On 6th November, the NEC in Birmingham will open its doors to the Farm Business Innovation Show. For three years on the trot, I have been a speaker at this event, talking to land-based business owners about how to exploit the marketing mix to optimise their diversifying businesses.
Why have so many land-based businesses diversified?
There is an extraordinary number of disruptive factors that have entered the arena in the past 10 years for this industry, which is why I love this show and what it is trying to achieve.
Disruptive Factors
- Greater mechanisation and automation: as with all industries, there has been huge digital influence which includes the introduction of precision farming techniques, sensing and monitoring systems, inspection via drones, Big Data and AI.
- Changes in consumer behaviour: there is a move to eating less meat and dairy which is well documented, but there is also a change to our palettes meaning vegetable plant breeders need to develop sweeter tasting cabbages, fun coloured Brussel sprouts and judge what unique product their customers might want on next year’s Christmas dining table.
- Heightened environmental pressures: ELS and HLS environmental programmes (and their predecessors) have seen farmers build beetle banks, plant wildflower margins and invest in trees. However, the public and Government expect farmers to do more on their behalf to improve biodiversity on a larger scale. This is at the same time as landowners are facing more flooding, more droughts and generally much harsher weather.
- Farming doesn’t always make money: large scale farms and niche farms can be very profitable, but the small and medium-sized traditional farms increasingly find themselves unable to compete in a global marketplace. In the UK this will be further impacted by reductions or the end to subsidies, which has already happened in other countries. Farming on its own doesn’t always make money, so the space on a farm needs to have multiple roles to remove vulnerabilities.
As you can see, farm businesses are not simple crop-growing operations.
Land-based Innovation – Tips for Success
Here are Ignite Exponential’s top tips for starting to think about innovation for land-based businesses:
- Diversification; understand your new marketplace: as you will see at the Farm Innovation Show, there are scores of different routes to take. You could invest in vertical farming, or run a trendy glamping holiday destination. You could diversify into different crops, requiring new machinery and familiarisation with the characteristics of that crop. You will need to balance what you are good at, what you enjoy and what the marketplace might want from your location and products. What is the supply and demand for your new diversified business?
- Be a marketer, operations manager and accountant: landowners already know how to multi-task. However, leaving the land and heading to the office permanently is not always an easy transition, and many business owners find it difficult to manage the huge amount of extra work and communications needed in a changing operation. So, think about where your own skills lie and where you might need to out-source a skill. Do you need a marketing agency, leaving you to run the operations of the business? Or do you need a farm manager, leaving you to concentrate on new business development?
- Innovation through acquisition: do you want to sell some or all of your land, or buy more land to achieve economies of scale? Perhaps increasing your hectarage through contract farming first. There are plenty of options and each business has its own set of factors to consider in terms of skillsets, finance, product and place.
- Test the market first: no need to buy 10 yurts and a soft play centre’s worth of play equipment. Start small and build on successes when you have more evidence-based knowledge about a new market you’ll be entering.
You are already an innovative entrepreneur if you are considering diversification plans, so take lessons from lean start-ups in other industries in order to lessen risk and get better results.
If you are going to the show, here are some of my recommendations for speakers to see:
Innes McEwen is Head of Farming for Future Biogas Ltd and is fantastic to listen to. He’ll be covering Renewables and Energy Storage at the show.
The engaging Tara Punter (@TaraPunterPR) will be covering PR for rural business. She’s an enjoyable speaker giving food for thought on your own PR strategy.
My old colleague Nigel Padbury (@PremiumCrops) will be speaking about what other options there are for break crops for farmers now OSR is harder to produce.
If you would like to chat about the diversification of land-based businesses, pop us an email and we can send you our AgriTech brochure!
Andrew Wynne from Ignite Exponential explores the worlds of UX and UI
You often hear UX and UI used together but they are different and important professions that can make the difference between success and failure for physical and digital products. The two disciplines – although intrinsically linked – require very different problem-solving mindsets and skills to achieve good results.
UI or User Interface is mainly concerned with aspects of design interaction, physical layout and visual design. UX or User experience is a term used to describe the overall experience a user has when interacting with a product or service. Some of the key areas covered by UX are user research, personas and usability testing.
So why is UX important? Where your product sits on the user experience scale from delightful to downright frustrating, will determine how well it is received how well it will last the tests of time and use.
UX isn’t limited to digital products such as websites and apps. It can be anything from the packaging of a toothbrush to the wheels of an orthopaedic chair. And the impact of good and bad UX is everywhere.
The term UX was first coined in the 1990s by Doctor Donald Norman, an electrical engineer and cognitive scientist at Apple. Norman emphasised the importance of designing based on the needs and goals of the end-user and introduced the term ‘user experience’. He described it as encompassing, “All aspects of a person’s experience with a system, from the materials used to the interaction itself (both physical or digital), along with the interface, graphics, and orientation.”
UX in practice
The UX process can be divided up into five main groups: research, design, prototyping, testing and measurement. Based on these phases, UX designers tend to follow a certain sequence for each project: carrying out user research, analysing their findings, defining user personas, mapping out user flows, creating wireframes and prototypes, conducting user testing, and finally, handing the designs over to an industrial or graphic designer.
A user-centred approach is crucial; you need to understand what your users need, how they think, and how they behave.
A good place to start is with competitor research to see what’s out there, before moving on to interviews with actual prospective users. Research helps you understand the problem you’re trying to solve, identify pain-points and challenges, validate your assumptions, find patterns and commonalities across your target user groups and shed light on your users’ needs and objectives.
User personas – based on goals, needs, and behaviours – are extremely valuable in the UX design process as it reminds us that we are designing for real people. They also stop decisions from being made based on personal preference. User flows can help to map out key product related situations, highlighting and identifying how users will react and feel.
In the design phase, developers begin to structure their content and consider the ‘customer journey’. It’s common to use ‘information architecture’, the process of structuring, labelling and organising content using wireframing to show how the product will function and how the user will operate it.
Moving on to Prototyping
Aspects of the prototyping stage may include:
- Experimenting with designs
- Repairing inconsistencies and errors
- Developing data and using it to improve upon original ideas
- Demonstrating products to management
- Checking to see that products are functional and usable
Using the prototype, testing will uncover problems, help discover opportunities and learn about users. In UX, tests can be as simple as observing customer or product interactions or as complex as presenting different versions of a product to the public to see which is better received.
Testing is a fundamental part of the UX designer’s job and it’s important to test your designs on real users. The most common type of testing for UX designers is usability testing, which is a technique used to evaluate how intuitive and user-friendly a particular design is. After several iterations of prototyping and testing, the design is ready for a visual makeover. This is where the ID and UI designer comes in.
The end?
Just because a product officially launches doesn’t mean the UX work is over. UX is an ongoing process that continues for as long as products are in use. Ultimately, the true goal of UX is to allow businesses to make products that are useful and pleasurable for customers to purchase. When done right, UX is one of the most valuable assets a company can offer. Just make sure you consider all users and understand their wants and needs!