Email is one of the most valuable tools for marketing your local food business. Even in our evolving online world, email marketing still outperforms social media, digital ads, and text messages in terms of return on investment. But the first thing you’ll need is an up-to-date email list!
Growing Your Email List: For Farmers & Food Hubs
The following tips are excerpted from our free “Email Marketing Toolkit for Farmers & Food Hubs”.
A good place to start collecting email addresses is in-person. Start your list the old-fashioned way with a pen & clipboard at farmers markets, events, your farm store, or any place where you are in contact with potential customers. Conferences and other events that connect buyers and producers are a key place to meet potential wholesale customers. Be sure to bring a sign-up sheet to these events!
Another way to get your real-life shoppers to your website is to create QR Codes linking to your online store or newsletter sign up page. Print those QR codes onto a sign for your stand at the farmers’ market, or your table at a conference—that way any passer-by can just scan the code with their phone to go straight to your website.
Your website is another key source of emails. Create a form on your website to encourage prospects to leave their name and email address if they’d like to keep up with your business. You can list the newsletter form on your homepage, within your blog posts, and on a popup that appears on your website.
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Use your social media to place a call out. Direct your followers to your newsletter form via link, or even just ask them to send their email to you via direct message on Instagram or Facebook.
Don’t forget about your current customers! Prompt customers to share their email address when placing an online order. With Local Food Marketplace’s online ordering platform, all shoppers use their email to create an account, and this information is shared to MailChimp via a simple integration.
Make sure to give customers an incentive. If they’re sharing their email address, what are they getting in return? Whether it’s recipes, promo and discount codes, information about upcoming events, or more stories about your farm(s), make sure to let folks know what sort of emails they can expect in exchange for signing on to your list.
One specific type of incentive is a lead magnet. This is a free resource given to potential customers in exchange for their email address. Content such as vegetable storage guides, recipe books, gardening tips, and more can be packaged into a pdf document that folks can download from your website after submitting their email address. You can also use discounts and promo codes as lead magnets. Create a popup that advertises for a percentage off their first order. Shoppers will submit their information to receive the code in a follow up email.
Want to learn more? Download Your Free Email Marketing Toolkit.
Additional Marketing Resources
Consistent, quality marketing is essential for successful businesses, especially online markets. Local Food Marketplace integrates with Mailchimp to provide a streamlined, in-depth customer database for you to promote your marketplace. If you’re looking for more information on how to increase sales and marketing for farms, food hubs, farmers markets, and CSAs, check out our recent blog posts: