Social media in the UK farming industry - NFU conference 2013
1. Why you cannot afford to miss using
social media
Lynsey Sweales
SocialB
@socialBuk @lynseysweales
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
2. What you will leave with today?
How Twitter is being used in the farming industry
How Twitter can benefit you
Setting up an account
Twitter Jargon, what you need to know
How to use Twitter
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
3. Different types of social media
Although they all enable sharing, there are
several different types of social media
Blogs are online diaries
Microblogs (Twitter) is texting online
Forums are conversational threads
Video sharing (YouTube) is shared video clips
Social photo (Flickr/pinterest/intagram) is
shared images and photos
Social networking (Facebook, LinkedIn,
Googleplus) is all of the above
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
4. How it relates to business
Businesses can – and do – use social media. For every major
business function of every organisation, there is an equivalent
social media function:
Research=Listening to the conversations people have with each
other to understand their wants and needs
Marketing=Talking in the conversations people have with each
other to spread messages about your company and products
Sales=Energising customers to sell you by finding your most
enthusiastic customers/employees and supercharging them online
Support=Supporting customers to support each other by setting
up tools that help them do this
Development=Embracing customers to work with each other by
integrating them into the way your business works
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
5. Why the social media explosion?
Free!
Sharing is a deeply ingrained human
instinct
Traditional communications were
brand led
New communications are word of
mouth led
Access to internet!
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
7. How can you benefit?
Over the hedge – chat with other farmers about the weather
(flooding, snow, etc), slug problems, price of grain, wider
issues, best practices
Gives you that contact with others esp. if you are isolated
Use it to promote your business
Keep up to date from organisations like NFU, industry press,
etc.
Keep up to date on campaigns – e.g. Buy British
It’s a fun and engaging place – its really simple to use
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
9. What is Twitter
Account settings
Account photo
Username
Profile details
Twitter stats Following flag
Latest tweet
Recent tweets
10. Important Definitions
TWEET
Each comment posted on Twitter is referred to as a tweet, and the act of sending a tweet is
referred to as tweeting
RETWEET
A Retweet is a type of message posted on Twitter, that repeats some information previously
tweeted by another user, symbolised by RT at beginning of Tweet. E.g.
RT @AgriChatUK: tonight 8-10pm @julierobinson_ will be hosting #agrichatuk session on how the wet
weather is impacting on farming operations
FOLLOWING
To subscribe to someone’s Twitter updates
FOLLOWERS
To have people subscribing to your Twitter updates
@Reply
Beginning your Tweet or citing @personsname in your Tweet designates that you are referring to
@personsname. People tend to monitor their @ mentions so it acts as a convenient, albeit
public, way to communicate with people who are not following you
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
11. Important Definitions
HASHTAG
a topic with a hash symbol (“#”) at the start to identify it.
Twitter hashtags like #norfolk, #food, #sosdairy
#buybritishhelp spread information on Twitter while also
helping to organise it
Great for using to search and find others
DM
Short for Direct Message, a private Tweet which you can
only send to people who are following you
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
12. Setting up your account
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
13. Setting up a Twitter Account
www.twitter.com or if you use a smart phone download the App
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
14. Account name, bio and image
Account name
While your Twitter username is what appears in your address, you can
also specify a Twitter Account Name, which is how people find you
As with your username, make sure you choose a suitable account
name, one which reflects you – your name is a safe bet
Bio
This is where you tell people about yourself in more depth. Again, make
the most of it: put across what you want to say in brief, succinct
paragraphs, ideally containing keywords (e.g arable farmer).
Image
This is the small image that appears next to your name. Most people
use a photo, and most companies use their logo.
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
17. Twitter searches
Find people/organisations within
Twitter – search names, sectors,
etc. e.g. Arable farmer
Twitter Search can also be used to
find information in real time – e.g.
hashtags #aggen #nfu13
https://twitter.com/#!/search-home
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
19. How to send a Tweet
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
20. Public engagement - Replying
If you see something someone has tweeted, and you’d like to reply to
it, you can do this very like replying to an email
To do this, place your cursor anywhere over the tweet. You will see a
small link saying ‘reply’. Click that, and type in your response.
Alternatively you can just type that person’s username into the tweet
dialogue box with the ‘@’ character in front of it. You can do this if
you want to direct a tweet at one person in particular.
Be warned that everyone will be able to see your reply. To send
private messages, you need to use direct messaging, which is
covered in the next slide.
NOTE – dealing with negative comments, anti activists – BE aware!
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
22. Private engagement - DMs
If you want to contact someone through
Twitter but you don’t want everyone else to
see it, use direct messaging.
You can only do this if that person is following
you, and you are following them too (that is,
you are Twitter ‘friends’).
To do this, in the Twitter dialogue box, type
DM with a space, followed by their username.
If using a smartphone click ‘Me’ then click the
envelope and select the person you want to
send a message to
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
23. Retweeting
If you see something someone
has tweeted and you think it’s
very good, then you can forward
that to your followers. This is
called ReTweeting. It’s like when
you forward an email to people.
To do this, simply click the
Retweet button
ReTweeting is a great way to
support others and very powerful
with campaigns
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
25. Participation - Hashtags
People often use hashtags to find information about specific
subjects, so if you use hashtags, they are more likely to find
you via that subject. Hashtags are therefore a great way to
extend your reach and get more followers in a meaningful
way.
There are a wide variety of already established hashtags, and
new ones being created daily, that you can join
E.g. #norfolk, #milk #food #slugwatch plus NFU campaigns e.g.
#tbfree #sosdairy #buybritish
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
27. #AgrichatUK
#Agrichatuk was set up to share, discuss and debate all things
agriculture on Twitter
They have online discussions every Thursday between 8pm and 10pm
– community hosted
Social media in ag - 1,191 tweets from 140 people, reaching an
audience of 161,005 in the last 24hrs
Rural mental health- 1022 tweets from 130 users - trended in the UK
during the 2 hour chat
How can ag attract the brightest minds- 648 tweets from 101 users
What do we want for farming and the countryside in 2013- 468
tweets from 88 users
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
28. #buybritish
#buybritishhashtag was started
when the horsemeat scandal hit the
press
Used to champion British produce &
encourage consumers to show their
support in British produce
NFU has other campaigns,
#farmingdelivers which incorporates
@chickenmeals and #turkey
You can search #hashtags and save
these on your phone, computer, etc
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
30. Farmers feedback on hashtags
“AgriChatUK is the perfect way for farmers to share best practice and experiences,
while at the same time interact with suppliers and customers.
Also, the opportunity to explain farming to a non-farming audience should not be missed,”
Charles
“If you take the time to get involved, it’s amazing how educational and useful it can be,”
Jono
“To learn about and engage in farming’s future people, future systems, and future
technologies with like-minded people,”
Neil
31. What you will leave with today?
Why social media
How social media (Twitter) is being used in the
farming industry
Setting up an account
Twitter Jargon, what you need to know
How to use Twitter
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
32. What you need to do now
Set up your Twitter account
Follow @Nfutweets
Search for #buybritish and see what people are
saying
Tweet if you have something to say or are
passionate about
You will then see how great Twitter can be for you
and tell other farmers
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
33. Why you cannot afford to miss using
social media
Lynsey Sweales
SocialB
@socialBuk @lynseysweales
Online Marketing & Social Media Experts
Editor's Notes
ASKWho uses twitter?We have gone through the booked in attendees and there seems to be a lot that tweet already. I have slight fear we may look like we are preaching to the converted. With that in mind are you happy to cover this off in your opening along the lines of, some of you tweet, some of you may not - yet. For those that do can we use the session as a rallying call to recruit more tweeters from the farming community. Task each one with encouraging five more, that sort of thing.Who has a smart phone?The marriage of agriculture and social media likely conjures up images of crop seeding on Farmville, but socially savvy agribusinesses are proving that the connection runs much deeper than the popular Zynga game. A 2011 study by the American Farm Bureau Federation revealed that of the 98% of farmers and ranchers ages 18 to 25 who have internet access, 76% of them use social media. Sure, agribusiness often gets a bad rep for being “behind the times,” but that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality, agribusinesses have embraced social media as a channel that is revolutionizing both B2B and B2C communications for the industry.The takeaway is that it isn't necessarily a resistance to technology that keeps a group or industry out of social media, but rather a lack of knowledge about how digital tools can have tangible business benefits
My background, worked in marketing & PR 10 years plusWorked on website projects and always hindered by technical babble & lack of understanding – so through ‘learning on the job’ and working in a live environment gained a full understand.Run and own Social-B a marketing and PR agency specialising in SEO, Social media & PR – clients local and also large national and global brands. Provide strategy, training and implementation on all levels of SEO, SM and PR- Muller, Boots, Dunelm, Emirates, Gatwick Heathrow, Manchester College, O2,
Anything free is a great enticement for people to use it – most SM networks are freeFrom a business point of view doesn’t matter if you are Nike or a small business in Norwich – you all have the same platforms to play on to gain business!Traditional communications were brand-led – organisations ‘owned’ their brandsNew communications are word-of-mouth led. Social media gives more power to people. Today, people own the brand. The brand is what people perceive it to be, and now, say it is.The explosion of social media also means that your sources of information are fragmenting. Instead of a few TV channels, radio stations or newspapers, you now have access to thousands of blogs, social networks and so on.They are passionate enough to create blogs, videos, and images, or to comment, give their opinion – often in their own timeThese often free applications make social media very easy to set up Sharing is a deeply ingrained human instinct. This, plus its ease of setup, is why it is exploding in popularityIts about power of the people through word of mouth social media networkingMany companies jump on the social media band wagon due to its popularity however there is no plan and not real thought process – this is where things often go wrong – or don’t quite work out as successfully as they should – many companies leave social media after a month or twoSo how can you use social media within your business to harness these people to talk about us, recommend us etc?
You don’t have to use Twitter to actually chat with others you can start but just listeningIt’s a fun and engaging place and doesn’t need to be daunting to use
Wouldn’t it be nice if you could keep up to date with the latest news, local information and agricultural stories relevant to your work without having to switch on a computer? What if you could hear about the latest industry events and get updates about topics you’re interested in while you’re walking out workingWell, now you can. Twitter in an online tool that keeps you informed with what matters most to you – all via your mobile phone. It really couldn’t be more simple.
Smart phone user left computer user rightIt’s a free tool that allows you to communicate with groups and organisations simply and quickly. You can sign up to as many people or groups as you like to receive their thoughts and updates on the issues that interest you.You only have 140 characters, so its easy and quick to communicate
Complete the new to twitter detailsNext step find friends – enter email – ignoreFind others – ignoreSearch = nfu -
Your Bio tells people about youThe locationWhat they sell/ who they areSome personality (if you wish!)
Walk them through the connect and #tag tabsIf on a computer left hand side, if on a smart phone right hand sideYou type your tweet in the dialogue box at the top of your Twitter pageYou have 140 characters or fewer in which to put across your message. This can be one thought, opinion or sentiment, and it can include links to other websites, for example to promote your latest blog post or video.Use tricks to help you be brief:Numbers for words, such as to=2, for=4
Click the connect button (the @ sign) although your phone should pop up with any new messages
Why RT, its great to help campaigns and get messages out quickly
If you want to add your voice to a common cause or thread, you can use a hashtagHashtags are small identifiers that everyone can use to indicate what they’re Tweeting about. They make it easier for people to find other tweets on a particular subject/location while filtering out the tweets that may just coincidentally contain the same keyword.For example, the hashtag #journorequest is a popular hashtag for journalists looking for certain storiesTo use a hashtag, in the Twitter dialogue box, type a hash sign (usually next to the ENTER key on UK keyboards), followed by a space, then your message.You can put hashtags anywhere in your tweet but again, be careful that you don’t go over the 140 character limit
#AgriChatUK is a hashtag on Twitter for everyone involved in agriculture to share ideas, discuss pressing issues, debate hot topics and simply connect with other people in the industry. We also host live chats every Thursday evening between 8pm and 10pm
Showing only the latest reach of 50 accounts – NFU have told me that the reach in the last few weeks has been over 1 Million accounts reached! – that’s huge and only possible because of twitter and its instant effect
My background, worked in marketing & PR 10 years plusWorked on website projects and always hindered by technical babble & lack of understanding – so through ‘learning on the job’ and working in a live environment gained a full understand.Run and own Social-B a marketing and PR agency specialising in SEO, Social media & PR – clients local and also large national and global brands. Provide strategy, training and implementation on all levels of SEO, SM and PR- Muller, Boots, Dunelm, Emirates, Gatwick Heathrow, Manchester College, O2,
