A domain name is defined as:
"...an identification label that defines a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control in the Internet, based on the Domain Name System (DNS)."

That doesn't help much, does it? Basically, a domain name is something like yourfarm.com that identifies your website on the internet. This is obviously an important decision as you start a farm website and one you have probably thought about.



If you don't have a domain name yet, search for your preferred address at domaintools.com.

We've covered domain names in the past, but here are some basic thoughts to keep in mind as you make that decision:

1. Shorter is better. For example, if your farm name is Beautiful Meadows Artisan Cheeses and Dairy, beautifulmeadowscheese.com is better than beautifulmeadowscheesesanddairy.com.
2. If available, always use the "dot-com" address. I have heard .com addresses referred to as downtown real estate while other address endings like .info, .us, .name, etc are in the suburbs -- you want a downtown store front so your website is easy to find. (Of course, you may want to be .org if your farm is a non-profit.)
3. Buy your domain name today even if you do not plan to start your website in the near future. It costs about $10/year and we can still host your site in the future no matter where you register it. GoDaddy.com is a popular domain registrar (a registrar is a company that registers domain names).
4. Consider registering your domain name for longer periods such as 5 or 10 years, because you do not want to be in a situation where your domain name accidentally expires. This is what one of our farmers is dealing with right now and it can be a real pain to get it back online while your email and website are in limbo. It's low cost and your farm is going to be around in 5 years right?
   
5. Think twice about using a "sub-domain" address like yourfarm.blogspot.com or yourfarm.wordpress.com. We always encourage farmers to use a full domain name like yourfarm.com because you will have complete flexibility for your website into the future. If you have a .blogspot.com address, you are limited to using blogspot's service. If you want to upgrade or move on, your signs, business cards, customer bookmarks, and etc will need to be reprinted or changed.
6. All Small Farm Central sites are hosted at a full domain name. If you purchase a subscription, we'll take care of your domain name for you so you don't have to worry about it! If you already have a domain name when you start your website with us, we'll explain exactly how to re-point the domain name at our servers. It's not hard.
   

Is your preferred domain already registered? We'll cover that soon in the blog. In the meantime, if your domain name is registered by someone else, let us know via email and we'll help you pick an alternate domain name.

We'll have a new premium template out for your farm website in the next few weeks. Here are the mock-ups. This template gives you a chance to show off all of your great farm photography!

Read more about premium templates.

Homepage of new premium template

Internal page of new premium template

Our newest feature, product graphs, which I discussed at length last week has been released.

If you are a current Small Farm Central subscriber, you may access the product graphs by logging in to your control panel and navigating to:
Create Content / Products / Product Graphs

If you need help with the product sliders, read the detailed help document. If that still does not help, let us know!

If you are not a current customer, but want to check out the new feature, request a demo.

We will be introducing a new feature in the next week or two: product availability graphs. These graphs help your customers visualize what is seasonal throughout the year; this is both educational and practical. Educational because eaters will understand what crops are available in your climate throughout the year and practical because they know what to expect in their CSA box or at the farmers market throughout the season.

Product availability graphs have been around on farm websites for a long time, but they were usually created in an external program like Photoshop or Excel, then an image was created, and then the image was posted to the website. This is not a very flexible or scalable approach -- some issues include:

• What happens when you want to add a new crop? 
• How much time does it take to update the image? How many steps are involved?
  
• What if you need to adjust the time of year that a product is available because you installed a high tunnel?
  
• What happens when you lose the original file or the staff member who created it leaves your business?
  
• The image based approach is problematic because of scaling and pixelated images.

Our new product availability graph feature in Small Farm Central solves these issues and adds some new twists.

Here is an example vegetable product graph as it would look to customers visiting your website:


Below is a screenshot of the farm website administrator editing the same product graph. Each product availability block can be dragged earlier or later time of the year as you develop your graph or edit it later.


Our Availability Twists

• Sliders on the administrator control panel create each product availability item; this means that you do not have to enter an exact date of availability for each product, it is a more fluid approach of dragging the bar across the screen until the season looks about right. Since harvest dates never fall on the same day each year due to weather, planting, rain, and everything else, it makes more sense to drag your availability across the screen but not promise an exact date to your customers.
• Automatic updates of current product lists - each week, we will automatically refresh your 'current products' list based on the values that you put into your product graphs. This allows you to create your product availability graph at the beginning of the season and let Small Farm Central do the work of keeping your current products list updated as you are busy growing food throughout the summer. (Although you may choose to adjust your lists as the year progresses.)
  
• Product notes - Optionally, you may give further information to your customers about each product by a defining a 'product note' that shows up when the user hovers their mouse over that particular product availability bar on your public website.
• Create multiple graph pages as you like -- create an availability page for each category of products that your farm sells, for example, you can have a separate graph and page for vegetables, fruits, jams, added value, and more.
• Update at any time - no need to find your original file, export the image, and upload it to your website. Simply login to the control panel, change product availability, click save and you are done! 
• Not image based - our product availability graphs are not based on images, so they will display clearly, load faster, and are more flexible for future updates.

We are still working on a few last details for the product availability graphs, so stay tuned for a release notice in the next week or two. We'd love to hear what you think of our approach!

Our newest template will be coming out in the next week or two. Note, this is not a premium template. This template is available to all subscription levels.

Enough talk, here is the initial mock-up of the site:

We think it is clean and professional while retaining "organic" imagery that keeps the template botanical and agricultural.

We hope you'll love it!