High Tech or High Touch?

Small-scale farms have learned that a high-touch approach is key to building customer loyalty. Little touches like remembering a customer’s name, saving the last 2 perfect tomatoes for a regular customer that can’t get to the market until late, and taking the time to offer preparation tips are all ways that farmers have learned to be high-touch marketers.

But we live in a world where technology is advancing at lightening speed. More and more of our customers are getting information digitally through podcasts, blogs, electronic newsletters and streaming audio and video. It’s only a matter of time before your most loyal customers start expecting a cooking tip at 7pm on a Sunday evening or will want to know what you’ll be selling at Wednesday’s market at 6am on Tuesday. They will want to know what sustainable production means and they’ll want to be able to share pictures of your farm with family and friends over Thanksgiving weekend. In other words your customers are going to expect you to be increasingly high-tech.

If you operate a small business you already know that it is never good enough to be satisfied with what worked last year. Ongoing success requires constant attention to changing trends and being willing to meet the expectations of your customer. So how can a small scale farmer compete in this increasingly high-tech world? And how do you find time to keep up with all these trends when you’re already plenty busy raising great food and fiber?

The good news is that as all of this technology gets more mainstream, it also gets easier to use and less expensive to buy. Most moderately priced computers today come with all the tools you need to do a lot of the basics. Most of the time all you have to do is plug in a new piece of software or hardware and your computer will begin prompting you what to do next and usually in language that the average user can follow. OK, but that still takes time and a fair degree of confidence. What if you just don’t have the time or interest?

Another strategy is to find a tech-savvy individual who is willing to exchange goods for services. In this way you can focus your time and energy on what you do best and still have a presence on the information highway. It is possible that you already have a customer that would be willing and able to help you out. If you are experienced with having apprentices on your farm then you might well be able to find an apprentice that is willing to exchange what they know about technology for what you know about production.

You might also want to consider taking a class or a workshop. The advantage of this option is that you can work on your materials in a group setting with a knowledgeable instructor at hand if you get stuck and roomful of others that are struggling right along with you. The biggest payoff is that when the class is over your materials are done and ready to go.

Still another strategy is to hire someone to do what needs to be done. If you know what you want and just need someone to make it happen then you might be able to get by with a student from a nearby college or tech school. If you’re not sure what you need then you might be better off hiring a consultant that can help with the planning as well as the actual building or upgrading of the site.

A last thought is to find a group of farmers that are interested in pooling their resources and hiring someone to work with the group as a whole. This can be hybrid option where individuals in the group can take on particular tasks that they can handle and hire the rest of the work out. For example, there may be someone in your group who is skilled at taking at digital photos. They might be willing to take photos of all the farms in your group in exchange for someone else writing some copy that might include brief stories about the participating farms, newsletter articles, and recipes. Someone else might be willing to record some stories or cooking tips. Then if you have an individual that can combine all those pieces you have the makings of a really dynamic site that will keep customers coming back to your site.

However you get the job done, be aware that future success is likely going to require a mixture of high-tech and high-touch strategies.