How to Stay in the Feed

Farmers are turning to new agriculture and social media tools for information, sharing ideas with each other and even the products they need. The best part – the apps can be used anywhere – even when the farmers are in the field. All it takes is a smart phone.  Android, Blackberry and iPhones are becoming as important as the farming equipment that is being taken into the fields.

Providing information about the weather, soil management or sharing news with other farmers, the new agricultural and social media tools are being developed by a number of companies. Agri ImaGIS Technologies in Fargo, North Dakota is a family owned business that has developed software for smart phones and iPads. Basically turning the tractor into a business on wheels, users can buy and sell items using the apps or they can use them for problem solving. Resulting in an increase in productivity as well as providing information for a variety of needs, the apps are bringing farms into the world of technology.

Currently there are a number of agriculture and social media apps available and many are free to download. For example, Common Diseases of Farm Animal is one. This app contains information on disease among farm animals – parasitic, surgical and infectious diseases – as well as determining the age of animals. This is available for the Android.

Another agriculture and social media app that is available for iPhone and Android users  is the NPIPM Soybean Guide. This is a free app that provides information on options for managing insect and arthropod pests that can affect soybeans being grown in Kansa, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota and North Dakota.

Currently a majority of the agricultural and social media apps that are available are Windows-based; however, this is an expanding field and applications are being developed frequently. Agriculture is rapidly joining the digital information age. Many fourth and fifth generation farmers have grown up in the digital age and computers and technology are tools that can provide a wealth of information.

Consistency is Key to Branding your Sight

Branding your farm business is one of the best forms of advertising that exists. Selecting a user name that identifies you when talking with others on social media sites is your personal brand that allows others to identify you and know when you are on the site. The names that are chosen are displayed next to your messages and very often they can be almost anything that is desired as long as it does not violate user policies.

Tractor Tweeting – The Rise of Social Media

Farmers are not nearly as isolated from the rest of the world as they were in the past. With social media, such as Twitter, it is possible to get answers to questions, help with concerns and virtually any other advice needed. There are even discussions springing up that are focused on caring for the animals that live on the farms. One such discussion, AgChat, was founded by a British farmer, Michele Payn-Knoper. The idea for the discussion started when she went to Twitter to obtain advice about a Holstein dairy calf that was not weaning. The advice she got worked and now the discussion is ongoing every Tuesday night. Since its beginning in 2009, the discussion has grown to include ten countries with 10,000 people sharing and exchanging ideas about farming and other related issues.

Social media savvy farmers may seem like an odd mix however to me it makes perfect sense and in today’s post I want to explain why. Farmers are taking their message online via Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube and it is a message the general public is interested in.