Gary Vaynerchuk, CEO of VaynerMedia and chairman of VaynerX, is one of the most influential marketers in the game. I recently started his book, Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, and I have really enjoyed it so far. One of Garys’ tips for success is never stop working. No matter how successful you get, you should never forget the importance of hard work once you get to there.

Cultivate meaningful relationships is a tip that Lisa Larter, CEO and founder of Lisa Larter Group, believes is necessary in improving your marketing strategy. You should always be engaging with your followers in a meaningful way. Don’t just like their pictures or try to sell yourself to them, message them and get to know them and their business.

Jay Baer, world-renowned marketing specialist, recently did an article with Digital Doughnut with tips for a successful LinkedIn profile. Jay says to stand out, brands should stop random acts of content. You should create content with a consistent topic and make them short. Attention spans are shortening, and it is very important to get information out quickly.
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Bestselling author and one of the Most Influential Women in Social Media, Ann Handley, shared some tips on writing. Write like you - don’t be who you aren’t. She suggests focus less on what’s new in digital marketing and find your own voice.

After looking into these influential people, I’ve learned a couple of things. The number one thing I read from each person was know your customer. You should know what they like, dislike, and love to see when scrolling through your feed.
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With the start of 2020, I’m ready to put this new information in motion when working on captions, ads, and blog posts. ​

Maybe you're just starting out with social media marketing for business or maybe you think you know every tip and trick out there--either way, I am learning things every day and I have been doing this for many years. Digital media is constantly changing, so the learning never stops. Here are some fast, simple tricks you can do that you might not have thought of before. 

Go through all the posts on Facebook you’ve done and ads you’ve ran and click to see who liked the post, then go through and “invite” any of those people that haven’t liked your page already to do so. Often times I see people have lots of likes but not all those people have liked their page, that’s an untapped resource of people to invite to your page.

Don’t use hashtags that are irrelevant to your post. It might be tempting to just browse popular hashtags and use them in the mix, but this can get your account flagged for spammy content and your posts wont be visible in your niche. Also don’t use the exact same hashtags on every post you make, this is cause for alarm as well.   

If you want more organic twitter followers, pin your best work to the top of your twitter page, as well as include your twitter handle on all other platforms!

Share blog content at least 2x on each platform you distribute to. Studies show that blog posts perform better the second time someone sees them. 

​I read an article the other day titled, The False Promise of Morning Routines. The article talked about famous influential people and what they do in the morning.  One of the people being, Mark Wahlberg, whose morning routine was shared with the world’s population. (Okay, that’s an exaggeration, but still!)  
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I really enjoy reading “Day in the Life” posts, so I thought I’d share mine with you all. You all will see in mine that I’m not a 5 a.m. gym person or a parent (more alone/extra time to get ready!!) My day is going to be just like me; sometimes disorganized or more organized then necessary. Just because a picture looks perfect, doesn’t mean what’s behind the lens is.

Today and tomorrow are the sales meeting for Show Me Shortline, our sister company. That basically means there isn’t anybody sitting by me and I’m completely alone in my area at work. It’s weird because some days it’s so nice to get work down with fart noises, someone talking to me, or watching farming videos, (what do you think I work with – 12 year old’s or grown men?) but some days it’s too quiet. Today is a day that I’m glad it’s quiet. I like it to be quiet whenever I’m typing something because I’m horrible about typing whatever I hear in the background. 

I had to make a call at 11:45 to a client who is interested in social media marketing. She wasn’t in, so I made note to call her back the next day! 

Lunch Time – 12:00 p.m.
I typically go home on my lunch break and eat something, but today they provided us with some lunch (and breakfast!) On a normal day, I would go home, eat some leftovers or Slim Jims (I’m obsessed!) and the tidy up my house. I always like using that time to catch up on things that I didn’t do last night to clean up.
 
Back to Work - 12:30 p.m.
After lunch, I check my email to make sure I didn’t miss anything while I was eating.
We have booklets that we give to businesses that we meet or that are interested in marketing, so I spend time laminating them. (Nerd Alert: I love laminating. I just think it makes whatever I’m laminating look so good and makes the colors pop!)

I use the afternoons at work to call people that are on my list. It’s generally people who have showed interest in marketing by reaching out to us or reading through emails we’ve sent out. My calls went good today! I got a meeting set up for next week and we sent out emails to two companies that wanted more information.  Once I’ve logged the information from my calls, I clock out and head home. Our work Christmas party is tonight, so I’ll be back shortly.

4:00 – Home
I get home after work and I let the dogs out and feed them. My typical routine would include feeding the dogs around 6 or 7, but I knew we would be at the Christmas party. I took a quick shower to rinse off the day. (Does anyone else do this? If I’ve sat around all day and never got dirty, I still feel like I need to rinse off.)
I re-did my make up and hair and get dressed in one of my favorite dresses. Question: Do you all try to match your significant other when you go to parties or weddings? I never do. We always end up in different colors that couldn’t match if we tried.

​If you are a small business owner, you may have tried to run a few social media or google ads yourself. But some of the terminology of reporting terms can be confusing. What is your CPC? Whats the difference between Impressions and Reach? Today we are breaking down a few digital marketing terms that you will see often!
 
ROI: Return on Investment. Your return on investment is in dollar amounts, how many sales you got from your digital marketing ads vs. how much you spent. So say you spent $1000 on a marketing campaign and it landed you 3 sales totaling $3000. Your product takes $500 to make each ($1500 for 3 products)  then you would use the calculation advertising cost divided by actual sale cost (including how much it takes to make your product), times 100. 
($1000/$1500) x 100= 66%. So your ROI for that campaign was 66%. It gets a little harder if your are in the service industry or aren’t ecommerce selling products online (say you sell $100,000 machines and aren’t going to be accepting payments online), but you can still estimate sales based on a certain campaign. Some ideas on how to do this is include an offer code like “use code GOTEAM22 in our store to receive 5% off” that way you can track how many offer codes were used and that can determine how many sales you got. You can also ask people to take surveys after purchase, or for very small brick and mortars, simply ask each purchaser how they heard about you. 

CPC: Cost Per Click. Cost per click is used frequently and can vary from campaign based on type of product, type of campaign and budget. By definition, a CPC is the amount of money you had to spend for each click. Some frequent click types might be click to website, click offer, click to call, etc. You can often make a “maximum cost per click” if you know you don’t want to pay more than a certain amount per click in your campaign.

CTR: Click Through Rate. Click through rate is the rate at which your ads were clicked. You calculate this by taking total clicks on the ad/number of impressions your ad got= CTR.
For example, heres one of our customers CTR’s for a google campaign for a month:
Total Clicks (803) /Total Impressions (24,459)= 3.2 % CTR

Bounce Rate: Your bounce rate is the rate at which people only stay on one page of your website and don’t search further or complete a purchase, often the page they were directed to in your ads. There are tons of opinions out there about whether or not bounce rates matter depending on what type of website you have (ecommerce vs. informational only, etc.) For some of our customers, they want to drive people to a particular product page on their website, but the items are not sold online, so it would be normal for someone to just visit that page, then move on. Where this become really important though is if you are selling items online, then if they just go to the product page and don’t go a step further and purchase, then that would be considered a bounce and this stat can be helpful to you because you can analyze what is it about your site, price, etc. that so many people are bouncing from.
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Impressions vs. Reach: this one can be a little hard to determine if you haven’t been running ads or shared content for a while online. Impressions are the number of times your ad showed on peoples feed or while they were searching online, this number does not reflect if people saw it, engaged with it or made any clicks. It was simply delivered to them. Reach on the other hand, is the total number of people who actually saw your content. For more on this, theres a great article from Sprout Social here: https://sproutsocial.com/insights/reach-vs-impressions/

Conversions: Conversion actions will be different depending on what type of website you have and what your goals are. By definition, a conversion is any desirable action someone takes on your website or ad. This can be anything from completing a purchase, to watching a video, calling your business, downloading a brochure, staying on the page for more than 1 min. You will need to analyze what it is you want people to do when they reach your website or click on your ad, then you will be able to set up your correct conversion and get reports on it based on what action you want people to take. Both google and social media are good at letting you customize your conversion goal, and easily see how many people took that action.
Read more about setting your goals here.

​Lets face it, our phone counts as our computer, alarm clock, dictionary, research tool, shopping cart, communication tool, social outlet, and even our dating life. In just 1 minute, 3 million searches are made on Google and 1 million people logged into Facebook. (hootsuite 2019)

If you’re in marketing you know that the way we market products has also changed in the last 10 years. Customers now get the majority of their views about brands online. People spend between 12-20 hours of research online on a major product before buying. The online research they do can be anything from customer reviews, videos, blogs, etc.
 
So what will be the best way to reach people in 2020? What are customers really looking for before they buy a product?
 
Here are 3 main things that customers in the digital age want:
1.Transparency
2. Ease
3. Value

Let me explain.

Transparency:

this means that with so many companies out there killing it on social media, you need to step up your game in regards to what you post and what your ads look like. People want to feel connected to your business before they make a purchase. They want to see your real business, your real employees, and customers really using your products. They want honest reviews of the product, and they aren’t looking for perfection in your format or product. But does it solve the problem they have effectively? Are you relatable enough in your social style or is it stuffy and staged photography and perfect video? People want realness. Transparency can also be user generated content from real customers. Here are some examples of companies that are winning at transparency:

(GoPro Instagram)

Airbnb Instagram

Ease:

​whether you agree with how fast paced we’ve all gotten is beside the point. Customers need to be able to find you fast, or they will move on to your competition. You need to be on the first page of Google, and when they are directed to your website it needs to be user friendly, with clear ways to get in contact with you or buy your product if you are an ecommerce site. Think Amazon. They also want to be able to ask you questions on your social media and get a response quickly. Like within 15 minutes quickly. Every. Time. If you have comments on your social media, reply to them. Quickly. Even the negative ones. If people DM you, reply quickly. If you don’t know the answer to their question right then, simply reply and tell them you need more time to find the answer. This is better than saying nothing. People want to feel heard. If you are a small business and don’t have time to respond to everyone, then get someone in or outside your company to handle this. You wont regret it. 

(Nike Twitter)                                                                          (Starbucks Facebook)

Value:

While about 20-40% of your content can be about your actual product or service you are selling, a good 60-80% of the content you share and create should be useful to your customer even if they don’t buy something that day. Say you sell cookware. Instead of posting “buy now! Best cook ware!” make it a point to share useful recipes and cute ways to stack your cookware, cleaning hacks to clean your cookware, etc. People want value and they want to know that you are an expert in the field. Blogs, step by step videos, how to’s and tutorials are also good ways to provide value. Memes that are appropriate and related to your field are also good ways to provide value to customers, because you are providing comedic value. This is a step that a lot of businesses miss. They are much different online then if you walked into their business. Marketing doesn’t have to be stuffy and sales pitchy.
If you get your following down, people will be more willing to stay around for the helpful info and wont mind when you also tell them about a product you sell when you make it 80% helpful, 20% selling. Here are some businesses that are great at providing value. Check out these businesses that get it: 

(Airbnb Instagram)

(Taco Bell Twitter)

Do farms need to market themselves online by having a website or a social media plan or both?

Some do. Some don’t. If you are strictly a row crop farmer who takes his harvest every year directly to the grain terminal, sell no other products and are not interested in educating others about your farm, you probably do not need a website or social media plan.
 
Lets examine some instances that it would benefits farmers to have a web presence:
 

1. If you are a custom hay operator.
2. If you are in the cattle business.
3. If you also sell seed or machines.
4. If you want to educate the public.
5. If you are looking for ground to rent.

​If you are in the cattle business. Anyone who buys and sells cattle can benefit from having a website and social media presence. You can get cattle sold and bought faster. If you also process meat and sell steaks, for instance, you can market these online and even perhaps sell online to people outside your area all via the internet. Here is a local producer who does a great job of getting her product out into the world: ​https://www.savannahsfarmfresh.com/

If you sell seed or machines. Lots of farmers these days find a seed or machine that has been useful to them on their farm and they decide to be a dealer for them. In this case, if you are selling anything you should have a website and be on social media promoting said products. Social media will allow you to reach people within the radius of your territory you are allowed to sell in, and you can get very specific as to who sees yours ads. You can gain a following and get loyal customers. Check out Dammann Farms on how their social media and web presence has helped them sell machines and other services. 

If you want to educate the public. Everyone is aware that there seems to be a disconnect between producers and consumers in regards to agriculture. There are many farms that are changing the game and using social media to be transparent about their operations and educate the public on what they do on their farm, how they do it and why. Here are some farms that are doing a great job: 

How Farms Work. https://www.howfarmswork.com/

http://hillfarmsnewmexico.com/  Hill Farms New Mexico

​If you are looking for ground to rent. If you are always open to taking on more ground, having a website that showcases what you do and who you are is a great way to find farm ground. You can put your website on business cards and give them to people, then they can go to your website and see about your operation. Meduna Farms does a great job at this on their farm page: 

​http://www.medunafamilyfarms.com/grain-crops.html

We compiled a list of the top 4 trending digital strategies that your business should take advantage of in 2019.

1. Video. For the last few years video has reigned supreme in types of content that gets the most traction, that being return on investment, phone calls, brand awareness. Every day, Facebook claims that 100 million hours of videos are watched on their platform. And that’s just Facebook, don’t forget about posting great videos to Instagram (Instagram TV for longer form videos), twitter, youtube, and snapchat. For ideas on how to make your videos great, read our blog and also an article titled 10 useful types of content viewers love. 

2. Live Stream. Social media marketing cannot just be a steady stream of “buy this product from us” because even marketers get tired of seeing that and we know our customers do too. Live stream gives customers a chance to see a new product, a behind the scenes or a more real, social part of your business. Its not too stuffy, its not too perfect, but its perfect for 2019. 

3. Meet customers when they’re already searching for you. Google is still one of the best ways to show up when your customers are already looking for what you sell. This is sometimes a better way of showing up for your customers instead of possibly showing them something that they don’t want to see. It seems less intrusive and it can make a good fit for you both. Say you sell organic beauty products. If you use google adwords you can show your text or display ad when people in your target areas search any of your keywords like organic beauty products, what is the best organic lipstick? Organic make up, etc. I will point out that if you are not familiar with google adwords you should get a professional to help so that you can create the best possible ads, there are lots of tips and tricks that can make your ad the most relevant and create the most conversions, and there are several ways to really mess it up too, so find someone who can do it right for you. 

via Nate Patel

4. Messenger apps. Message apps like facebook messenger, whats app, direct messaging on Instagram, etc. are all on the rise. Potential customers like to interact quickly with brands and be able to ask questions, get answers, deals, etc. A big point here is that you need to either have a chat bot or dedicated people to answer your customers questions on these platforms if you are going to do it, because it can go the other way and make your company look bad if there are hundreds of messages out there with no replies. Messenger can also be a good place to send coupons or deals to your followers, suggest a new product or video to them. Again, overuse of this will be highly annoying, so use sparingly and use mainly for answering questions and sending deals. 

via Social Media Today

resources:
https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/9-great-examples-of-how-brands-are-using-chatbots/524138/
https://sproutsocial.com/insights/facebook-stats-for-marketers/
https://www.singlegrain.com/video-marketing/10-useful-types-of-video-content-viewers-love/
https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-trends/

We ask  businesses this question a lot, and as advertisers our process and approach should directly relate to what the customer is trying to accomplish. So as a customer I wanted to let you in on a little bit of knowledge in regards to how we might go about obtaining your goals. I will take Facebook as an example, but each social media channel and online advertising platform should have its own unique ways to obtain your goals on that platform.

There are many different goals that Facebook allows you to pick (as shown below) but lets focus on 3 of them:

​If you have an eCommerce business and are selling products online, the conversions goal will be your friend. You can track sales from ads through your Facebook pixel and re market people who went to your website but didn’t follow through with the purchase. Some good examples of ads for conversions are short videos or carousel format images showcasing a selection of your best selling products. Make sure to  keep your targeting focused on what type of customers you have after doing a detailed customer profile analysis. Also keep in mind that like I always say, no one likes being marketed to, so keep your ad looking as “un ad-ish” as possible. Here are some good examples of that:

(via UpRight Facebook)                                                                                             (via Mt Dew Facebook)

Just like 2018, 2019’s biggest content on social media will be video.
Your videos should be formatted differently whether you are posting to Facebook, Instagram, snapchat or any other platform. See our previous blog on what types of content is best for each social media platform. For this post we are talking about facebook, so for facebook the best type of videos that will get you’re the most views include videos that are active, short and captures the viewers attention in the first 3 seconds. That’s right, you have about 3 seconds to convince the audience to keep watching, because lets face it: theres a LOT of video on facebook and it takes a special one to keep people from just continuing to scroll. In facebook ads you can choose the video views goal and pick an audience based on location, age, gender, and interests. It is best to make your video dimensions horizontal, except if you are in facebook stories, there you want to make the video vertical for best results. Having a short description in the post with your video has also shown to be best, and using emoji’s to grab attention can also be a plus. Some examples of good eye catching video ads are:

(via Redbull Facebook)                                                                                         (via Case IH Facebook)

Messages are a great way to interact with your potential customers. Everyone likes quick answers and businesses that are able to respond quickly whereas some of their competitors might make people wait hours, will get the sale 90% of the time. So if this is your goal here are a few suggestions of what your ad should look like. First, make sure that however long you have the ad running that you have someone on staff (or your marketing agency has someone on staff) to answer these questions when they come in. Nothing will hinder your campaign more than not being responsive to an ad that is dedicated to showing it to people who are likely to respond via messenger. And yes, you can set up your “automatic replies” in messenger but this isn’t the real conversation and quick answers that your customers are looking for. If you want to invest in a chat bot that can interpret questions and respond, then look into Mobile Monkey- for everyone else, just be prepared. Depending on what you are selling, a short, attention grabbing image or gif might be just what it takes to get customers to respond and ask you questions via messenger. Here are some good examples of ads that had the goal of messages:

To learn more about how Facebook’s algorithm does this, read:
https://www.cpcstrategy.com/blog/2018/08/facebook-algorithm/
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​While drones have been around for many years now, the military has been using drones since around 2000, so about 18 years. But only in recent years have drones come into the mainstream and most recently into the ag sector. Below we have listed some exciting new ways that drones can help farmers, whether the farmer is flying it themselves or hiring it out.

1. Checking Crops. With advancements in thermal imaging, farmers “need to evaluate crop health and spot bacterial or fungal infections. By scanning a crop using both visible and near infrared light, drone carried devices can identify which plants reflect different amounts of green light and NIR light. This information can generate multi-spectral images that trace changes in plants and reveals their health. A quick response can save an entire planting, by applying solutions as needed.” (Calderone, 2017).  This picture below shows drone footage taken on a farm using thermal imaging. 

(pic via AgriTech Tomorrow)

2. Checking Cattle. With a drone, farmers and ranchers can easily check up on livestock without needing to be right next to them. Most standard drones will have a range of up to 3 miles, with more heavy duty ones having the ability to fly further than that. This can save time and resources by simply flying over to check on livestock.

3. Planting, Spraying. New technology has even come as far as being able to spray and fertilize fields with drones. “planting: Startups have created drone-planting systems that achieve an uptake rate of 75 percent and decrease planting costs by 85 percent. These systems shoot pods with seeds and plant nutrients into the soil, providing the plant all the nutrients necessary to sustain life. Crop spraying: Distance-measuring equipment—ultrasonic echoing and lasers such as those used in the light-detection and ranging, or LiDAR, method—enables a drone to adjust altitude as the topography and geography vary, and thus avoid collisions. Consequently, drones can scan the ground and spray the correct amount of liquid, modulating distance from the ground and spraying in real time for even coverage. The result: increased efficiency with a reduction of in the amount of chemicals penetrating into groundwater. In fact, experts estimate that aerial spraying can be completed up to five times faster with drones than with traditional machinery.” (Mazur, 2016).
 

 

4. Machine sales and Demos. Drones are a great way for agriculture machinery dealerships, professionals who have patented ag products and manufacturers to show people how their machine really works. Online video viewership is the largest consumed form of content currently according to Search Engine Journal: “Right now, Facebook users are spending 3x as much time watching live videos than traditional videos. As if that weren’t enough, video content is projected to represent 74 percent of all web traffic by the end of this year, and more than 80 percent of all web traffic by 2020. What’s more, 4x as many consumers would rather watch a video about a product than read a post about it.” (McCoy, 2017).

A frequently asked question we get is do you need a drone license? Heres the answer: if you are a farmer flying a drone on your own farm for pleasure, no you don’t need a license. If you are going to shoot video for business, apply chemical or plant, then yes you need a drone license or you need to hire an individual or company who has a drone license to do this task for you.
 

References:
​
McCoy, Julia. May 8, 2017. “ 7 types of content that gain the most engagement and likes.” Search Engine Journal. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/best-content-types/194679/
 
Calderone, Len. December 28, 2017. “How do drones help farmers?” AgriTech Tomorrow.
https://www.agritechtomorrow.com/article/2017/08/how-do-drones-help-farmers/10153
 
Mazur, Michal. July 20, 2016. “Six Ways Drones are Revolutionizing Agriculture.” MIT Technology Review.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601935/six-ways-drones-are-revolutionizing-agriculture/

Video rules digital, and that doesn't seem to be changing anytime soon. According to Wordstream, "Social video generates 1200% more shares than text and images combined," and according to Social Media Today, 500,000,000 people watch facebook videos everyday. So now you're convinced you should use video, here are 4 rules we have found that are essential to be successful at online video. 

​1.Action shots. Start off your videos right in the middle of action or speaking. You only have between 1-3 seconds to catch the viewers attention before they might click off, so if your video has a lengthy intro or logo- you are likely to lose the person without them ever seeing your video. Watch this Red Bull Video below to get an idea:

2. Short video/Video appropriate for medium. Like I talked about in a previous blog, there is a correct type of content for each social media platform. So for video, longer form videos might be better suited for YouTube, sections of your website or Instagram TV- but the rules for catching the viewer at the begging still apply. For Facebook, twitter, and snapchat, short catchy videos between 15-60 seconds are the ones getting the most views. 

3. Optimize for each platform. Make sure your videos are dimensioned right for each platform. The majority of people are watching video on their mobile devise, so if you are not optimizing for mobile, you have lost. And this doesn’t mean taking video with your phone vertically, that should NOT be done unless you are taking live video in Snapchat or Stories to share right then. Make sure to put tags on your videos so they are easier for people to find, and make sure your sound and backgrounds are well thought out and clear. Also, don’t post your youtube link of your video to facebook, upload it directly to facebook, this way it’s about 10x more likely to be viewed, because people like staying in one app and not taking time to move over to youtube while in facebook. Facebooks algorithm also likes posts that keep viewers in their app, so its more likely to get seen that way. Check out Taco Bells method for YouTube Video vs. Snapchat. 

Above: Video for Youtube vs. Below for Snapchat

4. Give value. This might be the most important one. Give value to the customer through your video. Don’t simply put your product on the screen and say ‘flash sale, buy now.’ consumers are over that spiel by now and can see right through it. If you are in the hair product industry, perhaps a time-lapse video of how to achieve a new trendy hairstyle, or if you are in the food industry, a quick video showing someone making a new dish would give value. Think about what you want as a consumer from the brands you follow, try not to think like a marketer so much 😊 Below is a good example of Birchbox giving customers value from their video. 

If every video you post has these 4 elements in it, you are on your way to attracting more people to your videos! For more, watch a video below by Truly Social.