Farmzz Blog
How to Add Products on Farmzz: The Complete Guide to Building a Product Catalog That Sells
Claudette runs a 12-acre vegetable operation outside Trois-Rivières. Last June she sent her first produce notification to 180 subscribers. It read: "Fresh veggies available this week." No photos, no product names, no descriptions. She got 11 clicks. The following week she spent 20 minutes adding six products to her Farmzz catalog—complete with photos she took on her phone, two-sentence descriptions, and categories. Her next notification listed those six products with images. She got 74 clicks and sold out of heirloom tomatoes by 10 AM.
The difference wasn't the message. It was the catalog behind it. When subscribers open a notification and see real photos of actual produce with honest descriptions, they don't just read—they drive to your stand. A bare-bones notification with no products is like a menu with no food on it. People shrug and move on.
Your product catalog is the engine that makes every notification, every profile visit, and every QR code scan more effective. And the good news is that building one on Farmzz takes less time than a trip to the hardware store. This guide walks you through every step—from your first product entry to a catalog that drives real revenue week after week.
What you'll learn
- How to create your first product listing in under 3 minutes
- What makes a product photo convert browsers into buyers
- How to write descriptions that answer the questions customers actually ask
- How categories and availability settings keep your catalog organized
- How a strong catalog increases notification engagement by 3–5x
- Seasonal management strategies so you never rebuild from scratch
Why your product catalog matters more than you think
Most farmers treat their product catalog as an afterthought. They set up their profile, import their contacts, and rush straight to sending their first notification. The catalog gets a couple of hastily typed entries with no photos and one-word descriptions.
Here's why that costs you money. When you send a notification through Farmzz, subscribers receive an SMS and an email. The email includes your product listings—photos, names, descriptions, and categories. Subscribers scanning that email make a split-second decision: "Is it worth the drive?" If they see a generic list that says "vegetables" and "fruit," the answer is usually no. If they see a photo of deep-red heirloom tomatoes with a description that says "Picked this morning, perfect for slicing — limited quantity," the answer changes.
Farms with complete catalogs (photo + description + category on every product) see notification click-through rates 3–5 times higher than farms with text-only listings. That's the difference between 15 people seeing your message and 75 people driving to your stand. At an average sale of $28 per visit, those extra 60 visitors represent $1,680 in a single notification.
Your catalog also powers your public farm profile. When someone scans your QR code at the market and lands on your Farmzz page, the product catalog is the first thing they scroll through. A rich, visual catalog builds trust instantly. A bare page with no products makes visitors wonder if your farm is even active.
Step 1 — Open your product catalog
Log in to your Farmzz dashboard and click Products in the left sidebar. If you're starting fresh, you'll see an empty catalog with a prompt to add your first product. Click "Add product" to begin.
The product form is straightforward. You'll fill in a name, category, description, and photo. Each field takes about 30 seconds. Most farmers add their first product in under 3 minutes, and a full catalog of 10–15 products takes about 30–45 minutes total.
Pro tip: have your phone handy. The fastest approach is to walk through your cooler or greenhouse, snap a photo of each product, and add it on the spot. The photos don't need to be professional—they need to be real.
Step 2 — Name your product clearly
Type the name your customers already use. If people ask for "strawberries" at your stand, name the product "Strawberries"—not "Fragaria ananassa" and not "Fresh Local Organic Hand-Picked Quebec Strawberries." Simple and recognizable wins.
If you grow multiple varieties of the same crop, include the variety name: "Tomatoes — Brandywine" or "Apples — Honeycrisp." This helps customers who know what they want find it quickly, and it makes your catalog look thorough rather than generic.
| Weak name | Strong name | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Tomatoes | Heirloom Tomatoes — Brandywine | Specific variety builds perceived value |
| Honey | Wildflower Honey — 500g jar | Tells the customer what they'll get |
| Greens | Mixed Salad Greens | Specific enough to picture on a plate |
| Eggs | Free-Range Eggs — dozen | Method + quantity answers buying questions |
| Berries | Raspberries — pint basket | Tells exactly what and how much |
Step 3 — Choose the right category
Assign each product to a category: Vegetables, Fruits, Herbs, Dairy, Eggs, Meat, Preserves, Flowers, or other options that Farmzz provides. Categories serve three purposes:
- Organization on your public profile. Visitors can scan by category instead of scrolling a random list. A customer looking for berries shouldn't have to scroll past 15 vegetable entries to find them.
- Smarter notifications. When you create a notification, you can select individual products to feature. Categories make it faster to find the right ones, especially if your catalog grows beyond 20 items.
- Subscriber targeting (coming soon). As Farmzz expands its subscriber category features, product categories will let you send notifications to subscribers who are interested in specific types of produce.
If a product doesn't fit neatly into one category, pick the closest match. You can always change it later. The important thing is that every product has a category assigned.
Step 4 — Upload a photo that sells
This is the single most impactful thing you can do for your catalog. A product with a photo gets dramatically more attention than one without. The photo doesn't need to be professional. It needs to be real.
What works: A close-up of your actual produce, taken with your smartphone in natural light. A basket of just-picked strawberries on your tailgate. A row of zucchini laid out on a wooden table. Your hands holding a bunch of carrots with dirt still on them. These photos feel authentic because they are. Customers prefer seeing what they'll actually get over a polished stock image that could be from anywhere.
Quick photo tips:
- Shoot near a window or outdoors—natural light always wins
- Keep the background simple (a table, a basket, your hands)
- Get close enough that the produce fills most of the frame
- Take the photo while the product looks its freshest—morning harvest is ideal
- Don't use filters. Your Farmzz profile isn't Instagram. Honest photos build more trust.
Farmzz automatically optimizes uploaded images for fast loading, so you don't need to worry about file size. Just upload directly from your phone or computer.
Step 5 — Write a description that answers customer questions
The best product descriptions aren't clever marketing copy. They answer the three questions every customer silently asks: "What is it? What makes it special? Why should I come get it now?"
Two to three sentences is the sweet spot. Here's the formula:
Sentence 1: What the product is and how it's grown.
Sentence 2: What makes it worth the drive (flavor, freshness, limited quantity, special variety).
Sentence 3 (optional): A usage suggestion or pairing idea.
Example for heirloom tomatoes: "Brandywine heirloom tomatoes grown without pesticides, picked at peak ripeness this morning. Sweet and meaty with that old-fashioned tomato flavor you can't find at the grocery store. Perfect sliced thick with fresh basil and a drizzle of olive oil."
Example for wildflower honey: "Raw wildflower honey from our own hives in the Laurentians. Unfiltered, unpasteurized, with a complex floral sweetness that changes with each season's bloom. Wonderful drizzled on toast, stirred into tea, or eaten straight from the spoon."
Descriptions appear in notification emails and on your public profile, so every word pulls double duty. Write them once and they work for you all season. For more detailed guidance, check the product descriptions that sell guide.
Step 6 — Set availability to keep your catalog honest
Every product in Farmzz has an availability toggle: available or unavailable. Available products show on your public profile and can be included in notifications. Unavailable products hide from public view but stay in your catalog for next season.
This is one of the most underused features and one of the most powerful. Here's why:
- No rebuilding each year. When strawberry season ends in July, toggle strawberries to unavailable. When they come back next June, toggle them back on. The photo, description, and category are all still there. Zero rework.
- Honest profile = trust. Nothing frustrates a customer more than driving 30 minutes to your stand because your profile listed corn, only to find out corn finished two weeks ago. Toggling off-season products to unavailable keeps your profile accurate.
- Seasonal momentum. Toggling a product back to "available" is itself a notification trigger. Subscribers who saw "strawberries" listed last June will notice when it reappears—it signals the season is back.
Make it a habit: every Friday, spend 2 minutes scanning your catalog and toggling anything that's sold out or finished for the week. It keeps your profile current and your reputation solid.
Managing your catalog across seasons
A product catalog isn't a "set it and forget it" task. The best-performing farms on Farmzz treat their catalog like their market display: refreshed regularly, organized intentionally, and designed to catch attention.
Update descriptions seasonally. Early-season strawberries might be described as "First of the season—sweet, limited, and worth the trip." Mid-season: "Peak sweetness, abundant supply, perfect for freezing." Late season: "Last week for strawberries—come get them before they're gone." Each version creates different urgency and tells the customer something useful.
Refresh photos annually. A photo from last year's harvest still works, but a photo from this week's harvest works better. Customers notice freshness in photos more than you'd expect. Even a quick phone snap of today's baskets replaces a stale image.
Add new products as you diversify. Every time you add a new crop, a value-added product (jams, sauces, dried herbs, bouquets), or a seasonal special, create a new catalog entry. Subscribers discover new offerings through your notifications, and a growing catalog signals a thriving farm.
Reorder for impact. In your product catalog, you can drag and drop products to set their display order. Put your most popular, most seasonal, or most profitable items at the top. The order you set is the order visitors see on your public profile.
Remove permanently discontinued items. If you've stopped growing something for good, delete it. But for seasonal items, always toggle availability instead of deleting—you'll thank yourself next year.
How your catalog connects to notifications
When you create a notification on Farmzz, one of the steps is selecting which products to feature. This is where your catalog investment pays off. Instead of typing product details into every notification from scratch, you pick from your catalog and the product name, photo, and description get pulled in automatically.
This saves time and ensures consistency. Your subscribers see the same high-quality listings every time, whether they found you through a notification email, your public profile, or a QR code scan.
The data bears this out: notifications that include 3–6 products with photos outperform text-only notifications by a wide margin. Subscribers are visual. When they see a photo of golden corn beside a basket of red tomatoes, they start planning their drive.
| Catalog quality | Avg. click-through rate | Avg. stand visits per notification |
|---|---|---|
| No products in notification | 4–8% | 10–20 |
| Products listed, no photos | 10–15% | 25–40 |
| Products with photos + descriptions | 20–35% | 50–90 |
The takeaway is simple: the 30 minutes you spend building a proper catalog will pay for themselves on the very first notification you send.
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Frequently asked questions
How many products can I add to my catalog?
There is no limit. Whether you sell 5 products or 50, add them all. The more complete your catalog, the more useful your profile and notifications become. Farms that list every product—including niche items like dried herbs, flower bouquets, and value-added preserves—consistently see higher subscriber engagement because there's always something new to discover.
Do I need a professional camera for product photos?
No. A smartphone is all you need. The most effective photos on Farmzz are authentic shots taken in natural light—your produce in a basket, on a table, or in your hands. Customers respond to authenticity, not polish. A real photo of your actual strawberries outperforms a stock image every time. Just make sure the produce fills most of the frame and the lighting is bright enough to see color and texture clearly.
Can I reorder products on my profile?
Yes. Open your product catalog in the dashboard and drag products into your preferred order. The order you set is the order visitors see on your public profile. Most farms put their current seasonal highlights at the top and year-round items (like honey or eggs) further down. Reordering takes seconds and can make a big difference in what catches a visitor's eye first.
What happens to products when I toggle them to unavailable?
They disappear from your public profile and can no longer be included in new notifications. But they stay in your dashboard catalog with all their details intact—photo, description, category, everything. When the product comes back in season, toggle it to available and it reappears exactly as before. This saves you from re-entering the same products year after year.
Should I include prices in my product descriptions?
It depends on your operation. If your prices are consistent (like $5/pint for berries or $8/dozen for eggs), including them in the description helps customers plan ahead and reduces questions at the stand. If your prices fluctuate daily based on supply, you might prefer leaving them out and updating verbally. Either approach works—the key is to be clear and consistent so customers know what to expect.
How often should I update my catalog?
At minimum, toggle availability on and off as products come into season and sell out. Beyond that, refreshing photos and descriptions 2–3 times per season keeps your profile feeling current. A quick Friday evening scan of your catalog—updating what's available, swapping in a fresh photo, tweaking a description—takes 5 minutes and pays for itself all week. Farms that update regularly see 20–30% more profile visits than those with stale catalogs.