Yes, it’s advanced technology. Yes, customers may find it confusing at first and may even be intimidated by it. And yes, it seems to be changing everyday. But there’s no secret formula or magic about selling it.

As we were pulling this issue of Precision Farming Dealer together, two of the items really jumped out in how wide ranging the efforts are in adapting to and adopting the rapidly emerging tools of precision farming.

Customers who are willing to communicate with their equipment dealers deserve to be heard because they’re your best source for product performance and service issues. Of course, these communications usually come in the form of compliments, complaints and/or “I wish …” or “This would work better if …”

If you’re selling, servicing or otherwise promoting the use of precision farming technologies to multi-generational farm operators — that is father-son producers — it would be a mistake to automatically assume that you should focus your efforts solely on the son.

Farmers are an inventive group. Over the years, for example, armed with little more than a hacksaw and a welder, they’ve adapted worn out cars into inexpensive yet practical farm implements.

When your daily business puts you in the middle of industry-changing technological advancements such as those that are embodied by the term “precision farming,” it’s easy to start believing that everyone knows about it outside of your circle of friends, customers and colleagues.

It won’t be long before the technology that we call “precision farming” will be so ubiquitous on farms throughout North America that to go without will be like buying a combine without air conditioning or a tractor without pneumatic tires.

What a difference a decade makes. Ten years ago, farmers were shrugging their shoulders at auto-steering systems, telling their neighbors down at the coffee shop that they "knew how to drive in a straight line."

Welcome to the future of farming — where tractors receive commands from outer space, grain carts drive themselves and the data from combine yield monitors tell row-crop sprayers where chemicals are needed most. Is your dealership ready to sell and support this rapidly evolving technology?