Armed To Farm (Part 5)

Welcome back for the fifth and final part covering the Armed To Farm training! During our last day, we covered one final topic: Social Media.

Social media provides several opportunities for farmers. But first, what is social media? Social media provides a means to interact with customers over the Internet by allowing farmers to tell their story, promote their products, spread brand recognition, and address customer feedback. This interaction can be telling stories about the farm (blogs), providing short and frequent updates about the farm (posts), or visually using pictures or video. Additionally, Social Media allows your customers to follow people and organizations (like your farm), forming groups of people online with a common interest. They can then post comments to each other or the farm.

By far the largest Social Media website today is Facebook. Facebook is a general purpose Social Media website allowing users (customers or farms) to set up a profile, post news updates, send instant messages, and post photos. Twitter is another popular Social media site focusing on short, frequent posts, called tweets. Yet another popular website is Instagram focusing on sharing visual content like photos and videos. Other popular Social Media websites include Pinterest, Etsy, Snapchat, Periscope, and LinkedIN.

The rest of the training covered creating content for your Social Media profile, posting eye catching visuals, linking your Social Media accounts and scheduling posts, and interacting with online customers in a professional manner.

Armed To Farm was a great experience for Ben, allowing him meet other military veterans (and transitioning military) who are interested in starting or continuing to build a farm. All of the presenters were very friendly and knowledgeable. The farm field trips were a great way to demonstrate what other veterans are doing, and probably more importantly, that it can be done!

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Helpful Links:

Armed to Farm website
https://www.ncat.org/armedtofarm/

Armed to Farm Intro videos

Farmer Veteran Coalition
https://farmvetco.org

​USDA site for new farmers (including links for Veterans)
https://newfarmers.usda.gov

National Resources Conservation Service: Part of the USDA that provides technical & financial assistance for conservation work
https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/site/national/home/

National Ag Law Center: legal considerations
https://nationalaglawcenter.org

FTC: free annual credit reports
https://www.ftc.gov/faq/consumer-protection/get-my-free-credit-report

Farm field trips:
Four Seasons
Shannon Family Farms
​Purdue Student Farm
​Crowl Cattle Farm
Blue Yonder Organic Farm
​King Bee