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My Digital Farmer Podcast
340 Farm Marketing School Success Story: Patty from Lonely Lane Farms
01:16:10
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Ask and you shall receive. I have a lot of farmers tell me that some of their favorite episodes are the ones where I interview farmers. So I'm bringing you another farmer interview today and she is going to share her sales funnel with us. Along the way, we're going to discover a few marketing gems that can apply to your business. Are you ready? Let's get started. Hey there. This is Corinna Bench and welcome to the My Digital Farmer Podcast. In today's market, it's not enough to just grow your product, you've got to know how to sell it too. Welcome to the My Digital Farmer Podcast where we reveal online marketing strategies and tips to help farmers like you get better and more confident at marketing, learn how to find more customers, increase your sales, and build a strong brand for your farm. Let's start the show.
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Foreign.
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Welcome to episode 340 of the My Digital Farmer Podcast. I'm your host, Corinna Bench, one of the farmers at Shared Legacy Farms out in Elmore, Ohio. I'm also the founder of mydigitalfarmer.com which is all about trying to help other farmers like you get more confident in your marketing and sales strategy so that you can grow a profitable business. How's everyone doing today? Welcome back to the show. Happy December. Big shout out to all my regular listeners. Welcome back. And if you're new to the show, glad you're here today. Make sure you subscribe to the podcast. Go check out my first 10 episodes. They were designed to be an on ramp into the marketing lingo. So if you are pretty green still and you came here to learn the ropes of marketing, you need to go back and listen to those first 10. It's gonna be a good onboarding. Another way to do that is to get onto my email list because when you do, I'm gonna send you an email like every four days for about three months. I'm gonna walk you through the jungle of marketing. I'm gonna show you the key principles you need to know. I'm gonna give you free trainings, resources, people you should be following. It's so, so good. I get a lot of good comments on it. So you can subscribe to get that. It's free by going to mydigitalfarmer.com subscribe. Today's episode is sponsored by my favorite e commerce platform for farms, localline. As the season winds down for you, it's the perfect time to get ready for a smoother year ahead. And if you've been thinking about switching sales platforms, localline makes it easy. Their team handles the heavy lifting so you can start next season more organized and efficient. Localline is the all in one sales platform built for farms and food hubs with tools for e commerce, inventory automation, subscriptions, barcode scanning, box builder and POS. Farms using localline grow their annual sales by 23% and increase their average order size by 9.5%. Switching is simple. It's stress free. No setup fees, no sales commissions and their onboarding team will migrate your storefront for free so that you can focus on what really matters as a podcast listener. You'll also get one premium feature free for a full year when you use my code MDF2025. So head to mydigitalfarmer.com localline that's all one word. To sign up. Use the code MDF2025 to get that free premium feature and start the new year strong and sell smarter with localline. And now back to the show. Okay, before we get started today, I want to make sure that you have heard this announcement. This is something special that I am doing during the month of December. I am hosting a free live webinar every Tuesday morning at 10am in the month of December, except the week of Christmas and it's called the Farm Sales Framework. How to build a Steady stream of customers all Year Long if you have ever been confused about how all the pieces of marketing fit together, your emails, your website, your social posts, your offers, this training is going to help you learn the marketing framework. Yes, there is actually a marketing framework. And when you see it, you're going to be like, oh, that's what I'm supposed to be doing. And that's the strategy. And that's why I need to have this mechanism in place in my business. You're going to see the pieces that you need to be building. And when I first learned this, it kind of blew my mind. It connected all the dots for me and I want that for you too. Because once you understand how all the parts connect and what's supposed to be there, you'll know exactly what you need to build next to make your marketing actually work. So grab your spot by going to mydigitalfarmer.com webinar. I'll send you the zoom link in the confirmation email. I'll also send you a reminder email before we go live. You can come all three times if you want. We'll have a party each time. If you already know the framework, come hang out with me anyway. It'll just be fun. We'll be able to take questions again. That's mydigitalfarmer.com webinar I can't wait to see you there. All right, let's dive into our episode for today. My guest today is Patty Cloft and she is a farmer inside of farm Marketing school and I got to know her from attending the monthly Zoom meetups that we have with our students. She has just a really great story and I noticed that her business was a mature one. It was strong, there were a lot of features, a lot of products in her product ladder. She just had a lot of wise things to say and so I am so honored that she is coming on to the show and I asked her if we could just sort of walk through her sales funnel and talk about some of the things she's doing. She is the co owner of Lonely Lane Farms in Mount Angel, Oregon where she and her husband Mike run a multi generation family farm. They raise grass fed grass, finished beef and goat and they partner with other farms to raise grass fed lamb and heritage pork. With a degree in accounting, Patti oversees the farm's USDA inspected processing facility, managing the production, the sales, the scheduling and the team. Under her leadership, Lonely Lane Farms has grown into a trusted Oregon brand known for fresh meats, sausages, smoked products like bacon, deli meats and allergen friendly recipes made with simple clean ingredients. She's really passionate about sustainable farming, family connections and making high quality local meats for people who care about where their food comes from. Please join me in welcoming Patti to the show. Well Patti, welcome to the show.
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Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.
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A
Yes, one of my farm marketing students. I'm really glad you're here. Tell my audience a little bit about your backstory. Let's give them some context. Where did you get started? Where are you located? I know you do grass fed meats. You're going to go into your product mix just wherever you want to begin.
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B
Yeah. So I'm Patty Cloft. My husband and I run Lonely Lane Farms and Century Packing Company in Mount Angel, Oregon. I actually grew up in a farming family. My dad raised hogs or raises hogs and came berries and I worked with Mike for a while and we ended up single at the same time and got married and I started working for Lonely Lane Farms. Ever since we actually run about 350 acres of pasture ground, 120 acres that we actively farm for like forage, hay, silage and yeah, with our team we sell grass fed meats to grocery stores. We do One farmer's market, and we have a slew of home delivery customers. That's kind of the 32nd version.
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A
Yeah. What's the size of your customer base?
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B
So we sell to about 12 retail partners, which is our wholesale. And I want to stay between that and our farmers market home delivery customers. It has to be somewhere between high hundreds, maybe even thousands of customers a week just with the product count.
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A
All right, so that's important because I want my audience to realize that this is a more established business. Like, you've got a strong customer base. You. You're not starting at the beginning. And so the marketing and the fulfillment and the complexity of the business, it's all just more. Right. There is more complication, there is more going on. And that's one of the reasons I wanted to have you on the show, because I love to see. See kind of more advanced businesses. When you get to that stage, what are some of the things that you're doing in marketing and what are the things you're thinking about as an entrepreneur to try and continue to grow the brand? So. So thank you for kind of sharing that. What is your product mix? What are some of the different things that you sell?
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B
So we do grass fed beef. We also do a little bit of goat because we have them for brush control. And then we also have partner farms that raise hogs. My family's still included in that. And we also have a gentleman that raises lamb with us. So we do fresh meats, we do sausages, smoked sausages, deli meats, jerky snack sticks. Pretty much most of the meat products now we offer.
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We do a value add then.
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Yeah, a lot of value add. Yeah, that seems to be where the market's heading, so we kind of follow that as well. Yeah, that's okay.
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A
And so you mentioned you have a processing. You have two businesses. Can you just kind of explain that element?
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B
Yeah. So we started direct marketing with Lonely Lane about 25 years ago, mainly because the farm at the time was going backwards. And my husband talked to one of his professors and they were like, you're raising grass fed beef, you need to market it as that. So that set us down the path of selling direct. And we got to a point where we needed more processing and value added products. And we knew we wanted to be able to sell something we were proud of. And that led us to building our own USDA processing facility. There's a lot that goes into that too.
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Yeah.
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B
And so we've been processing for ourselves for about 15 years now. So we do everything from fresh meats, like I said, all those things we just slowly added on over the last 15 years. So. So.
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A
Well, that must give you a lot of control and. Yeah, I mean, just that opens the doors for you. That's such a. An issue for so many farmers who are trying to scale. They can't find a processor that can help them.
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B
Yeah, because you want to be able to get the product when you need it. And I will admit that, you know, even sometimes we get backlogged on our own products and need to work through it as far as like value added production and. But it does give you control over when you can do it quality, which is huge. A lot of us have to charge such a high, you know, high price for our products. And they not only need to look good and be local, but they also need to taste good too. So those are very important to us. Yeah.
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A
All right. So your main gig is grass fed beef, it sounds like. Is that the primary sales driver or would you say that a lot of the other things are contributing?
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It's one of the primary. We do a lot of pork as well. You know, everybody loves bacon for the most part. So. Yeah. And it also kind of helps because we come in more of a one stop shop for people. You can get a pound of ground lamb, you can get your beef steaks, and you can get your bacon for Sunday breakfast. So having the product mix really helps market our own business. Especially now as we move more into the retail side of it. How can we make ourselves more convenient for our customer base?
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A
Yeah. Now this isn't a question I plan on asking you, but did you, when you started your business, was it much more simple? Did you just have like one or two key things or. You always had a pretty big product ladder.
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B
So when we first started direct marketing, it was just beef. But rather quickly, the couple of grocery stores my husband was selling to was like, hey, can you get us pork? And lo and behold, my family was down the road. And so the pork was added fairly early on. And so we did beef and pork for about eight years and then we added lamb. Mainly we just retail lamb in the last, I want to say like three or four years. I've started getting some wholesale accounts for it and go. We just added like two, three years ago. But like. So that's mainly just because we use them for brush control and the meets like an added bonus. But there is a little bit of a demand there too, so. But yeah, okay, I think that answers the question.
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A
Yeah, no, it does. I, I just kind of want to point out to people who are listening that the longer the. Where you make your money is in the product ladder, like, if you have more products to. To sell your customers, it's going to increase the average order value. It's going to increase the number of times they come back and buy again. And so that is the goal. But we don't always start there. In our first year, we are slowly figuring out what that should be.
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B
Yeah, we're definitely the slow and steady wins the race. And in a way, it almost makes marketing harder because now you have three different species that you're trying to sell to people. And you're like, what do I. Which direction do I head? Yeah. So I've been basically primarily focusing on, like, beef and pork, because that's our main drivers. And then it also depends on seasonality, too. Like when you start moving into fall, we have a seasonal pork sausage that we do. So that's more of like my marketing. Like, hey, it's back.
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A
Right?
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B
Right. Yeah. So there's. It does well. It's great. You can offer it. It also opens up another set of challenges, too, I would say when you're.
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You're. You're open year round, right? You're selling product all year long, correct?
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B
Yeah, yeah, we're year round.
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A
Okay. So when you put down your promotion calendar, you know, you sit down one time a year, I assume, or twice a year, where you kind of look at what are we planning to sell when, like, do you get that all mapped out?
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B
So I'll be honest with you, I didn't map it out until I joined farm marketing school. It was all in my head, which my husband tells me is a very dangerous place for things. But it is. I do have certain things that. Yes, like in March, actually, it starts in February. I start doing corned beef for St. Patrick's Day. And then we normally move into Easter, wherever that lands. And then in May, you start going, oh, you got Mother's Day, which is actually a huge weekend for us, and Memorial Day, Father's Day, not quite so much, but yeah, I do kind of have that calendar in my head. And so it is year round. And you. I actually kind of saw where we had some gaps and it was like, what can I do in this month to promote something when there's no holiday? Yeah.
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A
Okay.
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B
So, yeah. And then in the fall, it gets easier because everybody starts thinking holidays.
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Do you find that there is one quarter of your year where you really bringing in the revenue? Like, is it Q4 or is it spread out.
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I would say quarter four. Yeah. Mainly too, because our farmer's market ends in November, and so we see a lot of stock up. And then December and January, we don't have our market. And then February, it kind of just picks right back up where we left off. So.
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Okay.
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Yeah.
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So talk to me a little bit about how the ordering process works, how fulfillment works. Maybe let's not talk about wholesale, but more like the retail side. Yeah. What does that look like? Just to help our customers see how it works week to week.
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B
Yeah. So at the farmer's market, it's basically we bring a bunch of products, they walk up, tell us what they want. Our. We leave everything in the coolers behind our tables, and then our staff grabs them a bunch of options if we have them available. This last year, I've been using local line to try to encourage pre orders, which has been, I want to say about, depending on the week, 2 to 5% of our sales there. But it is really nice because I can offer way more products on the online store than we can physically bring to the market. Believe it or not, we actually ran out of space in our coolers. So that's how that works. And then either myself or my assistant will pull the pre orders. And then those are build out Friday, so Saturday they just come and pick up, which is really nice. The loading the coolers is actually something I still personally do. I like to make sure I know where our inventory's at and things are loaded in the correct spots. Because, I mean, I found that this. Everything has to be in the same spot every week. And there has to be a system because I don't always go to the farmer's market. So the team there knows exactly what to do with all the different meat products because we have 212 different products now. Yeah. Between just all the different sausages, the pork cuts, different thicknesses of steaks, I mean, just all of that stuff. So it's. It's quite the show. But at the same time, we've built a lot of systems over the years. That's really served us.
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A
Yeah. Do you know what your average order value is? Are you willing to share that?
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B
You know, I don't know that off the top of my head, but I think at the farmer's market, it's anywhere from like 20 to $40. And then occasionally get those outliers, especially this time of year where people start stocking up.
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A
Yeah, okay.
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B
Yeah. A lot of our farmer's market customers are buying their meat for a week. And my home delivery Customers are generally ordering once a month, so that's kind of the trend I've seen there.
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A
Okay, interesting. So, yeah, that leads right to my next question, which was about data. What is your data telling you about your. Either your product line, what's popular, your profit margin.
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B
Yeah, so we actually don't use a lot of data. I mean, I do look at it like if I'm having an issue with something, I will definitely try to look at the numbers. Mike and I are pretty big on intuition. When we get busy and don't have time, you know, looking at numbers takes time. You actually have to sit down and analyze it. And so sometimes we shoot from the hip a little bit. But I do use data in some things. One thing I actually just did it for was I was looking at our social media and seeing who was actually looking at our content. And it turns out that only a third of our customers were actually seeing the stuff I was hosting. And so I was reading a bunch of rearranging there and I ended up taking it over just to. Because I was like, well, if it's not a big driver for sale, then we don't need to be devoting a lot of resources to it. So.
- [19:44]
A
Oh, you were paying someone to do it for you?
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B
We were, yeah. And it kind of gave us a good opportunity with the, with adding more members to our family to kind of reset some things too. So. Yeah, and that's actually what led me to farm marketing school because I was just posting randomly and I'm like, there has to be a better way. So there is.
- [20:09]
A
So you said you don't really look at your actual numbers, but you have an intuition. If you tap into your intuitive sense, what are some of the trends or patterns that you're seeing that are driving some of your decisions?
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B
So just looking at the orders that come in, because I do personally look at every order that comes in, we're seeing a lot more trend to, I want to say our value added products. So pre made sausage links deli meats are popular year round. I'm finding that's what we're noticing. So that's where we're focusing a lot of our energies on are what other products can we come up even if they're just a seasonal item that gets people excited to buy. Yeah, because sometimes that one sees. I literally have one customer that starts asking me in September when the cranberry sage sausage is coming back and it's always like, well, October. And so it does drum up some excitement for that too. So.
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A
But so you said you have 212.
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B
Well, yeah, 212 products. Yeah.
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A
My mind is just spinning around that. Like, that seems like a lot of complexity. How do you know how to guide someone in terms of like, what to purchase next? Is there a, like, where are you taking people? Where all roads lead to? What. What are you hoping will happen?
- [21:38]
B
Yeah, so I'm still answering that question. I will be honest with you. Originally we always tried to get people to buy retail, to buy a case of something, and then to end up on our quarters and halves. In the last, I want to say like three, four years, I've kind of moved away from that model and tried to focus more on customers that need monthly or weekly sales. Quarters and halves are nice, but it's just we're not set up for it. We. What we do best is we call them case ready meets. So, you know, our store just sets it on the shelf. It's already labeled and weighed, so that's where we focused a lot of our energies. That being said, with that many products, I was like, I think people are getting lost. So I started doing some packs on our online store where it kind of grouped things together a little bit more. I didn't exactly expect to sell that many of them. They are selling, but it gives people a little bit more of a direction so they just don't see this huge list and get overwhelmed. I started trying to group things together and my goal eventually is maybe add some recipes and a little bit more guidance to that, but I haven't quite got there yet. So.
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A
Yeah, I don't know if you remember, but Stacy, who's in our farm marketing school, we. She's. I call her the category queen. And I don't know if you've experimented with that in local line, but I've. I'm intrigued by how she has created category names and just put some of the same products in multiple places as sort of a way to organize and curate her large inventory.
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Yeah.
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But also to give new suggestions simply by how she names the category. Right. To appeal to a different crowd. Do you use lots of different categories in your store?
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B
I just started adding them because when I met Stacy, I was like, oh, that's a good idea. So I did take a look at her online store. I have added a few of them and then started putting some of the products in different. Categories are my main goal. We've only had our local line store for about a year, so my goal is to get everything on the store and then my goal for 2026 is to go through and really start flushing it out, like getting pictures and product descriptions and definitely putting more suggestions as far as the or the names of the different categories. But takes time too to do all that right?
- [24:11]
A
Today's podcast is sponsored by Farm Marketing School. All right, farmers, it's the off season now and you know what that means. It's time to start working on your business, not just in it. This is the time to step back and sharpen your marketing systems. Evaluate, set yourself up for stronger sales next year. And if you're like a lot of farmers, you know you need to do this, but you're not quite sure how to go about it. And that's why I created Farm Marketing School. It's my monthly membership. It's going to help farmers like you build a simple, repeatable marketing machine that actually works inside you get bite sized, step by step projects that make marketing easier. So each month you pick what project you want to work on. Like maybe you want to finally write your email nurture sequence or you want to build your social media plan. Well, I walk you through exactly how to do it. You set up the system so that it's a repeatable thing you can do every month. And you're not doing it alone because every month we meet live on zoom so that you can get coaching and, and ask questions and hear what's working for other farmers. It's like having a marketing mentor and a mastermind rolled into one. Now, each project is designed to be completed in under 30 days. Some of them are even faster. So you make steady progress without letting marketing take over your life. And it's so encouraging when you see progress actually being made little by little. And this winter, I'm doing something fun. It's brand new. I'm doing a special focus on money mindset. We're going to be doing a book study and some other guided exercises and discussions to really help us unpack how we're thinking about money, how that's affecting how we run our business. So we can start charging what we're worth and sell with confidence and feel empowered as the CEO of our farm business. So if you're ready to stop winging it and finally build a marketing system that brings inconsistent sales, please come join Farm Marketing School today. I would love to have you in my community. Sign up for your first month and join the fun at mydigitalfarmer.com forward/fms. That's my digitalfarmer.com forward/fMS. I'll see you inside when they first come in. What's usually the thing that they buy first. Like what's the big lure?
- [26:46]
B
Yeah. So normally we tell people to always try the ground beef. You can pretty much tell how good the grass fed beef is by the ground beef. And then for pork, we normally say just try the bacon. If it's good bacon, it's good pork. So. And then normally products people are used to using, they already, it's already in their cooking recipe technique. So those are the products we do for lamb. I generally suggest either lamb stew or ground lamb just because there's so many recipes out there for those particular items. And they're generally low barrier too for people. So those are kind of what I say are gateway products. And then normally once you can kind of get people to do that, then they start branching out into the other products we offer.
- [27:31]
A
How. How are people like finding out about you in the first place? Like, let's talk about the top, you know, the concept of the sales funnel because I know you took my class. So what's at the top of the funnel? How are people discovering you?
- [27:43]
B
Yeah, so I would say almost like 85, 90% is word of mouth. Our customer base is pretty broad. And I would say almost every email I get for someone asking a question is my friend such and such told me about you. And so that's a lot of where we get it. I would also say a lot of our website too, because a lot of people know they want grass fed beef or Oregon raised meats and they Google it and we pop up. And so I think that's the other little bit of it too. And I noticed since I started changing our social media strategy too, I'm getting a little bit more from that direction than I ever used to. So that's been pretty cool too.
- [28:20]
A
What about in the wholesale space? Like is that you having to go knock on some doors to try and get people to want to buy your stuff?
- [28:31]
B
A little bit of both, actually. So the same stores my husband sold to 25 years ago still buy our products.
- [28:38]
A
Wow.
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B
And which is very exciting. They're super loyal. They are the most understanding stores ever. I will tell you, when we've had life happen to us, I email them and they're like, you guys take care of you. As long as the meat shows up, we're good. I was like, yeah, that's pretty much how it works. And but some of it is outreach. I did about six years ago get a couple of stores just because I cold called them. But normally the store has to be in a spot where they are Looking for it and are receptive to hearing about you. We actually just added a store last week and they went to one of our existing retail partners, saw everything and approached us. So that's normally how new wholesale accounts come to us. It's a little bit of both, but normally it's organic growth.
- [29:27]
A
Yeah. Do you have to bring them product or do you find that they like to test it, or do they find it in another way? Is the test.
- [29:36]
B
Sometimes they. Yeah, sometimes they find it in another way. But we do have normally a meet and greet where we. Like this last store, we physically went down and talked to them and I did bring a whole box of products because we do so much. And depending on the location of the store is also what they sell. What sells in one community won't sell in another. So a lot of it is I tell the stores a little bit trial and error, but at the same time, they also kind of know what sells for their store. And so they're looking for specific products that we offer.
- [30:08]
A
Yeah. I've always wondered how that works. If. If that person that you're meeting with takes your sample and like, do they. Do they say, well, let's just try, like, you know, 10 packs of each of these four things and we'll see how they do? I mean, is that how the process works?
- [30:23]
B
That's generally how it works. Yeah. Normally too, there is. They're after something. So, like, lately it's been. Our deli meats are super popular, and so they'll carry the deli meats and then they'll be like, oh, we need this sausage. We're already buying from this farm. Let's see if they can, like, get that from them. And it makes it a little bit more convenient because we have so many offerings. Yeah. They will go that direction too.
- [30:47]
A
Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, let's. Let's talk a little bit about the frequently asked questions that your customers have before they decide they're ready to buy your product for the first time. That's one of the things we talk about in the sales funnel class, is that your marketing is designed around your answers to a lot of those FAQs. Right. If you don't address an objection or an FAQ that your customer has, they. They won't proceed. So what are some of the FAQs that, you know, your retail customers have before they're ready to buy that you have to answer and that you have answered through your marketing and, like, kind of talk about where you're answering them in your marketing channels?
- [31:33]
B
Yeah. So one of the big things now is grass fed and grass finished. And so I do have, I actually do that on our social media channel like every week there is. And for us it's just, you know, showing the cows on pasture, us making hay. A lot of people don't even see that anymore. And so that's a very frequently asked question. The other one too is we sell to a lot of people that have food sensitivities, which is why they're looking for website. Yeah. So we, I do plug a lot that we're allergen friendly. We don't use any of the big nine, which are like soy, wheat, dairy, eggs, fish, shellfish, there's a bunch of sesame, there's another one. So. So that's a really big one for us too. And so I do say that a lot. A lot of people know my husband's story of he can't do peanuts, wheat and dairy. And so none of our products have that in it. And yeah. And I have some clients that have bought from us from years and then like you don't use any of those. I was like, no, no we don't. So apparently I'm not doing that good at a job at selling people, but I am starting to plug that a lot more. So.
- [32:43]
A
But you know what, for people who don't care about that, they, they don't. That doesn't resonate when you, when you bring it up. It's the people like me who are like your husband. We're looking for that. Like we're looking for it. It's on our radar all the time. And so we'll spot it, we'll see it. And we'll probably see that stuff in our feed more than someone else just because. Yeah, my algorithm knows. Yeah, yeah.
- [33:05]
B
And I do post about that at least every other week. And it's. And you've probably found this too. A lot of the products that are out there that are allergen friendly don't taste very good. And so for us it's super important that our products are delicious. And they check all these boxes too.
- [33:24]
A
Yeah, well. And when somebody discovers that they do check all those boxes, you have turned them into a super fan because it is so hard to find. And you've made.
- [33:32]
B
Yeah, yeah. I literally had a four year old kid that came up and he was like, does, does any of your sausages have dairy? Because a lot of sauce commercial sausages do. And I was like, no, none of them do. And he just danced because he could eat them all. I was like that's why we do what we do.
- [33:47]
A
Yeah. Those of you who are listening, if you have any way that you can claim some of that language, allergen free, dairy free, like you should be, you should be using it, you should be talking it up, even if it's not a part of your story, because you will attract those people. And like I said, they are looking for you. They are looking for you, they're looking for those little phrases and they'll become very, very loyal.
- [34:12]
B
I actually had a marketing person tell us that like four or five years ago. They're like, you need to be telling people this on a regular basis. I was like, okay, yeah.
- [34:19]
A
And you have a big section on your website, like a whole stack, as I recall, where you're kind of talking that story. Yeah.
- [34:28]
B
I had someone that helped me build the website and they were the ones that were like, you, you need to, this needs to be front and center. This is what makes Lonely Lane un. So.
- [34:35]
A
Yeah. Well, they did a good job.
- [34:37]
B
So thank you.
- [34:39]
A
What is your, what is your warmup process for potential clients or do you find that they don't really need a lot of warming up, that they're kind of ready when they find you? Like, have they been warmed up before they even get to you in another way?
- [34:52]
B
I would say that's more. A lot of times people find us because they're looking for it. They've already, we have a very well informed customer. They're already like, I know I want this, how do I get it? But that being said too, at the farmers market, we do have a lot of conversations with people about what we do. You know, they're asking, are you grass fed? They're just getting those confirmations of yes, this is, they are what they say they are. And, and I do that in my emails, weekly emails is too, just to try to kind of get people get to know us as well.
- [35:23]
A
So, so your people are asking the question, are you grass fed or grass finished? As if they already know what those two things are.
- [35:31]
B
Correct. Yeah. And it used to be grass fed was enough. And I want to say like it was eight years ago now. They did the, there was a federal guideline and they did away with that. And so now making sure it's grass fed grass and it's just super important to people. And so that's why it's. One of my main marketing pushes is that people understand that it is grass finished too.
- [35:55]
A
Okay. You had a branded phrase on your website that I, I noticed. I don't even know if you realize you, you created a branded phrase but you call it the Lonely Lane Farms Difference. It like had a name. The Lonely Lanes Farms Difference. There was a whole website page all about the Lonely Lane Farms difference. And can you just talk to me a little bit about the backstory of how you created that phrase or why you decided to give that label so much distinction and importance?
- [36:34]
B
Yeah. Where we're at here in Oregon, there are a lot of people doing grass fed meat. So a lot of times the question we get is why you? Why should I buy from you? And so that's why we did it. It's like what makes us different, what makes us unique? Why should you buy from an Oregon family that lived here their whole lives over, you know, now you can get grass fed beef in conventional grocery stores. So that was the big reason why we put that in there was so people could go to the website and be like, oh, I can meet my farmers. I can see what they do. They actually raise the animals. They raise their own feed. Yeah, yeah.
- [37:18]
A
And so I just, I just wanted to point out that the way in which the website was written, it sound, maybe you didn't mean it to come off this way, but it almost sounded like you have, have created that label as a brand like that you could slap that onto a sticker and just, or stamp, and just stamp it on your meat like the Lonely Lane Farms Difference. And so I just wanted to point that out to our audience. Like you can do that. Like you just constructed that. You know, you didn't have to go somewhere and get permission to create that. But it's a, it's a common marketing tactic that you see where brand. Sometimes you see it in, in terms of like guarantees they'll, they'll give the guarantee of the product a fancy pants name and almost like they can just stamp it on there. And that's essentially what you're doing here is you're giving a stamp of quality by, by naming it this thing called the Lonely Lanes Farms Difference and, and talking about what that means somewhere. So just wanted people to notice that and you can go look at her website and find that page and read it and just see what I mean. But it, the way she talked about it, it was almost like an offer and a special perk of when you buy something. So I thought that was neat. What, let's talk about the, what we call the excite phase of the customer value journey. So this is the point when a person, for those of you who are listening and you don't know what that means, this is when your customers are being led down a success path. Once they bought your product, how are you making sure that they use it properly, that they know what to do with it, especially if it's grass fed? Sometimes people are not successful in cooking that properly. Do you have a success path?
- [38:53]
B
Yeah. So most of our retail is actually geared towards our farmers market customer base. And so a lot of times you do give out a lot of cooking advice. People won't buy a new cut until we kind of walk them through the steps. Yeah. So that's a lot of where that magic happens. Um, I started doing a weekly email this year and that's also really keeping people excited about our brand because not everyone comes to the farmer's market every week. And I don't actually give a lot of cooking advice or recipes in it. When I did the farmer's market every week, everyone would always come up and ask me, what happened on the farm this week? And I normally have this story I tell. And so my whole weekly email is my weekly story. Like, this is what happened this week on the farm. And Normally in the P.S. i'm like, hey, this is available this week. Go buy it. I'm a very soft person.
- [39:44]
A
Yeah.
- [39:44]
B
I'm not. I occasionally I've sent like two emails that are hard sells, that are overt.
- [39:48]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [39:49]
B
But other than that, it's just been like, here, this is what happened.
- [39:52]
A
That's a brilliant strategy. Yeah. So you're a storyteller and they come in, get pulled into your story.
- [39:58]
B
Exactly. And that, I think, is keeping people more excited. I've had multiple people pick up orders and tell me how much they love my story. And I'm like, okay. And I actually post more about my kids in that than I do on our social media now. So if you want to know about my kids, that's where you go, isn't that interesting?
- [40:16]
A
Like that I still have farmers that push back and they're like, I can't write an email every week. Like, people don't open them. And I have people tell me all the time that they love reading my emails. So I know that it is possible. And I think it's when you choose to make the content be less promotional and more just sharing your life, sharing wisdom, sharing observations, and people will read those. I don't know. What do you, like? Why do you think people are resonating so much with them? Like, what is. What's the magic of that?
- [40:43]
B
I think it speaks to their life. Like, I wrote one email about how I write lists. I literally have six different lists on my desk right now of all the stuff I should do or need to do, and I misplaced them one week, and I wrote about that, and because it was literally, like, for me, it was a big deal. And I got so many email responses from people that were like, I'm the list person, too. And it was like, such a random part of my life that people just loved. And I didn't even write about meat that week. Yeah. And so I think some of it is just connecting with people and letting them know that there's a family and a person behind the brand and people resonate with that. You know, you could tell them how to cook a roast, but I mean, honestly, all I do is throw mine in the crock pot, so there's not much to tell there. Yeah.
- [41:32]
A
Yeah. It's kind of helping them find common ground. And now they trust you, and you seem like a real person, and people want to buy from people who are. That they, like, who are real.
- [41:43]
B
Yeah. And it has to be genuine. I mean, people, I think, can eventually see through if you're not. So if it's not you, it. They're gonna see it. And then it's like, well, do I want to buy from that person? So I definitely try to keep it in my voice, what's going on in our lives. You know, I. Sometimes people. I just had a set of twins. People love seeing the twins photos, but it just. And it also drives home, too, that we're a generational family. We know we are a family. We're very family oriented. And, yes, we sell meat, too.
- [42:15]
A
So, yeah, maybe. Maybe there's people out there that are longing for family, you know, that just love. Yeah. That idea of being a strong farm family. And that's one of the. One of the things that they're living into. Yeah. Vicariously through you.
- [42:34]
B
Yeah.
- [42:34]
A
That is a stereotype of farms. Right. That farms have strong farm families. And that just might be like, oh, yeah.
- [42:40]
B
And that is part of our identity. Mike's third generation on his farm, and then on my family farm, I'm technically fifth, but I got downgraded to the third when I got married. So there is that. I mean, there is that whole generational family thing, but I don't want to say that's what we lean on either, because Mike and I did a totally different things than our parents did before us, so. But we do have the support of definitely his parents go in this direction, and mine too.
- [43:09]
A
But it speaks to just, you know, not being Afraid to share your. Your life a little bit and peek behind the curtain and, and show.
- [43:15]
B
Yeah, yeah, exactly. And like, I, I always write my email on Wednesday, so I'm already thinking, like, what happened this week? And not much has been going on, so I'm sure I'll think of something. I even write about our farm dog. People loved our farm dog. Yes. But she has a lot of personality, so she kind of earns it.
- [43:34]
A
But we used to do a newsletter section called Sienna's Diary, and it was like the dog's diary. And she would talk about things that had happened on the farm from her point of view and there would always be some kind of silly, like, you know, dig on. On rabbits and how she was trying to chase rabbits. And I got so many comments about the diary from the dog. I was like, okay, it's hilarious.
- [43:59]
B
But yeah, I mean, like, people resonate with dogs. A lot of people have pets and. Yeah, yeah, no, I. I think so. Like, you can write about your. I mean, I do write about. Hey, when we were making hay, I wrote about hay for like four weeks straight and. But I also had somebody email me. Like, I didn't know it was that involved. Like, people just don't see a lot of that. So you can write about the most mundane thing in your life and people will love it. So.
- [44:23]
A
Yeah. Okay, so let's back up because I feel like we've slowly been going through your sales funnel here, but let's just make sure that people are kind of seeing how, how the, the revenue appears.
- [44:36]
B
Yeah.
- [44:36]
A
So first you have like a marketing outlet in terms of social media. You have things that you're just posting there. Is the goal there to get them to buy, or is it to get them on your list or is it just to make them aware of what you do?
- [44:51]
B
I think it's more product awareness and I want to say, like, value awareness, like what we are, what we offer. I do. I'm trying to get people on my email list, but it's not a super hard sell.
- [45:05]
A
Okay, so people are seeing posts from social. How are they going to, like, leapfrog and turn into a customer? Are they going to go to your website because they Google you?
- [45:13]
B
Yeah, that's normally what I do. I try to get them to the online store normally so they can see what we do. And. Okay, that's. And then I think I'm going to try to change my focus in 2026 to really promote the email portion of it because I feel that's so much more personal than a Social media page.
- [45:32]
A
Okay.
- [45:32]
B
So I think broadly the social media right now is more informational.
- [45:38]
A
Yeah.
- [45:38]
B
And then try to move them to becoming a retail customer, whether that's via farmer's market or home delivery.
- [45:43]
A
So, okay, so you've got that. Then you've got word of mouth, which somehow you've just ignited people to want to talk about you. Are you coaching them to. Are you giving them a referral code or.
- [45:52]
B
You don't know?
- [45:52]
A
That's awesome.
- [45:53]
B
No, it just, it's all organic, which in a way is almost. For me, I think it's almost better. Like, if your friend just randomly says it, you'll be like, oh. And it just totally sparks that curiosity and people versus. I thought about maybe doing a coupon code. I don't. I haven't quite got there yet. Any.
- [46:12]
A
You might not need to. Yeah.
- [46:13]
B
And that's kind of what I thought. I was like, no, I. It's doing well on its own. I'm not going to mess with that mojo.
- [46:18]
A
Right, Right. Okay. So people at some point probably end up going to your website to answer some of those questions to make sure they. Or they maybe talk to their friend and ask their friend, how does this work? And then they. Are they going to your point of sale at the farmer's market and just kind of deciding what they want or they're going to the. To the website and they're being coached to buy this thing first. Like, do you make it obvious on this. On the website? Like, this is your starting point?
- [46:47]
B
Not really.
- [46:48]
A
Okay, start doing that. No kidding.
- [46:50]
B
I know. I said the wet. I literally started our web store in November of 2024. So that was when our web store went online. And so I'm still trying to find, like, figure it out. I just figured out I could write a welcome, like, little paragraph.
- [47:03]
A
Yes, I know.
- [47:05]
B
I'm already like, it's outdated. I need to change it. So there's not a lot of coaching on the web store, but they do come from the farmer's market a lot of times when they're looking for something they already have in their meal routine.
- [47:18]
A
Yeah.
- [47:18]
B
So what? So that's normally why we try to say, hey, if you're interested in trying it, just try the ground beef. Right. Most people have a ground beef recipe. So your.
- [47:26]
A
Your team knows to push the gateway offer if they're new, right?
- [47:32]
B
Yeah. My husband and my oldest son go to the farmer's market every week, so there's generally always a family member there. And people really like that.
- [47:40]
A
Yeah. Do you have a process for like trying to cross sell. Like, do you train your team to try to add one more thing to their order?
- [47:50]
B
As of now, I did have one gal that did it on her own and she sold a pile of bacon that way. Yeah, I don't have anything. We're kind of actually in a changeover of our farmers market staff right now. We've had some really long time employees move on to other parts of their life. And so now I'm like, I think I'm gonna have to start a script and I'll do a little bit more onboard training than we've ever done in the past. So.
- [48:14]
A
Yeah, you'd be surprised. I bet if you just coach them to practice that a little bit, they'll. They'll sell a lot more stuff. But that's another thing. So you have potential like ups sell or cross sell happening on farmers markets or in the store. How do you get them then? They get on your email list if they're ordering online. Are you capturing an email address at the farmer's market so you can email them?
- [48:35]
B
Yeah, I actually just have a clipboard and a lot of times they just set it on the table and I get anywhere from two to five a week. But I started in January and I've grown my list about a thousand percent since then. So.
- [48:48]
A
Wow.
- [48:48]
B
There was. There's always room for improvement.
- [48:51]
A
That's awesome. Are you running any kind of Facebook ads to run like grow your email list or is it just all organic?
- [48:57]
B
It's all organic. I did spend some time learning how to put like a pop up on our website and that really helped. That's why I know a lot of people are going to the website because that's where I'm getting a lot of email addresses. It's just the pop up and so I am watching that data like, hey, where are people actually coming in from? I did build a couple of lead magnets and they've gotten a little bit attraction, but most of it's just that pop up form.
- [49:20]
A
Pop up.
- [49:21]
B
Right, the pop up. Yeah.
- [49:22]
A
Remind me what's on the store? What does it say? I'm trying.
- [49:24]
B
Yeah. And just seeing it get Patty's story of the week and it's like exclusive content, photos not seen anywhere else. I think I put recipes on there because I do want to eventually. I have done that a couple of times, like, hey, this is our family favorite recipe.
- [49:41]
A
Okay.
- [49:41]
B
But yeah, it's just basically it's super simple. I think there's only like four bullet points and like people go for it. I. Yeah, yeah. And it's mainly all customers. I've only had, like, I think four family members sign up on it, so it's definitely a very warm list.
- [49:58]
A
Awesome. So when they get on your list, what's the next step?
- [50:03]
B
How are you moving them forward? So they get a welcome email from me. I did sign that up, and then I got one nurture email after that. I'm slowly building that out. And then I get my weekly story as well. And I found that sometimes they'll actually read that for about a month or two and then they'll buy. I've been seeing that a lot, so it's actually pretty quick. That is my opinion. Yeah. Which also leads me to believe that I think a lot of people are looking for it. They find us, and it's a pretty. Not a super hard push to get them to buy eventually.
- [50:37]
A
Yeah.
- [50:38]
B
So. But. And it may be all the other stuff we have between the social media and the website being so fleshed out that it's not a lot of work on my part to push them over that last hurdle.
- [50:51]
A
Right. I would be really curious. I know you said you're not really looking at the data yet, but I would be super curious to see you track that, even just anecdotally, like, how. What is a customer revenue in one year of an average customer. Right. And then do a little bit of math and divide it by 12 and see, like. Yeah, there's.
- [51:13]
B
I. Yeah.
- [51:14]
A
Because I. I think the next step for you is to. Well, maybe you tell me, like, when. When they're on your list and they bought the first thing. Like, do they. They come back again the following week? Or is it roughly every month? Is it roughly when you have the next big promo?
- [51:30]
B
It's month. It's monthly. I would say a lot of people. Our order minimum is pretty high for, like, home delivery. It's $125, people, bi. Monthly.
- [51:40]
A
Okay, stop right there. So I want to make sure everyone hears that, like, you can decide to set an order minimum. And that's brilliant. Right. Like, we don't need to waste money. Like, we're not making money for 50 orders, especially if you're doing.
- [51:53]
B
Delivery started there. I will be honest. Like, it was $50. And then I was like, this is a lot of work. And I bumped it up to 75. And then I was like, this is still a lot of work. And I was like, well, what number would I be happy with? And that's where I came to 125. I did set it up. So if they order less than that, there is a delivery charge. So there is incentive to order more, which is probably why a lot of people do, because then it's free after that. I don't advertise it that way, but it is there. So someone can still order 50 bucks. It's just going to cost them a lot of money to get it delivered. So that's how I built it. So it's not telling people. No, it's just. This is how it's set up, so.
- [52:33]
A
Right. Okay, brilliant. So I just. I. Sorry to interrupt you, but I know you're fine. Not everybody realizes that they can. They can set an arbitrary number. Well, it's not even arbitrary. Like, you've probably done the math and figured out this is the number that it really needs to be if it's gonna.
- [52:49]
B
Yeah, I mean, it does take time to pull the orders. So, like a lot of times. And you gotta charge for your time, even if you. You know, as the owner, I still bill in my time to everything. And now I have a staff member that does it a lot of the time. And for them, too, it's like pulling 50 small orders is not fun. So the bigger they are, it's like we're still getting the same revenue and it's a lot more streamlined.
- [53:15]
A
So.
- [53:16]
B
Yeah.
- [53:17]
A
So you have a customer then that anecdotally is buying once a month from you, and you probably have in your mind what the average order value, $125 in that range.
- [53:28]
B
That's generally where people. It's like 125 to 150. If I had to, like, set. Set a number, that's where a lot of people. That's a sweet spot.
- [53:36]
A
Yeah. So you do have kind of a goal. You're trying to get a customer in one year to spend about $1,500 with you, maybe.
- [53:43]
B
Yes, I would say that. Yeah.
- [53:45]
A
So if you get a customer into your lair, you know that in a few months, this person may eventually turn into that amount of revenue for you in one year. And in maybe if they stick around for five years, that's. That's six, seven grand for you. Right. So it's kind of cool when you start doing the math. You can project out, like, I need to hit this revenue number. Well, what does that actually mean in terms of numbers? That means this many new clients in one quarter or this many times. Yeah, right, right.
- [54:15]
B
Yeah.
- [54:17]
A
So what is the goal for you guys right now? Like, what are you trying. Are you trying to hit a revenue number? Are you just trying to Get a inventory.
- [54:26]
B
Right now I'm actually hitting a count. So I'm trying to do about. For delivery is 10 to 12. That seems sustainable for us. That's where I shoot. And then for the farmer's market, it's unlimited, really. We get a. We have a lot of people that, like I said, they buy their weekly groceries there and that they can pre order for the farmer's market. And there's no minimum. So I literally have people ordering $10 and on up from there. So. And I'm trying to get people to do a little bit more of the pre ordering, but I'm finding farmers market customers just like to show up and take what's there. So a lot of times too, it's just the power suggestion. So. Yeah, because we have a lot of people like, what's new, what's fresh? This week we get a lot of that. And so that's kind of the driver, I think, for sales there.
- [55:17]
A
Yeah. If you really want people to pre order more, I mean, is that something that you deep down wish they would do? Like, would it benefit you or. Not really.
- [55:26]
B
It benefits us when it's an item we normally don't send. But I'm finding people are really hesitant. I've been trying to like, push my husband, hey, tell him to pre order because it makes my job easier. But he's like, they're kind of resistant, but at the same time, it's starting to grow. I've only really started pushing it in May and we're in November, so I think the traction is getting there. And I've found too, it takes people about two to three years to catch on to something new. Especially if I'm not super pushing it, though. Yeah.
- [55:57]
A
I think you also should look at, like, you have to give them a reason to pre order. So, like, if you never run out the farmer's market of product, like, why. Why is. Should they even worry about it? But if you suddenly have limited bacon inventory coming to the market and they're like, but I have to have my bacon, you know, and you purposely leave it behind because you want them to. You're like, well, you got to pre order the bacon. I'm sorry.
- [56:24]
B
Yeah, we've done that with like some beef steaks that are generally limited. So like flank steak and skirt steak, you just never have enough. So I actually move those basically strictly to the online store. Like, if you want them, you have to order them. And they sell, still sell. And I don't have to inventory to the farmer's market. And it Frees up space for something else. So I. I have done a little bit of that and I don't know if I'm doing a super good job at communicating it, but it's definitely happening. Happening. And I think the farmers market team is also telling people that too.
- [56:54]
A
Yeah.
- [56:54]
B
So, yeah.
- [56:55]
A
Yeah. What kind of other marketing are you doing at the farmer's market? Do you have like, I'm just thinking, like, you have a. Probably have a sign. Do you have QR codes? Do you have brochures? Do you have.
- [57:06]
B
Yes. Yeah. So we actually have a 20 by 30 space. So we do have two big signs that list out basically our allergen free. We're grass fed, grass finished. And I think on another side of it, it lists like, just generically, like steaks, charcuterie, that kind of stuff. And then we actually have one big whiteboard sign. I want to say it's like four by three or something. The. And it's list everything we have with us that's in the coolers. So we literally call it the sign. And it's all sorted out by like beef steaks and smoked sausage. And so everything's listed on there. And then we have our price sheets, which are different. So if the inventory does vary a little bit from week to week, like if we're out of a certain sausage or whatnot. So that's the 32nd setup. And then people normally come. They take the price list. Some people order off of that. Or we're like, here's the menu for the week. And then we also have like little cards that have like our contact info. That's all.
- [58:01]
A
Because you don't have the product sitting out to look at. It's all in coolers.
- [58:05]
B
It's all.
- [58:07]
A
Is there a picture that on this menu or is it just text?
- [58:11]
B
It's all just text. Right now the crew I have there is a very nice group of ladies that are very artistic, which I am not. And so normally they'll draw a picture of like. So like during St. Patrick's Day, they'll draw like all the clovers. During the summer, they draw a picture of a grill. And so it's very cutesy. Like, generally it's something on the sign. You mean on the sign? Yeah.
- [58:33]
A
Okay.
- [58:34]
B
We do jerky and snack sticks. So those are all on like the table and presented. So it does look like we have something. And that generally helps draw people in too. But those are. People don't come to us for the jerky, but they. That is kind of like an upsell because it's right there on the table and they're like, oh. And they buy it. So.
- [58:51]
A
Okay, do you have any like sample. Do you ever do free samples or special off weekly offers? Is that ever in the rotation ever?
- [59:00]
B
No, actually we haven't sampled in, I don't want to say like eight, 10 years now. We did in the beginning. I will say that when we were first getting started, that was how we kind of drew people in is we did have samples. But you know, nowadays it's like you have to bring all the stuff to cook the product and your hand washing station and we have I think like 14, 15 coolers of me. And so the space is actually really limited.
- [59:26]
A
So yeah, talk to me a little bit. I know in, in farm marketing school you, you've mentioned how you, you have this big event in this is in the summer and, and that, that helps you actually with do quite a bit of pr. Can you talk a little bit about that? Was it your beef?
- [59:46]
B
Like, was it the Oktoberfest?
- [59:48]
A
Was it Oktoberfest? Was that the event where it's like it was Oktoberfest and you're like a big vendor there?
- [59:56]
B
Yes, we actually don't vend there. We actually produce the sausage for I think it's like seven or eight non profits to sell sausage. So then yeah, Oktoberfest is actually all a non profit festival that all of the food vendors are non profit. So we actually help that piece where some of them just sell sausage. But I mean they're non profits, they don't have a lot of the logistics so nowhere to store it, you know, some of that. So we step in and help them with that piece where we do all the storage we give them. The festival is four days so we deliver eight times during the festival just to keep them stocked and I don't make them buy the extra stuff. So for them it's also helpful too because then they're not stuck with product they don't know what to do with. So.
- [60:42]
A
Okay, so are you making any money on that process or is it just, is there is the value of that that you're just, you know, being a servant in the community, you're getting CPR.
- [60:51]
B
A lot of the servant. I mean we do make a little bit of money but it's a lot more about the community service portion of it. And it does. They literally let us put up a sign in the front of this booth that says it's a lonely lane farm sausage with a QR code. And we also. I'm A sponsor of Oktoberfest. So let us put up a sign with our website and a QR code. And we've actually had two or three people come to us at the farmers market, which is in a totally different community, that said that's how they found out about us. And now they buy from us. So sometimes even if you don't do anything for a lot of money, it comes back to you in other places.
- [61:28]
A
It does. It really does well. And it becomes something you can talk about on social media, too. You can take pictures of it because everyone's excited about Oktoberfest.
- [61:36]
B
And it was like three weeks of content. It really was like the making of it, the delivering of it. I posted every day during the festival, and then the following week is like, oh, thank you. Yeah. I mean, we do sell a lot of sausage. There are recipes, so people get to try them in a very, like, supportive, nonprofit way. And it does, I think, help get our name out there quite a bit because we actually sponsor. There's a road race, like a 10k that they do. And I did a little bit of like, hey, if someone's coming to this festival, who's most likely to buy our product? And I'm like, it's going to be these health people that are running. So that's actually why we sponsor that one.
- [62:15]
A
So, yeah. Now, you were the one who told me that you got on. On television, right? Or you got. After I did that podcast episode about it. Was that. Was that in relation to Oktoberfest or was that something else?
- [62:28]
B
It was actually. So a local news channel started doing this new part of their show where they go into a community and they try to learn a bunch about the community, like, what are people doing business wise? And our community of Mount angel is very agriculturally focused. And so they asked us if we'd be us. And actually on one of our neighboring farms, we came on just talk about what's going on in the agricultural community in Mount Angel. So. And that was part of it. They were down in Mount angel for October Fest. So, yeah, like I said, it comes back to you in different ways.
- [63:01]
A
So.
- [63:02]
B
Yeah.
- [63:02]
A
Oh, that's cool.
- [63:03]
B
Yeah.
- [63:04]
A
How are you? I want to go back to the sales funnel because we're almost done with that. Like, so you do have a process to coach people how to use the food that they buy and be successful with it. They ascend through the ladder of products. They start buying other things, testing out other things. I'm sure you're promoting some of these other items in your Weekly email or on your social. You kind of occasionally give some bandwidth to these products so they have ideas. Okay, so like, how does a person then get into that final phase of leaving a testimony testimonial or a review or starting to talk about you? Word of mouth? Like, is there something you're doing? You think that to suggest that they should? Or like, are you posting testimonials on your social so that they see other people are doing it? Like, how. How does that just happen, do you think?
- [63:57]
B
So I've only posted, like, two testimonials ever. Okay. Mainly because I saw that I should be doing it.
- [64:02]
A
Yeah.
- [64:02]
B
So I did. I think a lot of it is our consistency, too. Like, we're always. Saturday is farmers market day. I'm consistently on social media. Even when I had somebody else doing it, it was still consistently, we were there. So I think consistency is key because if people can count on it being there, they don't mind telling their friends and family, like, hey, go here. You don't have to worry about it. Right. So I think that is huge, but I'm not doing anything to coach that right now. Just do it organically. And I think going back to the genuine is super huge because I think a lot of people, especially with how social media and some of the stuff is, you see stuff and you're like, is that real? And so when it is real, I think it resonates so much more.
- [64:47]
A
I'm wondering, like, maybe the question is, I have a different question now. So maybe it's more about how are they putting on this identity of a lonely lane farm, like, buyer. Right. Like, so do you have swag? Do people collect swag? You don't have swag. Okay. It's just interesting, but, like, they're clearly starting to identify as someone who supports you. And I'm just kind of trying to figure out, like, what. What's. Yeah. What's causing that?
- [65:13]
B
Yeah, you know, I. It turns out, like, I started doing some customer research, and a lot of our customers are in the medical field and they're telling their patients about us. And so it's coming from a place of authority, I think, in some of these people's lives or custom, you know, potential customers. And, you know, we've been doing this for 25 years. And so I think sometimes, you know, we've literally had some customers for 20 years. And when people say, hey, I've been buying this for 20 years, it's also another position of, like, authority and consistency. So I think that may be why people gravitate towards it. And I also kind of get that they can't be as good as they say they are. We get some of that sometimes and then people try the product and then they're like oh yeah, they are that good.
- [65:59]
A
Yeah.
- [66:00]
B
So yeah. Okay. Well I.
- [66:02]
A
So it sounds like you don't have a mechanism to encourage that. It's just happening. Which is awesome. I love it.
- [66:08]
B
Yeah, I was actually thinking like I should get some, I should do something so I get some current ones on there, you know, because I think staying current and relevant is important too. Because if you log into somebody's and all you see is a bunch of like five six year old testimonials, there's that like huh, what happened recently? That there's nothing. So I was actually thinking maybe I should try to go that route. But I have a lot of people don't necessarily post, but they do email me personally with like hey, this is great. And I've asked a couple of them already like hey, can I use this right Use that kind of to promote some of our products too. So.
- [66:44]
A
Right. Are you pushing people to, to leave a Google review or is it happening on social more? If they're gonna.
- [66:51]
B
It's happening on social more. I actually haven't looked at our Google reviews recently.
- [66:56]
A
Okay. I was only asking because I know there is. I have this on my website. It's a. I pay like 20 bucks a month for it. Embed social I think and it's is the name of it. And it pulls the, the latest reviews and just puts them on this slider, you know, on your website so that you can see, you know, they're not like from three years ago because that's when you last updated it. They're, you know, they're actually current and I don't recommend that unless you are getting consistent reviews. You know, if you're that kind of scale farm business, especially an online one or whatever where people are being. There may be a mechanism that fires after they've, after they buy and they go and leave a review. And so you're populating new reviews every few days. At least that way someone, when they go to the website they're, they're able to see that they're like oh my gosh, there's like 3,000 reviews here that have been left or whatever. But that is something that's out there for those of you who are listening. You can find apps that will just automatically sync with your website which may be totally worth the $20 a month for.
- [68:00]
B
Yeah, you're Getting a lot of consistent and yeah, like my husband, I were just talking about there's always room for improvement. So I mean, that's definitely something we can look at. So.
- [68:08]
A
Yeah, yeah. Your website is amazing, by the way. So I'm going to encourage everyone to go look at it. Lonelylanefarms.com I really like how your stacks, your content stacks are what order they're in, the stuff that you're talking about. It's just very intuitive and it flows really well. And you said that you gave that project to someone else to help you design or did you work with them?
- [68:36]
B
We worked pretty heavily with them, so we gave a lot of direction. All the photos, all the content was us. I am not a website designer, my husband is not a website designer. And we knew the backend had to be set up fairly well. The company we chose specifically teaches you how to update it. So while they built it, I'm still going in and making changes. And I know how to do that now because they spent two hours showing me how to do it. Two hours well spent. It really was, because I, before we had that, I couldn't update our website even if I wanted to. And now I feel confident enough to go in there and make tweaks here and there and it's made a world of difference. So.
- [69:17]
A
Yeah, but you have some kind of buzzwords and there were some content decisions that were made as far as like these are the things that need to be on here because that is what my customer is looking for. I could, I could pick them out for you right now, but can you just try to answer, like, what do you think those would be as your. You had to answer that question for people.
- [69:42]
B
Yeah, I go back to grass fed and allergens. Like I said, that's our main selling point, how to find us. Because a lot of people like, great, you're great. Where can I buy your product? Yeah, like I said, also where to send people. I do keep that part updated very regularly. Pictures of our family and how we do things. That's really important to people too. Hopefully I touched on maybe some of them.
- [70:05]
A
Yeah, I mean you had phrases like 100% hand cut meats. Yeah, I just thought that was interesting. Like it would.
- [70:13]
B
When I. Yeah, you can actually laser cut meat now.
- [70:15]
A
Yeah, but I mean even just telling me that it's hand cut, it's like, oh, that should be special that it's hand cut. Wow. All right. I guess it's not all always hand cut. I wouldn't know that. You know, as a Person who's not a meat producer. The free from the big eight allergens. Even that phrase, the big eight allergens, that's a, that was a new concept to me. So now I've just been informed that there's something called the big eight allergens. And now I feel like, wow, they're, they're avoiding them. That's great. A USDA inspected facility processed in house. So some of these phrases, they, they get stacked on top of each other and they're essentially like, they come off as, as an offer stack. Like, here's what you're getting with my meat. So I just want to point that out to, to those of you who go to her website, study it. There is, there's some really good logic. There's emotion that gets triggered when you read this. There's a lot of social proof authority language on there that makes you look like you know what you're doing and that you are the guide for this consumer. You also have a how it works section. And I just want to remind customers, I'm sorry, listeners to, to make sure you have that somewhere on your website. Just how, how does. What's the step one, step two, step three process for ordering and buying the product is they don't always say see it through the weeds. So good job with that.
- [71:38]
B
Yeah, thank you.
- [71:39]
A
Yeah, I'll put the link for that in the show notes so you guys can go check that out. You joined Farm Marketing School, I don't know, like five, five months ago or so. And tell me a little bit, or tell our audience a little bit about. Because you're, you're kind of, in my opinion, advanced as a business. You've got a lot going on. You, you know what you're doing. And so I'm just kind of curious. What made you decide to join Farm Marketing School? Was there a specific thing you were trying to learn or accomplish or build?
- [72:13]
B
Yeah, so I had a couple new family members that I mentioned and I had a little more free time on my hands and I was like, you know, I'm going to use this time to learn a new skill. And I chose marketing and write a few books on it. And then what actually sold me on Farm Marketing School was the social media because I was so winging it. And I don't like winging anything. I do much better when there's a plan and I can follow it. And that's what I did. And I spent a good month and a half on that social media thing. And I tell you now, I do My whole week. Social media in 30 minutes.
- [72:48]
A
Isn't that awesome? I'm so proud of you.
- [72:51]
B
It's so nice. I literally, I didn't do it like every month. I literally picked one month and then I just mapped out what I was gonna do on the different days. And when I'm sitting there going, what should I post? I pull it out and we're like, oh, yep, that's what I need to do. And so that's really helped streamline that whole process. And it, I think it's actually made it better just because the content that needs to be on there is on there.
- [73:11]
A
Yeah.
- [73:13]
B
And so I also was trying to learn a lot more about email marketing because that was new for me. So that was a huge selling of like, do I have it set up right? You know, am I actually doing what I need to do? And I did a promotional calendar because I think I've said this before. My husband Mike's like, your head is a scary place for things. So I'm trying to take a lot of what's in my head and put it on paper so that I have a repeatable system that not just I have to manage. So that's been really nice. I learned a little bit more about product ladders and that's when I started doing the packs on the stores. Because before it was just a bunch of items.
- [73:49]
A
Right.
- [73:50]
B
So that's helped. And then I. The nurture sequence, actually I had nothing. I just had an email list and people just joined and nothing happened after that. So that's kind of been my main project. I built the welcome email. I liked the self paced part of it. I could do it in the morning, I could do it in the afternoon. There wasn't a lot of like, I need to be here time. My schedule can go sideways rather quickly. So just having the flexibility to take it with me wherever I needed to go, that for me was huge. I did like all the step by step so I could work on a project at a time. I was honestly, I was doing like two projects at a time. So depending on when my schedule allowed, I'd work on one versus the other because there's a lot of video watching, which was nice because the short duration of the videos allowed me to watch them during nap time or like, hey, I gotta pick up my kid. But I got 30 minutes to wait. And so fitting it into my schedule was super huge for me.
- [74:51]
A
So cool.
- [74:52]
B
And the content was good too. I actually had a note, right. A small notebook where I took notes as I watched the videos and then I still actually look back through those.
- [75:01]
A
Awesome. Yeah, awesome. Well, it's been so great to hash this all out with you. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom on our podcast. Well, I hope you enjoyed that episode. I will put all the links in the show notes@mydigitalfarmer.com forward/340 if you like today's episode episode, please go. Leave me a rating or a review or tell someone you know about the podcast. You can share the link with them and maybe they'll become a super fan too. Don't forget, if you want to get onto my email list, I have some free stuff to send your way to make your marketing stronger. And if today's podcast made you curious about farm marketing school and you want to join my amazing community of farmers, head over to mydigitalfarmer.com fms and sign up for for your first month, give it a. Give it a trial run. See if you like it. And I have a feeling you will. I'd love to see you inside. All right, that's all I got today. Thanks for joining me. Have an amazing week. Remember, I believe in you. I'll see you next time.