Archive for the ‘Ecommerce’ Category

Is your flower shop online? Online sales $250bn by 2014.

Monday, March 8th, 2010

The web research firm Forrester predicts that US online sales will be $250 billion by 2014. It’s a big number but something about the Forrester report is even more surprising and relevant for florists.

You probably bought some of your Christmas presents online because you were too busy to make it to the mall. But that number is still growing, all the more reason to get your flower business online. Some highlights from Forrester:

> e-commerce sales will be 8 percent of all retail sales in the US by 2014

> In 2009, 154 million people in the U.S. bought something online, or 67 percent of the online population (4 percent more than in 2008)

E-Commerce Spending $250bn by 2014

So what is the big surprise? It’s the amount of buying that’s influenced by websites. Think about all the people researching their cars before they head down to a dealer to make a purchase. Forrester’s crystal ball says that purchases influenced by websites will growth to $1.4 billion (that’s right billion!) by 2014.

There is a clear lesson here for florists — your website is another version of your shop window. It’s the tool that prospective brides or buyers of sympathy flowers use to check your store’s credibility. And it can be a tool to help aide your online sales, particularly for customers that don’t regularly buy flowers. Your website is an influencing tool and just maybe your best brand building asset aside from the flowers themselves.

Posted in Ecommerce | 7 Comments »

Will FTD, Teleflora, 1-800 Flowers blow it on Valentine’s Day? Watch Twitter!

Wednesday, February 10th, 2010

Last May the web was abuzz with complaints about the big florist brands — what will happen this Valentines’ Day? Big holidays have always been a chance for people to complain about these companies’ problematic service, but never before had this ire been so spectacularly captured and documented. Facebook and Twitter lit up on Mother’s Day with issues, apparently many Moms didn’t receive their flowers from FTD, even though buyers placed orders way before the big day.

Twitter is a service that allows people to make short comments for their friends and the world to see.  Twitter now lets people search its users’ comments — search for “Teleflora” or “FTD” on twitter.com and you will get an abundance of good and bad comments. These posts are now starting to show up on Google — search for “FTD” on Google and you might get a news story or a timely Twitter post right at the top.

The same goes for  your flower shop.  A Google search for your store could easily show a positive Twitter post or a negative one right at the top of search results. It’s the kind of publicity that could make or break your business.


Complaints about FTD on Twitter for Mother's Day

So what is in store for Valentine’s Day and what does all this mean for your flower business?

Brand and brand loyalty are changing in the era of the Internet. Successful brands used by millions of people can literally be born overnight. Brands can also be damaged or even destroyed overnight, thanks to the speed with with news travels through Twitter, Facebook, and online news.

This can be great news for a local florist.

Spend the time investing in an online presence (build a blog, create a Facebook page, create online contests and press releases) and you can dramatically improve your online and offline standing. But there is a danger also. Your customers are watching you more closely than ever. But beware, screw up that order and your current and future customers are likely to hear about it.

Posted in 1-800 Flowers, Ecommerce, FTD, Holidays, Technology, Teleflora, Uncategorized, Valentine's Day | 3 Comments »

CNN: “Flower shops are lagging five to six years” in technology compared to other retailers

Monday, January 4th, 2010

CNN Small Business fields a nice question from a Georgia-based florist on how to be profitable in a down economy. The CNN witer highlights how far behind retail florists are with technology compared with other retailers:

“It is imperative you become technically savvy,” says Riewe, adding that most flower shops, compared to other retailers, are lagging by five or six years. He suggests using point-of-sale software to collect information from those who send and receive your flowers. Using the data he collects, Riewe sends out “preferred customer” cards, which offer an opportunity to earn reward points and be notified by e-mail of special offers.

There are some other good, non-technology tips that we all probably know but it’s good to remember:

1. Keep track of what’s in every order, make sure you’re not “overstuffing”

2. Contests to get people in the store

3. With flowers, it’s better to under-order than over order

Click here to see the CNN article.

Posted in Ecommerce, Technology | 4 Comments »

Search Engine Optimization for Florists #1 – Google PageRank

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

So how do you get your florist ecommerce site visible by search engines? How can Search Engine Optimization and how can it help your site? This is the first in a series where we talk about how you can improve your florist ecommerce website to garner more hits from search engines.

The key to raising your site’s rank in search engines is Google’s PageRank — a measure of your site’s and site pages’ importance. This ranking rises largely based on how many sites are pointing to yours and how important those sites are. You can check your page ranking on this site.

Check your florist ecommerce site for free on this Google PageRank viewer

Internal linking plays a key role in the PageRank. Pages on your site that have the higest number of links from other pages on your site will get the highest internal ranking. Typically the homepage (index.html) will have the highest ranking.

External links are the main drivers of your florist site’s PageRank. Take the  search results for the word “rose” for example. The first page that comes up in Google is a Wikipedia entry on roses– and the reason is because that page has the highest number of other sites (and the highest number of important sites like the New York Times and USA Today) with pages about roses pointing to that Wikipedia entry.

So how do you raise the number of external links pointing to your site?

Incentivize Customer Reviews: Start by getting your customers to write reviews of your site in online directories like Yelp, InsiderPages, and others. Think about creative ways to encourage good reviews, including discounts and prize drawings.

Buy Online Advertising: Online advertising from reputable sites like YellowPages.com actually increases your search engine ranking as well.

Post Videos: Post informational videos of about your company, including commercials, interviews with staff, and how-to segments on sites like YouTube. Create a “channel” for your business.

Court Publicity: Most important of all, you need to court publicity from your local newspapers and links from local, city-specific websites. Because these sites will typically have a high PageRank themselves, they will drive significant number of hits and increase your ranking.

Your site’s PageRank is mostly driven by the number of external links pointing to your site — make this the focus of your efforts to promote your website.

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Posted in Ecommerce, SEO | 6 Comments »