Is your website a lead-generating machine, or a simple brochure?
How strong is your digital ecosystem?
Do you have a CRM that gathers customer information in the moment, or are your industry secrets stuck in the brains and rolodexes of your sales team?
At this point in time, it’s no secret that farmers are more digital than ever before, and that this trend will only grow over time. So, when it comes to creating a digital marketing strategy, the question is no longer why and when. It’s how.
We’re going to do away with lofty promises and fancy marketer lingo, and give you seven actionable ways you can make your marketing strategy more digital-centric in 2018.
You're not the only agri-marketer dipping a toe into the waters of the world wide web, so your digital strategy will have to be a lot more in-depth than a mobile-optimized website, or offering a few apps on Google Play or the Apple App Store.
Instead, your digital efforts should tap into marketing innovations and trends. You should use data to inform, correct and evaluate your strategy. And above all, you should aim to be agile and move quickly.
Here's how.
Ready to give your agrimarketing strategy a boost?
FAQs
What is agribusiness?
First of all, thanks for stopping by! Agribusiness is pretty much what it sounds like — it’s just industry jargon for businesses in agriculture.
I’m not in agribusiness, but I’d like to improve my company’s digital marketing. Why’d you make an eBook for them and not for me?
We’ve noticed that agribusiness is significantly behind when it comes to digital adoption, so we wanted to give them a little leg up. But the seven steps we outline in our eBook can be used by any company looking to get the best return on their digital investment! So, while the examples we give might be ag-focused, our advice is universal.
What is inbound marketing?
Traditionally, marketing has been mostly interruptive — think TV advertisements; full-page magazine ads; huge, looming billboards, etc. We now call that “outbound” marketing. But inbound makes the argument that marketing is more effective when people find you on their own (like through a Google search). And that’s easiest to do with an integrated marketing strategy that pushes out blog, website, social media content and more geared toward your ideal customer’s pain points. So, when they type a question in Google, ta-da — there you are!
If you want to learn more before downloading the eBook, here’s a quick lowdown on inbound marketing strategy.
So…what is content marketing, then? Sounds to me like that’s just another way of saying “inbound marketing.”
You’re close. Inbound and content marketing are very similar, but inbound marketing is a fully integrated strategy — and content is just one part!
Content marketing is all about providing users with useful, educational material that addresses their pain points. They can take the form of blogs, videos, eBooks like this — even infographics. As users engage with your content (maybe moving from an ungated blog post to a gated eBook, for instance), they’ll progress further down the buyer’s journey, which will help you nurture and generate new leads. That’s why it’s crucial your content marketing strategy is tuned in to your ideal customer’s needs.
When it comes to digital, how do I calculate return on investment?
That’s a great question. When it comes to digital, ROI is more than noting how many clicks you received on Facebook, or how many leads filled out a form to download an eBook. Speaking of which…you’ll have to read the eBook to find out!
