Farmers are understandably feeling powerless and undervalued in the current climate. Livestock farmers are shocked at the vitriol being unleashed on cotton farmers. Cotton farmers are en masse updating themselves on their industry facts and sharing with them with the world and wondering why this modus operandi doesn’t seem to be resonating.
Everyone is looking for somebody to blame and the quick fix. Industry representative bodies and National Farmers Federation are getting some flak. The farmers’ quick fix appears to be TV adds and billboards. I haven’t seen anyone put forward a *value proposition yet. Nor have I seen anyone suggest what our key messaging should be and who our audience is. We seem to have reached the destination without deciding where the journey should begin.
Tim Minchin is his 2013 Occasional Address declared ‘ Teachers are the most admirable and important people in the world.’ Anyone who has spent anytime in a 21st century classroom will surely agree with him
I was recently invited by a secondary school principal to speak at a secondary school principals’ event. I asked her how I should start the presentation. She said “Show them your websites – they are a teachers dream” Whilst I was happy to take the compliment, it got me thinking how long is it since an industry body contacted me to let me know they had made changes to their school resources websites. Too long it seems and my dream website is now my nightmare and I look forward to those industry bodies providing me with the info to update this site in particular.
It got me thinking whilst farmers like to think our profession is the most important in the world, for us teachers are certainly the most important. .
Teachers today have been tasked with ensuring their students are work ready and that means they have to deliver on the 4C’s as well as the 3R’s because 21st century employers value the 4C’s well above the 3Rs. 
Graduate Skills Most valued by Employers Source AAEG
Some of our agricultural industries in this country DO have world class school education resources.
How many farmers know what resources their industry body has created to make teaching agriculture related concepts joyful and easy.
How many farmers know they exist and where to access them?
Are they as impressive as these Learn About Wool
If not why not?
Are your farming industry’s resources empowering teachers to engage their students in the 4C’s
How can we best support our industry bodies to ensure all our farming industries have world class school education resources?
Lets all work together to ensure we are as enthusiastic about understanding and appreciating our audience as we want them to be as enthusiastic and an appreciative of us
#StrongerTogether #agriculture #farming #teachers #education
To get the best return on investment the Gold Stand requires measuring Impact. My experience working with farmer boards is they are outputs focused.
*Fascinating measure of outputs. How often do you look a billboard beyond when you are stuck in traffic?
How do billboard companies measure the results?
The Outdoor advertising industry utilise a revolutionary audience measurement system called move, move measures the total traffic passing by a particular billboard and delivers an accurate understanding of the number of people who will actually see the billboard. This measurement include the reach and frequency of viewing. In order to further understand your individual business conversions, we recommend directing people to a unique phone number or web page url, or listing a specific offer shown only on the billboard face.
