Useful marketing ideas for Florists in today’s digital marketing world. Learn ways you can grow your business online.
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MARKETING IDEAS,TIPS AND STRATEGIES FOR FLORISTS
Are you looking to grow your florist business and get more out of online advertising?
In many ways, the basics of running a flower shop haven’t changed much, at least not as far as the products go. A dozen roses mean the same thing that it did 50 years ago. When prom time rolls around, you increase your inventory of corsages. Funerals and weddings need their arrangements.
But, the way you reach customers has changed radically. People are more likely to find you online than just be passing by, and print ads, like the Yellow Pages, can no longer be relied on. Social media and online reviews are big influences on consumers. Increasingly, people just ask a digital assistant to find them a florist.
You also may be affiliated with various online florist services, including FTD, that require a reliable online ordering system.
Here are 10 essentials when it comes to marketing a flower shop in today’s digital world. Do each of these well, and your shop will flourish.
#1: Create a beautiful, functional website
The hub of your marketing and sales is your website. Most florists today conduct transactions on their website, meaning they need to use an e-commerce platform to process orders.
Your website needs to do several things well:
- It needs to look beautiful, giving people a positive impression of your work
- It needs to be easy to navigate so customers can find the arrangements they want and place their order
- It must be mobile responsive so people can navigate and place orders on their phones
Here is a design example:
Florist e-commerce sites allow you to add your arrangements as products. If you take online orders for delivery, be sure to have a page that details this service with info on minimum orders, same-day service and delivery areas with pricing.
Pro tip: Use professional photos
In many ways, your website is an extension of your shop. People expect to be able to view arrangements and choose something they love.
Your images must show your work at its best. Hire a professional photographer and get high-resolution images that let people use the hover over feature to get a good look at the arrangement.
Your most beautiful flowers will only look as good as their image, and since looks are everything with flowers, it pays to have exceptional images.
#2: Create a video commercial
Another effective way to give your website and shop visual appeal online is to create videos. Start with a short commercial video you can embed on your site, and optimize for on YouTube.
This serves as an introduction to your business and a nice first look at your shop.
Pro tip: Create video shorts for Facebook
As you work on inspired new arrangements, take a short video of your work. This makes great content to share on Facebook, and can also be added to your YouTube channel. Optimize your videos for various searches (for example, Wedding Flowers Dallas) and you can earn additional traffic from YouTube, which is a major search engine.
#3: Get active with social media management
Flower shops have a lot of opportunities to take advantage of social media, particularly Facebook.
Because Facebook is so visual, it makes for the perfect place to display your arrangements. You can add images of new arrivals, new arrangements and pictures from events. Better yet, you can get clients to share images of your arrangements, giving you a testimonial for their Facebook audience.
Every person who reacts to your post shows it on their News Feed, giving you more exposure. Also, everyone who reacts to your page can be put into an engagement audience so you can retarget them later with more specific ads.
Every event a client has, from weddings to birthdays, are an opportunity to highlight your arrangements in photos and tag your shop in the post. This kind of exposure is increasingly important and can spread across other platforms, like Instagram and Pinterest. Social media management lets people know who you are and what you do.
#4: Invest in social media marketing
While social media management is organic, free traffic, social media marketing makes use of paid advertising to hit specific target audiences on social media.
Facebook now offers more paid search tactics that you can probably use, so the task is to dial in the ones that work best for you.
As we said, you can retarget people who’ve interacted with your page or visited your website.
You can download a list of people who converted on your website, then create a lookalike audience to target people with similar characteristics.
Say you have a new line of bridal flower arrangements, and you’d like to get an ad in front of women who are engaged.
You can create that audience with Facebook targeting. Most life events, demographics or interests can be targeted with their paid social advertising.
Between organic brand marketing and paid advertising, social media can be one of your most effective sales channels.
#5: Master paid advertising
There once was a marketing service printed on yellow paper and left at people’s doorsteps. Now its main job is a doorstop.
Today, when people want to find a florist, they do it on Google. It’s a major advantage to have your business appear at the top of search results.
You do this in three ways.
The first is to use pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. You use the auction system (Google Ads to bid on keywords and gain placement at the top of the page. The top four results on any search page are all PPC.
Important tip: Florists need to take into account that a lot of local PPC advertising is dominated by big online services, like FTD and 1-800 Flowers. Analyze the bidding and determine if it’s going to be worth going up against that competition. If not, focus on the other two ways of getting listed.
The second is the Google My Business listing. This is a free listing that ties into local search and Google Maps. It’s important to optimize your description and service listing with the keywords, particularly for the areas you service. As a local florist shop, this listing will largely tie into your physical location. To get search results in other areas you service, you’ll need to run PPC ads. Also, more positive reviews will help your ranking.
The third is the organic listing of your website. This is driven by your search engine optimization (SEO) work and content marketing. Optimize your site for target keywords, get some backlinks into your site and blog on a regular basis to get high rankings.
Note that you can use your blog to optimize content for a variety of searches, including information on how to make the best use of flowers for different occasions. This is a great way to introduce your brand to leads doing research and get them into your marketing funnel.
When you do all these search tactics well, you can actually get three places on page one:
#6: Manage your reputation
For all your advertising, social media posting and website content, there is another type of content that’s — arguably — even more important. And you don’t create it. Your customers do.
We’re talking, of course, about the prowess of online reviews. Today, online reviews stand out as business content, and managing your reviews is a key part of building your reputation. People want to know what other customers think of your services, and they tend to trust those opinions more than your marketing content.
Just a look at the Google Places results shows how strongly reviews are featured:
Between Yelp, Facebook and Top Rated Local®, you can expect reviews to have a significant impact on your business.
There are two things you should do to create a positive review profile.
- Do work that deserves high praise. This is not just the beauty of your arrangements, but in the way you treat customers. Going above and beyond pays off with your reputation management.
- Ask your best customers to give you online reviews. Make sure those who appreciate your work the most say so online. You don’t want the voices of just a few whiners at the top of your review content.
Monitor what’s said about your shop online and respond to any legitimate complaints.
You want reviews that are authentic and positive. There is no better way to earn the trust of new customers.
#7: Use visuals and infographics
We’ve already alluded to the importance of visual content and images for florist marketing. Another type of content you can use on your website and social media is the infographic. This connects well with fast-paced consumers on mobile devices. Here is a good example:
#8: Develop local partnerships
Are you acquainted with the local funeral home director? Do you know that wedding planner downtown? What about the new catering company that just opened?
One of the most effective ways to generate new business is to develop referral partnerships with other local, complementary businesses. here are a lot of events that need flowers, so if you’re connected to the business organizing the event, you can get a lot of profitable gigs.
You need to do two things here. The first is to have a sterling reputation so people are comfortable referring you. The second is to network and meet other business owners.
To get the ball rolling, get some initial referrals to your partners. Once you’ve gotten them some business, they’ll be inclined to return the favor.
If you don’t cultivate these relationships, your competition will. The top florists in any city always have partnerships with other complementary, successful businesses.
#9. Harness the power of email marketing
Many of the strategies and tips we’ve covered so far are designed to help you get new leads and customers, but successful flower shops need both new and existing customers.
It’s always great to get new cutomers, but loyal, existing customers are the ones who will spend more with your business, make repeat purchases and refer you to others. It’s important not to overlook them.
Email marketing is a fantastic tool for building long-lasting relationships with your existing customers and driving repeat business. Plus, automation allows you to send out review requests, monthly newsletters, product recommendations and more in minutes.
#10: Get marketing help
If you are a florist in a city of any size and have some real competition, you’ll need to use the marketing tactics we’ve outlined to be successful. But just because you know this doesn’t mean you can do it all by yourself.
When you start adding paid search and social media marketing into the mix, these tactics become time-consuming to execute. Not only that, but all the copywriting and design work may be out of your skill sets.
There are several approaches you can take to getting some marketing help. You might have someone internally who is digitally savvy and can cover it for you. You can shop around and find specialists for each area (SEO, social media, etc.).
The best choice — in our admittedly biased view — is to work with an outsourced marketing team that can cover all these tactics for you. The advantage with us is that you get one resource that can handle all these tactics effectively and affordably, leaving you time to run your business.
It doesn’t any imagination at all to see that consumers today go on their phones to find services, like florists. Make sure you’re visible with your best content, and you’ll have a fresh flow of new customers today and in the future.
Originally published on 6/12/19
