This week we are adding a little theory to go along with the practical marketing advice. One of the key ideas of modern marketing is called "permission marketing" -- most of you are already doing this, but it is a helpful to have a framework and label for what you are doing to keep you on track.

Permission marketing is Seth Godin's term coined in a 1999 book which explains how businesses can effectively market themselves to their best customers without spending a lot of money and by providing value for the customer's attention.

In Godin's words: "Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them."

This is in contrast to "interruption marketing" like television commercials, billboards, spam email, and junk mail which clutter our physical and mental worlds without adding value.

As farmers providing healthful products that add a lot of value to a customer's life, it is easy to get that permission to market to current and prospective customers. Godin says, you are using permission marketing if customers complain when they don't receive your messages. So, do you customers complain when forget to send the weekly newsletter?

Provide value every time you connect with your customers whether it is a story about your experience producing food or practical information that the recipient can use like recipes, product availability, or nutrition information.

An Agrarian Example

Get permission to send a weekly newsletter to your farmer's market customers. Be timely by sending out product availability for the market the night before. Be relevant by splitting up your list for different markets so only the people who go to a certain market get the message. If you muddy the message by including all your markets for the week you are wasting the attention that your buyers are giving to you.

Try to send this message for the first 10 weeks of the season and then see what happens on the 11th week if you forget to send the message. I think your customers will complain!

Further Reading on Permission Marketing

• A recent blog entry from Seth Godin's blog explaining the tenets of permission marketing.
• Want to get really deep into the subject? Read A Comprehensive Analysis of Permission Marketing.
• Some good practical advice on how to get permission and how to approach contacting the customer.