How to Build a Loyal Base of Local Customers for your Farm
Ryan Grace, an Account Manager at Barn2Door, shares the who, what, when, where, why and how of building a Loyal Base of Local Customers for your Farm. Learn the best practices for identifying Buyers in your community, maintaining consistent communications and leading them to make a purchase.
For more Farm resources, visit: barn2door.com/resources
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Hello and welcome to the Independent Farmer Podcast, the go to podcast for do it yourself farmers who are taking control of their own business, skipping the middleman and selling direct to local consumer and wholesale buyers. This podcast is hosted by Barn2Door, the number one business tool for independent farmers to manage their business, promote their brand and sell online and in person.
Let's dive in to today's Independent Farmer Podcast.
Janelle Maiocco: Welcome to the Independent Farmer Podcast. I'm Janelle, CEO of Barn2Door, and your host for today's episode. As many of our listeners may be aware, Barn2Door offers an all-in-one business solution for independent farmers all across the country who are cutting out the middleman, taking control of their business, selling under their brand, and making [00:01:00] sure their customers can purchase from their farm, both online and in person.
In today's conversation, we'll be discussing building your Farm's customer list. We know that if your farm business is selling direct or wants to move in the direction of selling direct, a great move to maximize your profits and stabilize your income, you need customers, which means you need to have a list of customers.
How many customers do you need? How do you build it and keep your list current? We'll discuss all that and more with Ryan Grace, an account manager on Barn2Door's Success Team. Ryan works with hundreds of farms, literally his job is to talk to farms all day, every day to consult on their farm business, telling them tactics and best practices to ensure recurring sales, save time and running their business. You guessed it. How to build a loyal customer base for your farm. Welcome Ryan.
Ryan Grace: Thanks Janelle. It's great to be back.
Janelle Maiocco: Awesome. Yes. I know we keep bringing you back 'cause you get all this great advice and you talk to so many farms and it's great because you see trends and you see what works [00:02:00] too, which is really important. So today we wanna learn the what, why, how, who, and where, when it comes to building a customer list. It probably goes without saying, but is quite like if a farmer's selling direct, you can't just farm you literally have to have active buying customers and a certain number of them in order to be successful. I'll just state the obvious of what is a customer list? It's a list of individuals who currently and potentially buy from your farm. So it could be a blend of a lot of people who are already buying from your farm or people who you hope will buy from your farm and you're engaging them from a marketing perspective in order for them to hopefully buy. So that's the, what is it? But, digging in Ryan, why is it important for independent farmers to build a loyal list of customers?
Ryan Grace: Yeah, it's crucial, honestly for farms who are getting started to be able to build this list and to start early.
So, one of the main reasons is for that direct access to the customers. You don't have to fight the algorithms that you would in social media, [00:03:00] so you get direct access to the customers that you're trying to reach, that you've built up. You get higher engagement, so we see a really great return, especially with farmer content in inboxes do really well, according to industry standards.
Then better at turning those first time buyers into loyal, continuing customers that are coming back from you over and over again. And on top of that, this is now an asset to your business. This is your list that no platform can take away. You own it. So, those are just a few of the whys, but definitely really important for farms to grasp that concept early and often throughout the process.
Janelle Maiocco: Yeah, I feel like most of our success team, whether it's an onboarding manager, an account manager, or during any of the office hours that we provide or, in our connect program talking to other farmers. So often the conversation comes back to marketing for the purpose of sales and having a customer list, a growing customer list, and then always be looking to add to it and then engaging them often for sales.
I [00:04:00] love what you said, that you own it. I think this is one of the biggest passions behind Barn2Door, which is if we can help independent farmers all across the country sell directly into their local communities to their own buyers and buyers that they own, because there's not a middleman, there's not an aggregator.
There's not somebody else who's doing all the promotions. It's your buyer, you're going direct to that buyer, and those are your relationships for your farm. That is just gold. The list is sort of the, the vehicle or the exercise. But the reality of it is, is farms having relationships with buyers, that are buying from them directly and mostly typically locally.
And so, it's a great way to de-risk your business, let's put it that way.
Ryan Grace: Yeah.
Janelle Maiocco: So, so we love supporting farms doing that any way, shape or form we can. Now I do know that when you're talking to farms about that customer list, just to get down to the nitty gritty, how many customers do I need?
If I'm thinking, hey, I need a list of emails, or I need a list of [00:05:00] customers, which are synonymous, by the way, this should be a list of emails. That's you, you, you will need to be able to email all of your customers. Ideally also phone numbers. But ultimately, how many do I need, right? To be successful as a farm?
And is it a range? And if so, why? Yeah, go ahead.
Ryan Grace: Definitely. It's a question we get often in account management working with these farms who come in and.
Janelle Maiocco: Yeah.
Ryan Grace: I would say before even jumping into the numbers, it's really important to understand the quality over quantity. So, just 'cause you have a massive email list, doesn't necessarily mean it's gonna be super successful.
So, you wanna make sure you're building a quality email list with buyers who are interested in your products. So, as you're growing that, you want to think about who you're trying to target to, who that customer is that's already supporting local businesses. Those are great quality customers that you can start building a list with.
And then just from a numbers standpoint, as far as goals that I've seen, if you're looking at a hundred to 200 subscribers, that's a great point for consistent engagement. You're gonna have some repeat [00:06:00] buyers and sales with that number once you get up into the 500 to a thousand, it's a really strong customer list for some of these small farms.
With regular offerings, you can start driving your CSAs, your signups, weekly produce sales. And once you pass that thousand subscriber mark, you're really putting yourself in a strong position to be a local resource for your community, not just for your farm products, but being able to introduce other producers and expand your offerings.
So, those are a brief number breakdown. But again, the important part is to remember that, that quality over quantity when you're building that list.
Janelle Maiocco: Yeah, I appreciate that. You know, I was talking, I think it was to another account manager now that I think about it, and they were saying, you know, it depends where you're starting, right?
Like if you, you certainly, I know we have farm that come to us and some literally are like, I don't have a list yet.
Ryan Grace: Yeah.
Janelle Maiocco: And there are others that come to us with a thousand, 2000. And, you know, even add zeros to that. So, there's a whole range of how many [00:07:00] emails and customers do you have on a list, when you're starting.
Because I feel like, you know, not to be overwhelmed with, you have to grow it to a thousand overnight. Right. I mean, what's the type of advice you give to folks who are maybe starting with a lower number? Does the handful or, less than 50, et cetera. I feel like on the success team, that becomes a priority focus in that case.
Ryan Grace: Definitely. Yeah. 'cause you have to think about, some of the attrition where people may be moving away or, yeah, just moving outta your area so you won't be able to sell them again. So, you constantly wanna be growing that list, so if you come in with big numbers, you want to keep adding to that.
And if you come in with zero, that's okay. That's a great starting point. I think it was Phil, on the podcast a few weeks back that talked about the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, and the next best time is today.
Janelle Maiocco: I love that.
Ryan Grace: Take that same concept here with the emails. Start with your friends, family, people in your existing network.
So, when you really take time and I. I tell my farmers, write it down. Write out a list of people you know, who own businesses. Write a list of [00:08:00] people you know, your friends, family. If you're a part of a church community, those contacts, other work contacts that you may have, and start developing a list of people that you could reach out to.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: To ask for help, to incentivize them to join your customer list. Get 'em excited about why you're doing it, what you have in the works, and let them be a part of that journey with you. So you can start with a handful. I think if you can come in with trying to get one email a day, you're putting yourself in a good spot.
So, whether you're coming in with a lot or, or a little, you're still in a good position here.
Janelle Maiocco: I love that. I love that you have folks write it down. Everybody they can contact and ask for help. I think there's a lot of people that are incredibly motivated to be helpful to farmers, and to see that local food be successful and more importantly to know that if that farmer, and don't hesitate, I would say if that farmer's business model is I'm gonna sell direct because I don't want a middleman and I need to maximize my profit.
So, I have to have loyal local customers that buy direct. People will appreciate that they're trying to set that farm up [00:09:00] for success in the long run. And there's a lot of people who wanna participate in that success. Like that feels good to people to be helpful. And guess what? They're not just helping the farm, they're actually helping all their friends and family eat better.
So there's a lot of really good carrots out there, no pun intended, but there's a lot of good carrots that you can give. You know, just even with goodwill and healthy eating, in addition to like any referral incentives, like if you wanna give, you know, coupons or promos or whatnot, but you know, don't be afraid to ask.
Especially those local businesses and friends and family, and think who they know. That's really good. And then you said, a key thing there at the end, Ryan, you're like one email a day. I was gonna ask you what's reasonable if I'm like, I really wanna grow my email list. Are there certain times of year that are easier to grow it?
Like, what's reasonable? What if I wanna grow it really fast?
Ryan Grace: Yeah. Getting out in person, it tends to be a lot of farms coming in are like, I need to get this thing rolling. So, when you think about your farmer's market, such a great opportunity to get face to [00:10:00] face with so many customers.
And going in with the mindset. Not necessarily that I need to sell out of all the products I have, but I wanna make as many meaningful connections as I can. Make those connections, get those emails, and start building up a reward system for that customer base to reward them if they send you a referral, if they bring in a friend.
So, start getting comfortable asking the question of, Hey, how did you hear about us? That's gonna give you good insight to what avenues are working for you as far as your marketing efforts go. And then as you get those customers that are raving about you, they're telling their friends and family, sit down and interview 'em.
Ask 'em why. Ask 'em what they love about shopping with you. What other products would they be interested in? These are dream customers or ideal customers that you'd call 'em. They're gonna have a lot of great information for you to build your marketing efforts around, so your email templates that you're sending out to those customers, you can craft based off that feedback.
Janelle Maiocco: Yeah, I appreciate that and I really love what you just said, and I wanna double click on it because you're, like, if you're at a farmer's market, maybe half of it is [00:11:00] about selling your product and literally the other half from an importance perspective is gathering emails and building those customer relationships.
That's really key. I love that. Because I know there's many times when farmers will sign up for Barn2Door when we start getting them set up and we discover they do go to farmer's markets, but they haven't been collecting emails. And we get so excited because we're like, you're not even gonna believe this huge opportunity.
Put out a clipboard, get out a QR code. They use the Barn2Door POS in person. It automatically will collect emails directly from folks transacting in person at the farmer's market. So, it's just such a rich opportunity to collect emails and just, I feel like rapid fire building your email list at farmer's markets in particular, or to your point in person.
Ryan Grace: Yeah.
Janelle Maiocco: Can certainly help with that. Online too, I think we might get into that later in this conversation. So.
Ryan Grace: Yeah.
Janelle Maiocco: I know there's some online opportunity too, but we will get into that shortly. Before we get into that, you started to sort of tease us with who are you marketing [00:12:00] to?
Who should farmers be marketing to in terms of building, I mean to not all customers are created equal, right? So, if I'm a farmer, I don't wanna just cast a net so wide that I don't know if those people are either gonna buy or not. So, how do I identify who I should be going after to make sure that they are the right type of customer to become that loyal, repeat buyer?
Ryan Grace: Yeah. So if the why is where we're starting off, which most farms, knowing your why is gonna be really important, 'cause that's gonna share some of those core values, it's gonna share why you got into farming. 'Cause it's not easy, it's hard. And once you develop what that why story is, then you're trying to figure out, okay, well who am I gonna sell this to?
A lot of that breaks down to what your goals are for the business. Like, that customer, is it somebody, again, who's gonna talk you up to their friends and family, who's going to prioritize health for their family? So, if health is one part of your why, then that's the customer that you wanna start targeting and marketing to.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: If it's the convenience. So [00:13:00] if it's, I wanna make this really easy for people, and then that's the customer you want to target. So, you wanna think about setting up deliveries, you want to think about a customer who's gonna prioritize those. And once you have an idea of who that customer is that you're trying to target, you can start setting up really effective marketing campaigns for partnering with businesses that may be servicing that customer as well.
So, we think our fitness centers, chiropractic offices, coffee shops, places that people are already going to support a local business. They're already spending their dollars there. They want to invest in local businesses. Those are great starting points for building partnerships and getting your name out there and getting your brand out there.
And just start that messaging going to that customer that's hitting on your why.
Janelle Maiocco: Yeah, I appreciate that. And I would say it's the why of the buyer as well. Buyers today are going to buy local food from farmers because they care about health. Nutritious food and they care about it being easy. We've done many surveys to [00:14:00] buyers and the reason they don't buy is 'cause it's not easy to get food.
And price is typically not actually an issue. So again, like I said, we've done buyer surveys. Price is not the issue. It's just they buy because things are healthy. They love to support local farmers, they like to know where their food comes from. It's good to know why are buyers buying from you?
That is why. But, it has to be easy to get a farmer's food. So, it has to be local pickup, a site in my neighborhood or door to door delivery. The more convenient it is to get a farmer's food, the greater likelihood of a buyer to buy often and become a loyal customer. And I think that's important to point out because, while this whole podcast is about, Hey, you must have an email list, you must be growing your customer email list. It's actually not enough to just email people and say, buy the food if it, I mean, if they can shop online, they love it, 'cause it's easy to shop anytime and they can add it to their car and make an easy purchase.
It's important for it to be an easy purchase and shop [00:15:00] experience, but it's equally important for it to be an easy fulfillment option. So again, that local pickup, local delivery, is a game changer. It's the difference between having a hundred customers willing to buy from you versus five customers out of that a hundred.
I mean, literally that's how many more customers are willing to buy. So, it's kind of a double-edged sword like you market, but then it must be easy. And those two things in tandem are what give you the ability to attract local buyers who will buy regularly because it's easy enough for them to get that food compared to the alternatives.
Ryan Grace: Yeah. And I'll steal this from Alex at Chucktown Acres. He brought this up in one of our Connect series, which for everyone listening, one of my favorite resources we have as a company. Awesome. Can't speak highly enough of it. But one of the things he brought it up in that is, his deliveries early on, making it convenient early on for his customers was an investment.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: So he viewed that if he was doing two or three of 'em, [00:16:00] this is an investment in my future because I know I'm building the trust and the loyalty with this customer base that's gonna grow and scale. And then I can always bring in someone to run that side of things for me and offload some of that workload.
But early on, view it as an investment. It's an investment in your future.
Janelle Maiocco: It is, it's true. Like again, that one, two punch, like I can have a list of a thousand customers, but if it's not easy for them to get the food regularly, again, local pickup, door to door delivery, those thousand people aren't going to buy.
Right. Only a tiny percent of those might buy. From time to time, but convenience for buyers literally is the earmark buying decision. So healthy and convenient. Just remember that, like gather the list and then invest in making it easy for those buyers wherever they may be. Can't emphasize that enough, but that's great that, Alex was mentioning that as well.
And that's worth it. And I think you're right. I think he actually, a lot of people will hire a local kid or a college student or even work with some local delivery service if [00:17:00] they have to, just to make sure that that piece gets done. We also have tons of farms who do it themselves.
They just do like a local loop and they target specific neighborhoods or churches or gyms or what may be, and it's just been gold for them. And in fact, they typically are making money if they're doing door to door delivery, right? 'cause they can charge that fee for delivery. So, there's a lot of good options, but you need a customer list.
You need to market to them regularly and it has to be easy to get your food. Online shopping, drop it in the cart, then have fulfillment be near them is just gold. Yeah, so really important. Okay, let's get back to the customer list, which is checklist number one. And making sure that you can, engage those folks and get them buying regularly.
When should I build my customer list?
Ryan Grace: Yeah. Like we said, going back to when's the best time to build a tree?
Janelle Maiocco: Oh yeah. I love that.
Ryan Grace: I would say today. So do it now. Start today, and then always. So, those two themes, it's a consistent process.
Your customers, again, they're gonna be moving. They may grow their families, they may be adding [00:18:00] into other community groups and things like that. So, you always want to be focused on growing that list. You wanna be consistent with your emails. So, as you are building this list, build that consistency early. Start inviting them to give feedback, get that conversation going, that's gonna be really valuable as you scale into this, getting feedback on, like we talked about just a few minutes ago. Your pickup locations.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: Your delivery zones. What works for your customers. You wanna be a good resource to those customers and you wanna get that feedback. And having a healthy email list with engaged buyers is a great resource from all standpoints of your business.
Janelle Maiocco: I appreciate that.
I was just thinking of a fun question. Can I have too many customers? Can my email list be too long, Ryan?
Ryan Grace: I think going back to the quality over quantity. If you have a massive email list with no engagement, then it may be time to do some refinement. So, similar to the store audits, we recommend go through and see who's engaging with you.
Send out some interest. Maybe you build a group within your email list of your VIP [00:19:00] buyers. Those customers that are really loyal, it doesn't mean you ignore the other ones, but now you can start marketing to two different segments within your email marketing campaigns.
Janelle Maiocco: I love that. I do feel like you hit on such an exciting, important point, which is, once you begin building that list, and once it's large enough to essentially ensure your product is always moving, and purchases are consistently being made, you can start to look at your customers, and sort of segment them around like VIP, you can make sure that they get the best products first, right? Because, if you have enough customers on that list, now you're, you know, the product's gonna move.
Now you can start building in fomo. You can build urgency into purchasing before it sells out, which is also really exciting. You'll have the ability to, like you said, reward those VIP customers. Give them first dibs, when new things are listed in the store, online. Or you can give them access to a private section of your store online.
That's just a feature that Barn2Door has that a lot of [00:20:00] Farms will lean into, for their most valued customers. And so, ultimately it gives you a lot more leverage to reward people, build an urgency for purchases and sell out, which is a great feeling. I feel like I would sleep better at night. I know our farms do when that's the case.
And, having a bigger and an always growing list can give you that leverage, which is really exciting.
Ryan Grace: Yeah, definitely. And you hit on another good point there with that customer list. As you're growing and you're getting more feedback from them again, you're gonna be able to now, use that towards those marketing strategies as far as bringing in new products, new offerings for them.
So, it's something that really does grow and scale with your business.
Janelle Maiocco: Ryan, share with the folks that Barn2Door is a direct integration with MailChimp, which is essentially, a great solution or tool for farmers to manage customer lists, but send out regular emails and newsletters. The beauty of it being integrated is that customer list literally is shared between Barn2Door and MailChimp. And so, there's just a lot more [00:21:00] capabilities that farmers have, including the ability to even set up some automation. Do you wanna share the strength of this once you have a customer list?
Because you get to be even more sort of intuitive in terms of purchasing behavior and encouraging more frequent sales.
Ryan Grace: Yeah. As you grow that list, you get more data on what your customers are doing, where they're spending their money. That integration, with Barn2Door, MailChimp is huge. You can really dive in as deep as you want as setting that stuff up, with what's called customer journeys.
So, these are great automation, where you can put in, when somebody signs up for your newsletter, it will automatically send them a nice little welcome email introducing your farm, a little story about who you are, links to your shop, links to your social, links to your website. And then from there, if they purchase with you, you can send them leave us a review email and have these campaigns kind of trickle down based off of what their behaviors are.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: And be very targeted in how you set that up. You can have it tag your audience group, which is a good way to stay organized. It's another thing that I would [00:22:00] recommend as you are growing this list, get organized early, it's gonna help you out in the long run as you are getting these customers. You meet a bunch of great people at an event or a popup, tag that customer from that event. 'cause maybe you're doing another event down the road a year from now at that place, and you wanna let all those customers know, Hey, we're back.
Come see us at this pop-up event we're doing each year. So, it's good to stay organized early. I would start getting those tags. You can make that automatic with the journeys, which is really cool. You can have it send your customers surveys. This is all within MailChimp, so you can have it send them surveys, get great insight again on what products they love. What other products would they wanna see you have in your store? What new pickup locations would work for 'em or be more convenient or are there other delivery times that would help out? So, powerful tool. You'll see all their sales, you'll see their orders, you'll see what they're doing in the Barn2Door platform. So, I can't speak enough to how powerful that email platform is.
Janelle Maiocco: I appreciate that. It's a good note to just write notes [00:23:00] on your customers, keep notes, tag them, et cetera. And when Ryan said behaviors, a good example of that would be their frequency of shopping. You can set up an automated email if somebody hasn't purchased something in three months or six months, you can literally send up an automated email that will go out while you're busy doing other things on the farm that says, Hey, we miss you, you know, and gives them a promo or something like that.
So again, we love customer lists. We also love segmenting them in a way that makes sense for that customer's journey or experience of your farm. And also we're also huge fans of automation when it can work, right? That's one thing that technology can do for you as a Farmer. It can automate some things, activities or tasks or emails, et cetera, to make sure they're getting done.
And to not take more time, but actually to continue to engage those customers. So, very exciting. Where should farmers store this list?
Ryan Grace: We make it really easy, within the platform through Barn2Door to add those customers, get 'em synced in there.
That's one of the other benefits with the new updates to the POS, being [00:24:00] able to, as you're getting those email receipts, grow your customer list. And it's an important note here when you are asking for emails, whether you're doing it via clipboard signup form, or for the email, the receipt that's gonna grow your customer list. Assume that your customers want to get added to that list. I wouldn't ask for the email. I would say, what's a good email address for you? Have some inflection in there. Make it positive, 'cause you're assuming, why wouldn't you wanna be on this list where you're gonna get promos, discounts? You're gonna see my offerings when I have 'em first available.
And you could even dangle the carrot of if you're selling out, so you're at the farmer's market, maybe you sell outta your bacon and you're running outta that. Someone comes up and asks for it. You say, well, if you wanna get ahead, you can join our newsletter. That's when we have our products listed.
That's the best way to know and to pre-order even before the farmer's market. And you can use your merch, you can use your cups, your hats, your stickers. It doesn't take much to incentivize people. People love free things. So, if you can offer those as a way to incentivize those signups, that could only help you out.
Janelle Maiocco: [00:25:00] Yeah. Great recommendations. I appreciate that. So, that online list of emails very important and that's when you can essentially start to leverage it to make sure you're engaging those customers. The last one is, where do I find them? And this is, there's sort of an in-person and then there's an online aspect of finding buyers.
What do you recommend to farmers Ryan, sort of in a nutshell? I think we've said some of these already, but, good to just put the bullets here. I'm trying to find customers and get their emails. Where would I do that? Offline and in person.
Ryan Grace: Yep. So, we hit on the farmer's market. That is a great place.
People that are going there, they're looking for locally sourced good products. So, that would be one of the top places we'd recommend going into. And then, when we go back to thinking about who our ideal customer is, so when we have an idea of that.
Janelle Maiocco: Mm-hmm.
Ryan Grace: Think what does that local loop look like for that customer?
What would their day to day look like? What other businesses are they investing their money and their time with? And then how could we set up partnerships with those? Or maybe you do a, I had a [00:26:00] farm that set up a parking lot party with a couple other vendors in this nice parking lot, had a coffee shop, some boutiques, and then they put their farm table out and just brought in the humane shelter to do a little adoption with the puppies.
And it just brought in a crowd, a couple food trucks. And that wasn't a farmer's market. That was something that they just reached out to that plaza and said, Hey, who'd be interested?
Janelle Maiocco: Nice.
Ryan Grace: This is what we're thinking about doing. And it worked out.
Janelle Maiocco: Nice, 'cause then somebody else is helping with the marketing.
Ryan Grace: Yeah.
Janelle Maiocco: Every vendor there is gonna be promoting it and the plaza. That's a great idea.
Ryan Grace: Exactly. So, you wanna be thinking strategically about those things. Your local fitness centers another great partnership to put up a signup form, put up some mailers with your QR code and your website.
So, I think having those boots on the ground, having those in-person connections really do make a big difference. And it's crucial to helping with this customer list. And then for online, it's being active. If you have a social following, get busy posting about it. You wanna make sure that you're enticing those customers to go on there and [00:27:00] purchase from you.
So, put in some special offers. I have a farm who is doing a really great, creative referral program. So, when you refer a friend, you're gonna get a promo just for you, for your next order. And so, it was a great campaign for them to help grow their customer list. But you wanna be thinking about ways you can, again, you're enticing that customer and then rewarding them for when they do help you out. So, when you get a customer who's sharing your name, building these referrals, you wanna build that ecosystem that rewards them. That's a personal touch. A thank you. Hey, this means so much to our business. We appreciate you. Here's 5% off your next order, 20% off your next order.
Whatever you can do. So, ask for help early and often. Your friends and family, your customers, they want to help you. They want to be a part of that.
Janelle Maiocco: That can be an offline or an online activity. I think a lot of folks don't appreciate that social media is like, word of mouth on fire, right?
Like you can have rapid fire sharing and likes and opportunities online, that [00:28:00] will be even faster on the uptick than maybe sometimes organically offline. If you have an existing email list, ask those customers to share, even give them the words or a picture, and your store link online.
Ask them to share to their friends and family and people in their neighborhoods or neighbor groups on Next Door. Like have them share. I think there's sometimes Facebook neighborhood groups or different things like that. Like ask your existing customers to share in their same local communities where you already have those pickup locations and potentially delivery.
And that online sharing is powerful because they each, they all have friends and literally online friends, and who are watching those Facebook, Instagram, et cetera. And that can be just really powerful, from a sharing perspective. I love that. Another one would be, if there's any digital email marketing letters that you can get into.
I think Ryan said earlier, if you belong to a church, if you know people [00:29:00] who run a gym or if there's any other online newsletters that you think you could get into, ask, a lot of people will do it in kind, gyms, we've had farmers have great relationships with gyms where they'll post it.
Today at Barn2Door had a farmer deliver CSA boxes. And a bunch of us here at the office are subscribing to the CSA, like offices and maybe there's nearby offices or hospitals, or doctors' offices or et cetera that would gladly want to promote healthy, nutritious local food to be delivered to an office.
So, I think there's a lot of, like, again, they have newsletters. They're all sending out newsletters online. They're all sending out digital newsletters. So, if you can ask and get into those, that is huge. And so, I think there's just any online collection then, it's even easier because in many cases that they're gonna just sign up directly or shop directly, and if they're signing up directly or shopping directly, their emails are automatically getting added to your list.
And that's, you know, one of the things that we made sure was [00:30:00] true, right? When people, they create an account, or even if they shop as a guest on Barn2Door, we're collecting that email for you. And so, really important to just like keep gathering those emails both online and offline. I think there's some natural ways.
Oh, one other thing on the, when our designers build websites for farmers, we always have a popup form that collects, you know, farmers can say, yes, please put up the form to capture emails from anybody who visits our website. And then, if you just push people to your website, they're gonna see that pop up and maybe enter their email.
So again, very rich opportunities to be collecting emails, offline and online. Like if any of those works start anywhere, right? Like start with any of those.
Ryan Grace: Yeah. I break it down into you have your passive email collection techniques, and then you're proactive. So, you have some that you can kind of set in the background, a wide net that you can come back and check later on that you just have working for you in the back.
So, local directories to get your name, your website on, like you said, other local businesses that are trying to promote local, [00:31:00] that they're looking for a farm like yours to be able to list as a local resource. Real estate agents, as a new welcome home gift.
Janelle Maiocco: Oh, good one.
Ryan Grace: And you, you move in. That's a nice beef bundle or a produce bundle to welcome you into your new home. Is a great way to connect with the local community. So, those are just some ideas.
Janelle Maiocco: Schools are probably a good one too, right? I think there's a lot of farms that actually do tours, like have schools do tours and you know, collect emails of all the parents, right?
Like, you know, you certainly, why not? Their kids are gonna go home now with maybe a sample of a product or a good farm story or some photos and you know, give those parents an opportunity in the school newsletter, you know, as a follow up. To have all those kids take flyers home. So there's, yeah, lots of great ideas. If anything from this podcast, if you can go away with some good ideas to build your email list, then awesome. I mean, that's why we're here is to help you be successful and build those relationships. Ryan, any final word? Any final bits of advice on customer list building, maintaining that list, that sort of thing that we haven't got?
We've covered a lot. [00:32:00]
Ryan Grace: Yeah. I would say consistency is so important. I can't understate that enough that it's really need to be consistent with this process of adding people to your customer list and being consistent with the communication you're sending out. So, just 'cause you have that fantastic list doesn't necessarily mean that's gonna be highly successful if it's just sitting there.
So, and put it to work. And it doesn't have to be in your face with sales every time. Add some educational content, something that's entertaining, talk about, maybe it's calving season, you got some cute calfs out there. So, and just kind of try to hit those three E's of the education, entertainment and e-commerce.
So, try to get a good balance of those as you are putting your content out.
Janelle Maiocco: I am so glad you just said that because it reminded me of something I was gonna say earlier, because you were talking about the integration with MailChimp and now you're talking about the three E's, which is a really good social media strategy.
Barn2Door has academies. You know, email list building is a part of many academies because if it ever has to do with marketing, you [00:33:00] have to have the customers who you are emailing, that you're trying to grow those relationships and recurring sales with. But we do have academies, at Barn2Door taught by other farmers who are highly successful, in many regards, and are teaching them classes on literally grassroots marketing is one of our most popular.
If we're sold out, like, it's standing room only if you can even make that joke for virtual class. But, every single month, that one is filled to the brim. We have classes on social media, email marketing, including walking through the integration. And then Barn2Door offers a marketing toolkit that farmers subscribe to monthly.
So, we're walking farmers through. It's really like, get your list. We'll help with marketing, whether it's automated or just getting into the habit with the basics. And we'll give you all the tools to do that successfully, with minimal time. But, you do need to communicate with the customers that you want to buy from you.
And then, ultimately to make sure that it's convenient, if it's convenient for those buyers to get your food by with local pickup or delivery. I think one of our other favorite farmers that we [00:34:00] work with closely always is like, there's no reason for them to say no. Like if you've removed all the friction in the buying process, you've got the email, you market and you're delivering on their doorstep, the only thing left is yes, I'm buying.
Because it's such a better option than any of the other food and grocery stores, et cetera, right? It's just such a better option. And nine in 10 people want local food. They want the nutritious food. But to tap into that nine in 10 people, you have to have them on a list. You need to email them, and you have to make it easy.
Ryan Grace: Exactly. Yep. And that's one of the other benefits of what we get to do in our role here. I know you probably hear it from all of us, as we share, but we get to meet with farms every day, so hundreds of farms that we get insight to what's working, what's not. You don't have to reinvent the wheel.
We have a great resource, great network, with the farms that we can share some of these success stories and we have proven data that says this is what works. And so, that's one of the more fun things to be able to share with our farms as they're getting onboarded. It may be overwhelming at first, but [00:35:00] we got you.
We'll walk you through it. We work with plenty of farms and have seen them be very successful, so.
Janelle Maiocco: That's fair. Who have started with zero and now are just off to the races. Awesome. I wanna extend my thanks to Ryan for joining us on this week's podcast episode. You can check out more of Barn2Door on our team on Instagram @Barn2Door, or on our website, Barn2Door.com.
Here at Barn2Door, we're humbled to support thousands of independent farmers all across the country. We're delighted to offer services and tools, classes and resources to help farmers access more, customers increase sales and save time for their business. If you're an independent farmer who's just getting started or transitioning to selling direct, or if you've been at it a while and wanna simplify your business management or grow your customer list, visit Barn2Door.com/Learn-More.
Thank you for tuning in today. We look forward to joining you next time on The Independent Farmer Podcast.
[00:36:00] Thank you for joining us on the Independent Farmer Podcast. At Barn2Door, we are passionate about empowering independent farmers to build a thriving business. To all the farmers out there, thank you for all you do to grow amazing food, care for the soil, and serve your local communities. You are the backbone of our country.
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