7 Secrets Of Successful Florists!

My name is Drew, I love helping florists achieve millions of dollars in online sales but was fed up with how many ecommerce companies under deliver leading to loss of money. So I merged my tech expertise with my knowledge of marketing and ecommerce to create a website solution for florists. For over 15 years as the director of Flower Store In a Box, I have consulted, advised and watched many florists attain wild success in the industry while others are struggling to make momentum. My experience has taught me some hard but sweet lessons that made me come up with these 7 highly converting strategies that help online florists skyrocket their sales. If you want to generate serious income for your flower shop online business then follow and execute these 7 simple strategies.

1. They Make a Strategic Plan

What sets apart a successful online florist from those who are not is they have a clear plan to achieve their business goals. As a business owner, it is necessary for you to create a plan as early as now. How?

A) Set Your Goals Make your goals tangible by writing it down on a sheet of paper. Jot your business objectives for the next 3 years and make it specific and achievable like:

• Turnover 1 Million Dollars a year in online Sales
• 20 orders a day
• 10 orders a day
• $50,000 in orders a month

B) Identify Plan of Actions If you want to attain your goals, then create a plan of action and execute them accordingly. You can always change your strategies along the way but never lose track of your goal. For instance, in order to generate One Million Dollars in sales yearly, you have to sell 12, 500 pieces of an item worth $80 in a year. To put it simply, you need to make 240 sales a month of 48 sales daily. Don't you think it's possible? If you aren't sure then ask yourself of these two questions.

• Is my goal achievable?
• What are the strategies I am going to use to attain my goals?

1. Look At Different Ways To Achieve Your Goals

There are actually different approaches for you to materialize your goals. You just have to be consistent and eager to make noticeable progress.

Calculate How Many People Need To Visit Your Site To Achieve Your Goals For a florist, the average sales conversion rate is between 6 - 13%, therefore for every 100 people who visit your site, approximately 6 - 13 persons will order. So for a healthy 10% sales conversion rate, you need to drive 480 people to your website every single day to achieve a $1 million gross sales when the year ends.

Create a Strategic Marketing Plan Most successful florists take advantage of different marketing strategies that are proven to drive positive results. You can use Google AdWords, SEO, social media marketing, and affiliate marketing to name a few.

Plan for Special Occasions like Mother's and Valentine's Day Way Ahead More to the idea of planning, florists know exactly the market they are in. For an instance, Valentine's and Mother's Day happen the same time every year so you have to plan your marketing activities and messaging in advance. I know one successful florist who pre-plans their marketing, messaging, banners, and email campaigns six months advance. And, they also purchase their products few months before the big events. And since they make the purchase during lean season, they get big discounts. As a result, they generate huge income when the occasions come in. As a side note I am always amazed by the number of my customers who seem surprised by our support during Mother's and Valentine's Day!

2. They Execute the Plans

Successful businesses succeed because they have come up with an achievable plan and execute them accordingly. I've seen the plans my customers make and they are nothing more than just a list of things to do with dates they need them to be done. Let's say, if your goal is to post daily on Instagram then do it with no excuses. You can even take advantage of different marketing automation tools to regularly publish your content online. Tools like Buffer and Hootsuite are of big help. The point is it doesn't matter what your tactics are, you need to follow through and do them.

3. They Understands The Value Of The Term 'Spending Money To Make Money'

Spending Money to Make Money is an old but accurate statement. This simply means you have to invest to make profit. So when it comes to marketing, successful florists does not make any second thoughts to spend because they know it's worth it. Good online advertising will cost money from setting up to analyzing the results. Using Google Adwords, doing SEO, and hiring professionals to help you leverage your business are worth the investment. So, don't skimp on your marketing and advertisements budget because they can drive your enormous profit.

4. They Understand Their Physical Market And Are Targeted In Their Approach.

Successful florists are very strategic in their approach especially on their marketing, their products, and their delivery areas. You have to have a process in place from order-taking to the delivery to minimize your expenses and maximize your income. Moreover, you should be detailed and deliberate so your customers will receive the best service while you generate more returns. So what should you do to make the best for your business?

a) Limited Delivery Areas Professional florists know when to say yes and no. They only accepts order if they know they can deliver, otherwise they don't commit. It's better to make $1000 with $500 pure profit than $2000 with $50 profit to none. To make this possible, limit the delivery to areas you have access to. This strategy also helps you in your marketing especially when targeting keywords. Instead of spending on general keyword terms like Flowers Delivered, it would be best if you target specific suburbs or locations. This technique proves to works well on SEO and advertising campaign.

B) Limited Product Catalogues Most professional and successful florists have limited product catalogues instead of offering all kinds of flowers and sundries. Apart from it is easier and cheaper to prepare, it also gives you a unique identity that premium clients understand and pay for. This sets you apart from the general market. And, it would be easier for you to promote your uniqueness and your florist choices to the people, who know and trusts you. So instead of being the jack-of-all-trades, you can just focus on improving your products and services to meet or even exceed your customer's expectations.

5. They Are In the Business For A Long Term Goal

There's never a thing called overnight success. All successful businesses today are the results of years of hard work, sleepless nights, perseverance, and dedication. The same is true in the flower shop industry. It takes time to build your identity before you can get consistent attention from your prospects, influx of customers, and continuous stream of income. You have to invest time and money, not to mention the years of learning to identify the most practical marketing strategies, to help you success on your endeavor.

6. They Are Consistently Measuring Their Success and Failure

We all know that a successful florist make tangible and achievable plans and execute his plan of actions properly. However, not all the time it works. Lucky if it is. So it is necessary for you to measure the results of your execution and gauge if it converts or not. By tracking down the results, you will know what are working and not. This will help you identify future strategies for your business. The same with marketing, if a campaign does not deliver results then there's something you need to modify or improve. Be flexible if it calls for a change but never ever lose sight to your goals.

7. They Understand That The Majority Of Online Floristry Customers Have Little To No Brand Loyalty

Florists understand the online floristry market. They know that the majority of consumers have little to no brand loyalty or brand recognition. Majority of their traffic is generated from ad-hoc searches that do not include a brand name. And, these are searches generated from advertising or organic links. This is because customers only rely on Google to search for the best flower shop nearby. And this happens all over again when they need to make a purchase after several months. So instead of reaching out to the previous flower shop, which they made a deal with, they go through the same process of searching for a florist on Google and clicking on the advertisements or organic links that catch their eye. And, this affects where and how you should spend your money. Aim to spend more of your budget on acquiring new customers. And keep track of the results so you know how much each sale actually costs you. As a business, your goal is to convert leads into paying customers and make them return clients. Don't forget to market to your existing customers. You should also market to your existing customers. Build your customer database and use different marketing strategies to reach out to them. Email marketing absolutely works for florists especially during major events such as Valentine's and Mother's Day.

What Other Things Do Successful Florists Do?

• They understand the power of online advertising.
• They understand the value of the term spending money to make money.
• They use and understand different statistics tools such as Google Analytics and Google Webmaster.
• They have excellent product descriptions and web content.
• They produce unique and compelling content.
• They change and improve their website content and product descriptions regularly.
• They plan and prepare for the special occasions and well in advance.
• They value marketing.
• They have products which are easy to make but visually very impressive.
• They follow up on both positive and negative comments on social media.
• They market in different countries not just Australia because they know there are people who send flowers overseas.
• Their SEO and Adwords campaigns are inclusive of the minor keywords as well as the big ones.
• They target specific locations for marketing.
• They are the local florist and they build trust on their website.
• They pay attention to what their competitors are doing.

Conclusion

If you want to be really successful in the flower shop industry, set specific objectives and execute your plan of actions accordingly to create momentum until you achieve your goals. Measure your successes and failures and tweak your plans if necessary until you find out what tactics work and not. It is also helpful to target the local market and adapt to the changes all the time. Most importantly, always look for new customers while you take care of your existing ones.