How direct-to-consumer farms can use marketing data to grow online
The 2025 Global Brands Benchmark Report from Social Insider compiles engagement and posting data from more than 600 brands across six social platforms and 12 industries, including food, beverage, and retail.
This kind of benchmark data isn’t just for large marketing departments, it helps any business understand how audiences interact with content, which social media platforms are performing best, and what’s realistic when measuring engagement.
For direct-to-consumer farms, this insight can guide how you invest your time online, where to share updates, and how to measure what’s actually working. This can be especially valuable when your time is already stretched between actual farming and the retail side of your business.
Instead of guessing what to post or when to post it or just winging it, benchmark data shows what’s performing well across industries that align closely with your farm, especially food and retail.
You might also find this data a bit different than if you were comparing engagement rates for personal brands or “influencers.” This type of report is more representative of businesses, which is a more accurate reflection for farms as well.
Table of contents
A snapshot of the report findings
The Brands Benchmark Report evaluated 608 brands across 12 industries in six global markets from January–June 2025. The study looked at social media platforms (Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and X), type of content (video, photos, text), and engagement rate for those respective points.
While the report did not indicate how engagement rate was calculated, typically it’s an evaluation of how content is resonating with people through likes, comments, saves, clicks, or shares.
Engagement rates measure how content is received and influences activity. It’s a signal that marketing efforts are relevant and effective, while impressions, once the go-to metric for online marketing, measure visibility of content. Essentially, impressions ask, is it being seen? They can be beneficial for building brand awareness and recognition (Social Insider).
Let’s get into the report data from the U.S. The data we’ll look at includes overall trends, as well as the food, beverage, and retail industries, given their relevance to the farm-to-consumer space.
The report shows:
- The beverages industry led engagement at 0.709%, showing strong audience interaction for short, personality-driven video content.
- The food industry followed close behind with an average engagement rate of 0.6%, reflecting consistent interest in recipe, product, and behind-the-scenes storytelling.
- The retail industry averaged about 0.5%, still strong given the volume of content and competition in this area, proof that curated or well-thought-out visuals and customer experiences drive attention.
- Video-focused platforms, such as TikTok and YouTube, continue to outperform static formats (text or images).
- Facebook engagement has leveled off but remains a central place for local updates and community connections.
Online marketing efforts for the food, beverage, and retail brand space demonstrate that audiences want authentic and experience-based content. Small farms in the direct-to-market area are in a perfect position to deliver that type of content online as well.
Platform and content performance insights
The highest engagement rate among platforms is on TikTok, at 1.507%, indicating strong popularity for short-form video content.
The report recommends leveraging YouTube and Instagram for video as well, as both show significant engagement with this content type. On the flip side, the data suggests reducing time spent on X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook because of their low engagement rates.
In terms of content type (video or static, such as photos or text), the Brands Benchmark Report shows the following engagement rates:
- TikTok video: 1.51%
- YouTube video: 0.59%
- Instagram video: 0.46%
- Twitter text: 0.07%
- Facebook photos: 0.07%
What does this mean for farms?
How can you use this data for your own farm’s marketing strategy online? Use these ideas as guidance when creating future content for social media.
Content type:
- Lean into short-form video. It’s driving growth across food and retail sectors, which is perfect for capturing daily life on the farm. TikTok is by far the highest-yielding content type in the U.S. benchmark, meaning you’ll likely see stronger audience response if you invest here. You can also multipurpose short-form video across platforms: TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts, getting more mileage for your efforts.
- Use longer form video to build trust. YouTube, extended Instagram Reels, or longer TikTok videos are great for showing how you farm, create your products, or share your perspective on how you run your business. YouTube and Instagram video content are viable and performing, just at somewhat lower rates as compared to TikTok, but are still great for deeper storytelling or your “farm story” content.
- Text posts (especially on X) and basic photo-only content (especially on Facebook) are significantly less effective according to the benchmark, so for time efficiency, they should be lower priority or used in supportive roles rather than as main content drivers.
- Create a content mix weighted heavily toward video formats. If you’re spending time on text-only or basic photo posts, reconsider their role or elevate them with short captions, movement, or story-driven visuals.
Content strategy:
- Lead with stories. People engage most when they feel connected. Share what’s happening around the farm, not just what’s for sale. It could be farm chores, packing orders, taking inventory, pick up meat from the processor, etc.
- Stay consistent. A weekly rhythm matters more than constant posts every day or on a schedule.
- Encourage engagement with asking for feedback, opinions or suggestions
- Look for ways to create sharable content, which can get more engagement, but it is “less visible” than likes. It still signals to social media that your content is valuable.
- Adapt trends when they fit with the voice of your farm or individual personality. For example, take a playful approach on a TikTok trend using farm humor or livestock personality.
- Leverage Facebook for local updates and consider being involved with groups, especially locally based, or even create your own group
- With the drop of engagement in Instagram, look for ways to generate more interaction. A good place to do this is in stories with polls or other engagement focused stickers. Ask for feedback in posts/reels.
- On TikTok look at content that starts a conversation
In terms of social media platforms, focus your energy where the consumers are most engaged, which means prioritizing TikTok (and short-form video in general across social media platforms), followed by YouTube and Instagram for storytelling, and using Facebook or X more selectively (for community updates, not your main marketing focus).
Awareness and action: Building your own farm social benchmarks
You can also use this report data, along with your own data, to track how your farm’s online marketing efforts match up with industry benchmarks, as well as your own data over time.
Do this by reviewing your analytics on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube to see which posts your followers engage with most.
Compare your performance to industry averages. Remember, 0.5–0.7% engagement rate is common for major brands, so small farm pages often perform higher due to stronger community ties and often being a personality-focused brand (as in you, the farmer, are part of the storytelling).
You can calculate your own engagement rate using a basic formula:
Engagement rate = (Total interactions ÷ Total followers) × 100
Example:
120 likes + 10 comments + 5 shares = 135 interactions
1,000 followers → 135 ÷ 1,000 × 100 = 13.5% engagement rate
Then compare your engagement rates to national rates:
- Food brands: 0.6%
- Beverage brands: 0.7%
- Retail brands: 0.5%
You can also use metrics built inside most social media apps, which typically offer historical insights, ranging commonly 30–90 days, with some report options. Consider tracking this monthly to see trends by keeping a simple spreadsheet to record progress over time.
Social Insider also has a free engagement rate calculator. Just enter your social media handles, and it will generate an estimated engagement rate for your accounts. It’s a quick way to see how your farm’s performance stacks up against the benchmark data in their 2025 report.
References
- Global brand benchmarks report. (2025). Social Insider.
- Impressions vs. engagement: what to track and how? (July 2025). Social Insider.
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