The farming community are using social media as an important tool for a number of things. Here are seven principles that can apply to your own industry or sector.
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I recently moved to the Suffolk countryside from central London. We’ve swapped concrete for fields, pavement for mud tracks. It’s not better, just different. For example, it’s beautiful out here, but I can’t go running where we live, partly because in the dark, it’s really dark and you can’t see the holes which lie waiting to twist an unsuspecting ankle. In London I could just go running and go at any time of night on the well-maintained tarmac pavements.

That said, I found that the village we live in at the moment does actually have a pavement that extends from one end to the other. I found that it takes me four minutes and twenty-two seconds to complete one length of the village. In the winter this was perfect because it meant there was a little bit of streetlight (when there weren’t any power cuts) and it meant that I could keep running in safety.

I digress. The point of the introduction is to let you know that since moving out of London, I have been fully immersed in rural life and it has been very eye opening, not least because we have felt closer to the farming community than we have ever done.

Last summer, I interviewed a friend of mine called Farmer Tom on my podcast. It was such an eye opener, not least because I know he has been doing fabulous work utilising social media as a tool to connect with people and share what life on the farm is like. I then realised that there are others, lots of others who are using social media to connect with a lot of people and talk about issues facing the farming community. There are farmer influencers. There are youtubers and digital educators.

This all led me to do a bit of reflecting and reading, especially this article where I discovered that the Farming community are very effective at using Social media, and more than that, we can learn a lot from them. Specifically, social media is a tool that:

 

1. Enables Farmers to connect with other farmers

So important in an industry that I imagine can be quite isolating. Connecting with others from the farming community is a huge benefit of social technology. There is that prevailing sense of peer to peer support. It’s a sense of belonging, that one is part of something larger.  Without social technology there wouldn’t be that sense of immediacy and connection.

I have seen this in my own community and social media use. There are church leaders and others that I connect with on social media. There will be the equivalent in your own niche, and ‘niche’ is the term. There are a profusion of niche communities and interest areas. Find yours, plug in and connect.

 

2.Brings peer to peer encouragement

Connecting is the first point on a relational journey, but value often comes in the next part of that journey. We discover there are shared aims, or resources that now become accessible. Maybe we can introduce someone to someone else we know, or the person we just met can point us to a resource or organisation we didn’t know about before. As an extravert I love the power of connecting and collaboration.

The sense that we’re not on our own, that others have been through the same thing and that we can bear burdens for each other (either by saving time, or hearing woes, or sharing insights etc) is a key part of social media use. It sounds like this is an important part of using social media in the farming community too.

 

3. Can educate with new skills

Most of us have used Google or Youtube as our entertainer, teacher, trainer and instructor. Don’t know how to do something: ‘google-it’. Want to learn a new skill ‘youtube-it’. It’s the same thing in the farming community too. How incredible that social technology now paves the way for accelerated learning.

What is the equivalent in your space? Who out there in your niche needs to know what you know? Why not experiment and put some posts out there and share a skill, or how you do something which is second nature to you, but unfamiliar to others. TikTok has seen the birth of a new type of social media content: ‘edu- or info-tainment’. Maybe this is something you could explore for your own niche?

 

4.Enables interaction with the public

This is so important for the farming community. As an urbanite myself, I would go along to the supermarket get my vegetables or meat from the shelf, and not really think about the whole chain of events that enabled that produce to get there in the first place. It appears that social technology has enabled the farming community to reduce the barrier between producer and consumer, and educate on key principles and address knowledge gaps.

In a related way, I have seen this same principle on TikTok and elsewhere. For example, Rev Chris on Instagram has been a huge hit amongst the younger generations. A young priest who gives 60 second sermons about life and faith. His makes faith and being a vicar so much more accessible for people who might never come across a vicar in a normal week, but from the comfort of their own screens they can connect with someone like Rev Chris and find faith.

 

5.Creates a platform to engage with current debates

There are a lot of pressures on the farming community, but through social media, the community are able to engage in debate, highlight the issues on the ground, and sound the alarm when policies negatively impact the industry.

This is the beautiful thing about Web 2.0, it enables two-way conversation, but also provides a platform for the voices that may not otherwise have been heard. This is an amazing opportunity for Christians too. Another place to be salt and light. To reflect on current issues through the lens of your faith in Jesus. To point out injustice and to bring the presence and love of God into the midst of a secular digital market place.

 

6.Can generate another income stream

It sounds like social media can generate another revenue stream for the farming community, particularly those who have higher engagement and followers. There are youtubers who have a huge following and through advertising and views, it creates another source of income in an industry that is very exposed when it comes to consistent income. I was talking with my friend Farmer Tom on the podcast last year and he said that it he lost a whole crop one year due to a hailstorm. There is no refund available.

There maybe some reading this who are looking to push into income generation through social media. It’s very doable and we can link you up with someone for a conversation about the best way to get started if this is of interest?

 

7.Bridges the gap between rural and urban communities

I feel like this describes my life from the last nine months after moving from central London out to rural Suffolk. The farming community are harnessing the power of social technology to bridge the divide between urbanites like me and the rural communities from which they’re living, working and broadcasting. How amazing that there is a way for this to happen now.

What a great principle for us to think about in the Church. As Christians we have an opportunity to bridge the divide between the community of faith and those who wouldn’t say they have a faith. Of course, Jesus Christ is that bridge, and he bridges the gap through our words, through our lives, through our posts, through our interactions and comments. Make the most of it.

 

What do you think? Has any of this resonate with you or been helpful? Feel free to leave a comment below and engage in the conversation.