S3 Ep6: Ellen Francis | Opening the gates - Building community connections on social media

Ellen Francis of the Quy Hall Estate in Cambridgeshire explains why she has put social media at the heart of how the Estate connects with its local community, in the latest episode of the Estate Matters podcast, recorded at Groundswell.Ellen and her husband Henry left careers in law and City finance to take on the diversified Estate between Cambridge and Newmarket, which they have now run for thirteen years. Alongside residential and commercial lets, tenanted and in-hand farmland and a Site of Special Scientific Interest, the couple are transitioning their arable land to regenerative farming.The Estate's Instagram account has become a way of opening Quy Hall up to the people around it. "It's a tool for opening up, a tool for being transparent, and a tool for connecting with the communities around us," Ellen says, describing its value as relational capital rather than sales.She also shares why she stopped keeping herself out of the frame, having realised that people connect with a person and a story far more than with an account "that looks like it could have come from any estate".The episode is a candid, practical listen for any estate wondering whether social media is worth its time, and Ellen's advice to those still hesitating is simple.