Social media in ag

At one of the IFAJ dinners, people were seated according to themed table topics. My table focused on social media.

There was plenty of good conversation from the group – a couple of Australians, an American, someone from Denmark, a freelance PR person and conference organiser from Latin America, myself and a table leader who is a freelance journalist in BA and teachs marketing at the University. 

Half of Argentina is on Facebook – about 20 of the 40 million population which is about the same as Canada.  About 75% are Internet users and 1 in 3 has a cell phone. Of the 20 million, stats say half go to FB every day.  There are 7 companies with more that 2 million fans and 43 ag companies are on the site. 21 companies directly related to ag are on Twitter.

Conclusions:

• There is room for ag companies to grow their social media presence.
• Social media enables farmers and agri-food companies to tell their own story of production and practices to defend their work and stop misinformation.
• People will listen to individual farmers more than to lobby groups perhaps. This could be a great advantage for the industry.
• Social media is still for younger people, but the for the young it is normal. It is like the cell phone has become to the general population, or the television.
• Social media allows people across the country, many who may be in more rural areas, access to colleagues and information from across the world very quickly.
• Traditional media sets the news agenda but social helps with interpretation and keeps info alive and active as people use it to share. Half of people also use SM to seek more info on a topic.
• What’s up is growing rapidly.
• Uses:  Q&A, Advocacy, networking, learning, take action, sharing information
• Growth in utube as well for farmers to show what they do.

Thoughts:

• Will individual farmers have time to take up this channel?
• How will traditional media continue to use the comments/posts on social media to drive the media coverage and agenda?
• Would individual producers be heard better if they shared a common key message, but posted individually – yes, but how will his happen.
• Social media has a very strong advocacy component that is hard for politicians and companies to ignore. It’s easy to brush off a constituent letter or complaint call, but not so easy when the complaint comes via social media. These tend to result in speedier replies, if not actions.
• The anti group on social media is more well-organized and this could be a great problem. They already have a fan base and a following.