1. 30 Ideas for Direct Marketers
Jess Epsten

3. Money
• Paid
advertising
• Signage
• Promotional
Materials
Time
• Education
• Building
community
• Relationship
building
• Earned media

4.  Story
behind your food – differentiating
yourself
Quality
 Growing practices
 Connection to your family


5.  Develop
and logo
a farm identity

6.  Label
it local

7.  Take
pictures

8.  Mass
markets vs. niche markets

9. •Sell your product “to one person”

10.  You
can identify market segments by all kinds of
factors, like:









Gender or age
Price willingness
Interests
Location
Income
Size of Household
Local vs. tourist
Occupation
Etc.

11.  Who
is this woman?
Julie

12.  She
is married.
 She has two children ages 7 and 10.
 They go to Emma Elementary.
 She is a CNA and at the hospital.
 She spends time caring for her elderly parents.
 Her interests outside of family & work include:
Cooking
 Being health conscious
 Facebook


14. In the places she is already looking!

16.  1:
Sponsor school sports events in exchange
for logo placement/mention at those events.
 2: Advertise in the yearbook or monthly
newsletter.
 3: Sponsor school plays and other functions
that have a printed program.

17.  4:
Offer cooking
classes or classroom
demonstrations.

18.  5:
Outreach to teachers and school
administrators about educational field trips
to your farm.
 6: Donate product to PTO fundraisers and
other school events.

19.  Parents
of school-age kids will tend to follow
certain patterns in media consumption:
7: Some cable TV consumption “over shoulder”
of kids, or with them.
 8: Radio: Predictable drive time radio.


20.  Parents
of school-age kids will tend to follow
certain patterns in media consumption:

9: Some communities have targeted print media
for this group, such as:



WNC Parent (Asheville Citizen-Times)
Summer camp guides or summer activity guides
Special editions or inserts in local papers and
magazine

21.  10:
“Buying Club” type marketing can work well
in any place with a critical mass of people

Create some kind of bulk presentation of your
product




Apples by the bushel
Side of freezer beef
Case of 12 dozen eggs a week
Organize a leader to coordinate this program

23.  Multiple
intervention points
 Reaching the same person 3-5 times with a
consistent message
 Be patient.

24.  She
wants to be more health conscious

25. Advertising:
 11: Provide rack cards or bulletin board
material to local gyms.
 12: Use targeted radio, TV, or newspaper. TV:
food network in your county; Radio: healthrelated call-in show; Newspaper: health
exercise column.

26. Engaging in your community:
 13: Introduce yourself to nutritionists, heart
health centers, and similar health providers.
 14: Sponsor athletic events like a 5k.
 15: Add lots of nutrition facts about products
to your website. Add a recipe section.
 16: Connect with natural food stores.

29.  17:
Meet with their HR director. Talk about
local food as an employee benefit.
 18: This could open the door to have posters
or other materials in break rooms or public
areas of the workplace.

30.  19:
Place paid ads in employee newsletters.
 20: Find one friend/ally on the inside. Offer
them a free share/product/etc. if they will
be the “captain” in spreading the word about
a direct-ordering/delivery system.

31.  21:
Offer to provide a “farm stand” on a
certain day of the week

33.  Let’s
depart from Julie and apply the same
kind of thinking to a different target market.
 How about second home owners in the
mountains?

34.  22:
 23:
 24:

35.  Use
coupons that promote value, not
discount or cheapness.
 “Value” means a fair price but also refers to
the perceived value of your product.
 Examples . . .

36.  25:
A free tour of your farm with a purchase
greater than $X.
 26: A free sample of one of your lesser-sold or
less-understood products with a purchase
greater than $X of a more popular product.

37.  27:
Receive free product for referring a
friend to a major purchase.
 28: Offer bulk buying options for certain
products.

38.  Press
releases
 Pitch stories
 Become the local
expert about food
and agriculture for
the local news

39. Don’t count on word of mouth to work
magically by itself.


Customers say “I heard it from a friend”…

40. I heard it
from a friend
Then I saw
your sign
Then I saw
your rack
card
That
reminded me
to call you
Then I saw an
article in the
paper

41. So…
 Invest
early in having nice looking,
consistent, web and print materials.
 Regular ad placements in targeted media.

43.  Start
this early and never stop.
 Collect email addresses and mailing
addresses
 Send mass e-mail or mail communication
selectively

46. Megan Ray
megan@asapconnections.org
828-236-1282

47. Jess Epsten
jess@asapconnections.org
asapconnections.org
828-236-1282