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Brand with Valerie Luhman: Saving Time and Connecting with Customers Online
183 Plays4 years ago
Join our conversation with Valerie Luhman, owner of Grass Fed Cattle Co, for the ways she's connecting with customers online and her tricks to saving time with social and email!
Show Notes:
https://www.grassfedcattleco.com/
https://www.barn2door.com/resources
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Direct Farm Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Direct Farm podcast, the weekly listen for farm selling direct.
Four Levers for Farm Success
00:00:07
Speaker
We'll talk about the four levers for farm success, which are quality, brand, price, and convenience. We'll hear from outside industry experts and producers like you to delight your customers to save time and to increase your direct farm sales and business. We're glad you're here.
00:00:26
Speaker
Welcome back, everyone. You are listening to the seventh episode of the Direct Farm podcast.
Recap of August 2020 Conference
00:00:31
Speaker
And if you've been listening along, you know that we've covered our four keynote speakers from the August 4th 2020 Direct Farm Conference.
Announcement of Upcoming Conferences
00:00:39
Speaker
Today we're going to shift gears, but first we have a really, really exciting announcement.
00:00:44
Speaker
And that is that following that first conference, we got such good questions and feedback on brand and price and convenience that we are going to put on three more conferences and deep dive on each of those. So go to directfarmconference.com and you'll be able to see the direct farm series.
Focus on Brand for Holiday Season
00:01:03
Speaker
Our first conference will be a deep dive on brand to get farms ready for the upcoming holiday season, to keep their brand awareness and loyalty
00:01:12
Speaker
really relevant and drive sales for their on season during the off season when you have a little bit more time to focus on your your digital channels.
Guest Introduction: Valerie Lumen
00:01:22
Speaker
So go over to directfarmconference.com you'll be able to register and join us on November 10th for the first conference on brand.
00:01:31
Speaker
So with that in mind, to help us kick off the conversation around brand today, I had a conversation with Valerie Lumen and I'll let her introduce herself. She and her husband, Jared own grass fed cattle co in Southeastern Minnesota. We, um, we farm in Minnesota in the Southeastern corner, um, near Goodhue, Minnesota. And we raised grass fed beef, pastured chickens, and then we worked with a couple other farmers as well.
00:01:59
Speaker
We farm with my husband Jared's dad, John, and love it out here. It's beautiful. It's a little bit chilly around this time of the year, but we absolutely love
Valerie's Farming Journey
00:02:10
Speaker
it. Just finished our last batch of chickens, went to the butcher this morning, and so it's been a really fun summer and now kind of fall for us. We own the grass-fed cattle company, and we primarily serve our customers in the Twin Cities. We
00:02:26
Speaker
bought the grass-fed cattle company from another couple Marcus and Abby about a year and a half ago now and they started the grass-fed cattle company because they really wanted to find a local farmer that they trusted
00:02:41
Speaker
that they knew had really high quality beef that their family could buy from. And so they asked a few friends of theirs if they wanted to share a whole sphere. They were splitting it up in their kitchen with some friends of theirs and ended up having more people that wanted to do the same. And so they decided to start a business around that and went out and found some local farmers that had really great grass fed and grass finished beef and started the grass up cattle company kind of from their own home in the twin cities and
00:03:10
Speaker
Really got the basics all set up for us and ran the business for about eight years before we bought it a year and a half ago. And so Jared and I got married a little over two years ago and had been doing a little bit of direct marketing off of our farm. Just, you know, if you had a year, maybe 510 sometimes
00:03:32
Speaker
And was something we always had really wanted to do and him and his brother were just kind of looking at this website one day. And saw the grass such cattle company for sale and we fell in love with it. We love their website their branding. We became owners and it's kind of been a wild ride since then we've learned a lot, but are absolutely in love with
00:03:52
Speaker
just a group of customers we get to serve and all the great people that support our farm and get to enjoy the meat that we work hard to raise. I asked Valerie what it was like to purchase an existing brand. And she mentioned that they really fell in love with it, but I wanted to know what had changed and how they made that brand their
Maintaining Brand Authenticity
00:04:09
Speaker
own. The brand that I fell in love with really is still the same. It was very authentic and vibrant and connected to the farmer and really focused around building trust.
00:04:22
Speaker
With those farmers to the customers. So I think that's something Marcus and Abby just did an excellent job of and really gave us a great place to start and continue to build off of Kind of branding it a little bit more towards our farm. And that's the hope that someday will be able to raise a lot more of the product. We're currently working with four or five other farmers and you know getting some off of our farm as well.
00:04:45
Speaker
And so we've changed a few things, but that brand hasn't changed a whole lot just because we still want it to be a really vibrant, authentic feeling and experience for our customers, whether it's through our emails and our communication that way, whether it's through the in-person experiences they have, just opening up that box and seeing some really delicious meat from our farm.
Expansion to Convenient Options
00:05:14
Speaker
That side of things hasn't changed a lot. What has changed is when they were selling a few years ago, they were only selling in bulk so eighth quarters and halves of steers and then half pigs as well. And so we have expanded that a little bit really to
00:05:32
Speaker
provide a little bit more convenience for some of our customers. We've also added pastured chickens because right away we sent out a survey asking people what they'd like us to add or do differently and that was the biggest thing we heard back. So we got right on it and we added those to our farm as soon as we could last year and have had great
00:05:53
Speaker
a great time raising those for the last few summers.
In-Depth on Farm Success Levers
00:05:55
Speaker
So of course on this podcast, we love to talk about levers and it's more often the four levers for farm success, right? The quality brand price and convenience, but levers can also just be anything that's worked really well for your farm to help drive sales and ultimately to grow your business and be successful. So I asked Valerie what some of those things were for grass fed cattle co that she and Jared had tried over the past year and been able to make work really well for them.
00:06:23
Speaker
A few things that we have done just to serve our customers better. Yeah, we try really hard to listen to them and ask for feedback and take that into consideration. Just trying to give them more options. Previously, they had only been able to pick up their boxes of meat no matter how big or small in Edina at our location where we store our meat.
00:06:45
Speaker
And that works well for a lot of people in the area, which a lot of our customers are right around there. But we do have some that are in the suburbs of the Twin Cities. And so we were able to add delivery for those people. And they absolutely love that, especially during this time where there's so many unknowns. And so that was a big one that we added. We also added shipping for people, which
00:07:08
Speaker
Um, some took advantage of this summer when they were at their cabins, um, having a ship of box to meet up there. So it could be there when they got there, uh, for the weekend, just spend with their family. Um, and then just overall, I think continuing to provide the quality meat that they fell in love with that the grass with cattle company started with and continue to make sure that that's our top priority. Um, and making sure that the brand is focused around.
Importance of Brand Trust
00:07:35
Speaker
being connected to the farm and trying to do everything we can on social media during their in-person visits to just make them comfortable asking questions about the meat and how it was raised, what are farmers like, who we are, all of those things so that they feel comfortable with who they are supporting and where their meat is coming from. My next question for Valerie was a simple one, but a really critical one. I wanted to know why she thought brand was important to farms.
00:08:06
Speaker
We really focus on brand, not just as the colors or what our website looks like, but more of the experience and the feelings that customers take away when they are working with us or talking to us or just seeing us on all of our different social media or email platforms. We like to think of it as not so much branding, but building trust with the people that are supporting us.
00:08:32
Speaker
giving us their hard earned money and saying that they trust us with that to give them a quality product. And so we're really kind of thinking of it more as a relationship with each person that we are communicating with the people that are seeing our social media posts that are getting our emails in their inbox, usually a couple of times a week and really just trying to build that brand. So I guess for me,
00:09:00
Speaker
You know, I've learned a lot in the last year and a half. I feel like it's been a bit of a wild ride, but for me, just having that thought process is a little less daunting than saying, you need to build a brand. Rather, I need to build relationships with the people who are trusting us and who are supporting our farm. That seems a lot more doable than saying I need to change or build or whatever it is with a brand that sometimes can be daunting, at least for me right in the beginning.
Applying Marketing Skills to Farming
00:09:30
Speaker
Having worked with Valerie before, I knew that she went to college for marketing. I wanted to know what carried over from her school experience and then what she learned new, what got picked up just by simply doing it. There are so many things I know I learned in college that I'm using every day, but you know, you kind of forget, at least I start to forget where I learned things and
00:09:51
Speaker
you know, did I read it on the internet? Did I hear it in class? Did I, you know, pick it up somewhere along the lines? You know, I follow a lot of different farm accounts and get ideas from other people. Um, so it's hard to remember what exactly, but I know one of the skills was definitely photo editing. Um, how to take a good picture just on my phone. We take a lot of the pictures that we use for our newsletters, social media on our own phones. Um, so that,
00:10:19
Speaker
you know, we can save time and a little bit of money. And being able to edit those and make them look a little bit more like a professional photo was definitely a good skill. And then just some key messaging things that I know we learned in college looking at different companies websites, doing a little bit of case studies around which companies have been successful with their key messaging, what really sticks in customers minds. That has always played into how I tried to brand the Grassut cattle company and
00:10:49
Speaker
build that trust through our brand. So those are some skills I know I remember learning in college that I'm still using every day, but just the little things, even in our social media posts, in our newsletters, always having that call to action and asking people to do something or think about something or shop, whatever it might be, is another thing that I remember just
00:11:12
Speaker
being pounded into our heads, but it definitely stuck with me and it is something I use every day. So Valerie mentioned key messages. And so I wanted to hear what grass-fed cattle crows key messages were that were being repeated throughout all of their posts.
Core Messages: Environment and Family
00:11:27
Speaker
So our key messages, you know, they're really a combination of what we believe and value the most on our farm and in our family. And so they really go back to kind of three main things.
00:11:43
Speaker
the environment and trying to do everything we can to take care of our land to use regenerative practices that really heal the land that we believe we've been blessed to be given and to have the responsibility to care for and so we want to make sure that we are being sustainable in that aspect and then second that we are providing the most nutrient dense healthy food for
00:12:08
Speaker
not only our family, but lots of other families and that we're blessed to be connected to those people and that we get to care for them as well. And then lastly, just the family aspect. Not only our direct family and being able to give future generations an opportunity to farm if they so choose or other people. You know, we may not have children that end up farming, but we may be in contact with people that
00:12:34
Speaker
are like family to us and we'd love to teach those people what we've learned along the way and to farm in a regenerative way as well. So those three things really are our three key messages. I try to tie into every post, every email, every interaction I have with people because that's what I want them to remember and to feel when they think of the grass-fed cattle company.
00:12:59
Speaker
Having heard Valerie at the direct conference, I knew that she had some really important things to say on saving time and marketing. And so I asked her that question.
Social Media Strategy and Tools
00:13:08
Speaker
She gave me two main ways. The first one was planning. Yeah, I would say there's kind of two big ways I try to do that. And one is through planning those social media posts. I will admit I haven't been quite as good the last few weeks at planning them out. It's just been a little
00:13:25
Speaker
bit crazy here with all of the animals going to the butcher and getting those boxes packaged for our customers. But I can tell you when I do use this practice, it saves me so much time and thought and energy really just gives me more freedom throughout the week. I try to plan out one week of posts at a time using our key messages, of course, but also the three E's.
00:13:50
Speaker
which I know we talked a lot about through my part in the direct conference, but the three E's being educate, entertain, and e-commerce. Trying to kind of rotate between those three big topics of my posts and using those to kind of pair with a key message and then create a post with a call to action. So I plan them out.
00:14:15
Speaker
each week through just a simple email to myself and write out the captions, try to pair that with a photo that I've taken on the farm throughout the last week, or we do use some stock photos for pictures of meat. And that seems to work really well. And just really simply then during the day, I can take time to copy and paste that into an Instagram or Facebook posts and get that sent out. So
00:14:41
Speaker
I find that it takes me a little bit of time to kind of get into the mindset and remind myself of those key messages to start writing them. But if I can do them all at once. I'm already in that mindset. I'm thinking about our customers, what they want to hear what they've asked me and I can really get those done a lot quicker.
00:14:58
Speaker
The second way that Valerie shared she was saving a ton of time is with drip campaigns through
Using Drip Campaigns for Engagement
00:15:03
Speaker
MailChimp. I'll let her share what that looks like for grass fed cattle co, but we encourage farms to do this. It is a great way to connect with your customers while also saving some time. When somebody signs up to be part of our email list through our website, through our Facebook, you name it, they automatically start getting some emails from us introducing them to our farm.
00:15:26
Speaker
our business and all of that. So there are three different emails. One that introduces them to kind of our dream behind this business and really gets to the heart of our why behind what we do. Then introduces them to our farm, why we farm and the way we do, who they're supporting and the values behind the farm that they're supporting. And then lastly, our business, how it works.
00:15:50
Speaker
it's a bit of a call to action to make their first order and some of the different ways that they can do that.
00:15:57
Speaker
That is awesome because people will reply back to those. They will bring those up when I see them in person and say, loved reading about your farm, watching the video, all of those things. I don't think I would be able to spend that time telling each and every person that subscribes to our email all of those things that we want them to hear. Valerie is so thoughtful about the messaging that she uses to keep it consistent and make sure that customers are walking away knowing a few key things.
00:16:26
Speaker
I asked her what her system for planning content is because I know it is so important for actually driving sales, but also for saving time and continuing to post consistently.
Content Planning System
00:16:38
Speaker
The system that works best for me is to just open a blank email that I actually send to myself and write a quick outline of every day of the week and which of the three E's I'm going to post about that day. So I
00:16:55
Speaker
Literally, we'll just write Monday, entertain Tuesday, educate Wednesday, e-commerce. And then I'll try to come up with a big topic of that post. And so whether that be, you know, sale on ribeyes or share a influencer's post that they've done with us or to share a recipe or share about why we choose to grass finish our beef kettle. All of those things, you know, I just jacked down really quickly.
00:17:24
Speaker
And create that outline and then I start working on the actual posts. And so I type out that content and pair it with a photo. And sometimes I do run into, you know, kind of a bit of a writer's block and I'm just like, I don't know what what's new, what I could post about that.
00:17:43
Speaker
Um, people will find interesting and I find myself just going back to those key messages and they're kind of ingrained in my brain. They are sort of who we are as people and farmers. And so sometimes it's just easy to forget that. That's not everyone's life and they find our story interesting and they want to hear about it. And so actually one of my favorite posts is one that I did about the day in the life of a farmer. And I talked about what Jared does every day.
00:18:12
Speaker
um kind of his schedule and all the things he checks on and the livestock he cares for and people loved it but you know to us it's just another kind of boring typical day and so um just remembering when I do have that writer's block to go back to those key messages and even kind of create a grid of the three key messages along the top and those three E's along the side and that gives me nine post options that I can
00:18:41
Speaker
easily tie together talking about, you know, the health, the nutrition behind our grass-fed beef and what benefits that offers and why you should click the link below to buy a ribeye steak. And so that's kind of how I plan out our posts and try to make it a little bit less time commitment and try to do it all in one batch just to keep that mindset of
00:19:10
Speaker
What are our customers wanting to hear and how can I best connect with them and build trust with them through these posts? I asked Valerie about this holiday season as she's moving into it, both because it's a time to be connecting with customers online and also a time to be driving
Holiday Season Challenges and Plans
00:19:26
Speaker
sales. In the past, we have done quite a few events this time of year where we get to meet new people, talk about maybe a holiday box we have going on. We have in the past done gift boxes and things like that.
00:19:40
Speaker
We do offer gift certificates to our customers to give as a presence to people. Unfortunately, I just don't know that we're going to have a lot of extra product for us to sell during this, you know, Thanksgiving and Christmas season that's coming up, which is unfortunate, but I think we're going to try to take a little bit of a different spin. I'm going to try to do some
00:20:04
Speaker
kind of my second time trying subscription model. The first time I think I just made it a little bit too detailed in what they get in every box. And that made it difficult on the inventory side of things for managing it. So taking some advice that I heard through the direct conference, I'm going to try to leave it a little bit more wide open. And so that may be a promotion we do during the holiday season. I'm being completely honest, we just don't have the
00:20:32
Speaker
processing dates or the animals on our farm to have product available the whole time during that season. So it's going to be a little bit different and still kind of a work in progress for what we're going to do about that. But, you know, we've had a lot more interest in the bulk orders recently. And so we've been trying to get those pre-orders filled and keep planning more processing dates as close
00:21:00
Speaker
as we can so we can get those customers freezers filled with meat from our farm. It was great to hear that Valerie had not only attended and presented at the direct conference, but also learned something new that was working for another farm and is turning around and giving that a try with grass-fed cattle
Advice for Fellow Farmers
00:21:16
Speaker
co. And in the spirit of sharing advice, my last question for Valerie was what takeaways, what advice do you have for farms that are listening that has worked really well for you?
00:21:26
Speaker
Yeah, well, I by no means feel like an expert. I am learning every day and have lots to learn from other farmers. So appreciate the people that have taken time to answer my questions along the way. But something I have learned in the last year and a half or two years of having this business is just to take those opportunities to learn to
00:21:45
Speaker
Find podcasts. I just discovered a new Pastured Poultry podcast that I'm, I don't know, 10 episodes into already and it's only been like a week since I found it. But just to take those opportunities to learn from other farmers, you know, send them an Instagram message and ask them about a post they made or about anything you have questions about. Most, most every farmer I have come in contact with is just so happy to help others
00:22:09
Speaker
And another great piece of advice along those same lines that Dr. Williams said at one of the trainings I was at is to make sure that you are responding to people that have feedback, whether it's positive or negative. And it's really tempting to, you know, wait a little while to respond to those people who might not have the best feedback to say, but those are the ones you should really reply to the quickest and try to listen and ask questions and really understand
00:22:39
Speaker
where they're coming from and use that feedback, trying not to take it personally, but use that feedback to make your business better and to connect more and understand what people are really looking for. Well, I hope you enjoyed listening to that conversation with Valerie as much as I enjoyed having it. She has some awesome insights on how to be thoughtful and really effective in messaging to your consumers and really driving sales, building that brand loyalty by building relationships online.
00:23:07
Speaker
So thank you to Valerie again and do come back join us next week. We are going to talk to Grace She is a barn to door employee who before joining us was working on a farm herself So she's going to tell us about that experience and why she's excited to be doing what she is now. Have a good week We'll talk to you soon