. Value the things that you're putting out there into the world, because it's your time and effort that is really what is represented by a dollar, right? If I know I'm paying myself $20 an hour on paper, what type of value does that give back to me? Or what energy stream am I putting into that one hour that gives me that value back in my business? So for me, the marketing activity is not just thinking, oh, write this off to your marketing budget. What even is a marketing budget, right? Why would you allocate a certain amount of dollars to hiring someone to do your social media posts, or Jen, you were saying, go on a site where you can say, this is my budget, what can you give me for that? All that to say, when I think about when I'm putting something out there when I'm targeting a marketing campaign, I definitely want to understand why. I'm a very outcomes-based person. So what's my outcome? So if I think, Okay, well, I had excess of apple crops this year. We're seeing some farmers who had no apples last year, but this year, for whatever reason, they've got a glut of apples. What can I do about that? Can I take advantage of that by doing a Farm Day? Come to the farm, we'll give you one free apple, or, you know, something like that. But that's marketing, and it's easy to say that, but what does it actually look like to get there? And my goal is really to just use up these extra apples or sell these extra apples. So do I do flyers like you were saying, Rebecca, do I do a video like you were saying, Jen, or how do I spread the word, and how much money is it going to take me to spread the word? So I think of this term Return on Investment as directly connected to that marketing. So in my little research I did before this episode, I'm seeing that what the general market states as a good Return on Investment is if you're bringing in $5 for every one marketing dollar you spent. So if you spent $10 printing flyers and you then bring $50 in, does that seem like enough volume of revenue? Or do you want $500 brought in? Or do you want $5,000 brought in? So thinking about how much you want to return on that investment for your marketing is an important thing to understand about you, yourself as a farmer. Do you know your cost of production for the product you're trying to move through? Or do you understand, is it worth even putting money into marketing this one thing, because there's 60 other people who are doing the same thing? So do we need to investigate a wholesale channel versus a retail channel? I think that having financially-driven decisions that are supported by farm data that you can then enhance with them or enhance with good marketing, is a really smart way to go about spending your dollars and allocating those assets before you just say, oh, we'll just throw money to this. Getting a really good handle on those dollars, and your Return on Investment is important. I'm going to pause there in case there's any input or comment.
Rebecca Dube 38:58
And that's why we have Kendall, for the business aspect of things, because you always need someone looking at the money too!
Kendall Kunelius 39:06
Yeah, the money is important for a lot of reasons, but mostly because farms are a business. And what you were saying, Jen, about like, your business is never going to be perfect, so just start is so resonant. Because whether you realize it or not, if you're a farmer with 50 chickens - if you are a person with 50 chickens, and you're selling those eggs at the end of your driveway, you are technically commercial. You are selling your products for profit on the open market. So thinking about your business in a way that we always think of as risk management. We always want to limit liability and manage that liability. But maybe you have something there. Maybe you really have something that - it isn't going to be a million dollars and it doesn't have to be. Business doesn't have to be huge. But you can say I'd like to sell $1,000 worth of eggs this year. That would be great. Right? How can I do that? Maybe I'll spend $50 on my own branded cartons. I know the labeling laws for New Hampshire, what information I have to have on that egg carton. But maybe I would like to take the time to buy my own personalized stamp so I can ink stamp each carton. I feel like that's an important thing I want to then show on social media. Or, if I own a produce farm, I've invested in this one species of blueberries that are really specific to can really well, they're good for pies. So that's why I'm marketing that. It kind of follows through your whole story of being able to say, I don't need to make a million dollars, but it would be nice for me to be able to see some sort of tangible output from something I'm putting a lot of energetic input into. So that's why I would fall in love with marketing.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 40:53
No, but you make really good points, and I think too marketing is, marketing is good to get the word out about your product. But thinking from like a social media point of view, we have something available to us that not a lot of businesses, especially not a lot of farms, had available to them, 10, 15, 20 years ago. At least at the capacity that it is now, where you have this platform that you can just show up in somebody's for you page because the algorithm is right. You have the right SEO in your account, or people, enough people have liked some of your comments, or they follow other similar farms or accounts. And you have this opportunity to showcase what makes your products and services different from the other farms. You can showcase. This is why - maybe you're not giving away all of your secrets, but you're able to showcase. This is what makes our products stand out. This is why this product costs this much, because there's this much labor that goes in behind it. And you can turn that into a 30 second - it's going to take a lot longer than 30 seconds, but you can cut that into a condensed version, and you can educate the public so that there's more of an understanding as to some of the prices of that's what goes into your products or services. And I think that the fact that we have the opportunity to do that, and that that opportunity is so readily available. Because to do that before, you were going to have to pay how much money to have a commercial or to have a camera crew come and create a video to put on your website? And you don't even know if people are going to see it, because how are people going to - what money are you spending to get your name out into the public? Whereas now you can create a free social media, you can create a free Facebook account, a free Instagram account, and there you go. You can just start showing the world your products and the services and the love that goes into making those products and services. And that's how you get, that's another way to get a really big following and to make money and to promote yourself. And that's why I like marketing.
Rebecca Dube 43:04
Terrific. Alright, and we hope that everyone out there will continue to love marketing, and will incorporate that into their agricultural practice.
Kendall Kunelius 43:16
So, Rebecca, where can people connect with us? Where can they connect with us on our platforms? So we've got, obviously, the podcast. We've got our Women in Ag newsletter, and then, Jen, do you want to share where people can connect with the University of New Hampshire in general? All your, your domain as the social media person!
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 43:36
Sure. So we have our Facebook account, and that is UNH Extension. Same with our Instagram account. And then if you want to go on to our website and check it out, we have all of our resources there, more about Extension, but also you can check out our blog and any events. It's extension.unh.edu. We'll see you guys there.
Kendall Kunelius 44:02
Yeah, me too, because you've been putting some awesome content on the UNH pages lately. I've been reinvigorated. It's always been good content. Yeah, I think it's always been good content, but it's great to see content that I'm like, Oh, I know who took that picture! Oh, I know where that is! And it's kind of neat to get a personal relevance to that. So, yeah, it's awesome.
Jennifer Bosco-Webb 44:24
Thank you. We've been working on a new schedule. That's another pointer that I'm going to say real quick is consistency is key. So we're trying to work on a schedule where we're getting certain content out on specific days of the week so that the public comes to expect that, so that's a huge part of social media too.
Rebecca Dube 44:24
Thank you, Jen for joining us, and we hope all of you will incorporate marketing into your own business plan and that you'll join us for more content on the next episode of Shared Soil.
Kendall Kunelius 45:04
Shared Soil is a production of University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension, an equal opportunity educator and employer. Views expressed on this podcast are not necessarily those of the university, its trustees or its volunteers. Inclusion or exclusion of commercial products in this podcast does not imply endorsement. The University of New Hampshire, US Department of Agriculture, and New Hampshire counties cooperate to provide extension programming in the Granite State. Learn more at extension.unh.edu.
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