Cultivate’20 will be held July 111-14, 2020 at the Greater Columbus Convention Center.
For more information about this event, please visit OAF’s Website.
BloomsBy supports floral designers every step of their floral event planning. You can create professional wedding/event proposals, increase profits, create floral contracts, stem counts, and collect payments all with BloomsBy’s floral wedding management software available on PC/Mac and iPad app.
With BloomsBy Proposals, floral designers can create beautiful and professional proposals in a matter of seconds. No more lost and cluttered information, keep track of your clients requests in one location.
With the new BloomsBy Proposal user interface, BloomsBy proposals are easy to create, organize and manage. Floral designers are able to build a floral arrangement from the bottom up with flowers and supplies.
Add your business’ personal touch by adding a personalized message to each proposal with a customizable email template. Each client is different and adding that personal touch matters.
Add your customer’s inspirational photos to the proposal as a guide for creating the flowers for their special event.
Track, schedule, and take customer credit cards for deposits and payments.
Add markup, labor and then easily check to make sure you are pricing your flowers correctly. Making sure your weddings and events are fairly priced yet profitable.
With the BloomsBy Proposals flower catalog, it gives you the opportunity to record your pricing for your flowers and use these to help build your beautiful and professional proposals.
Build components like bridal bouquets, boutonnieres and more by adding the specified number of flowers for every arrangement.
Flowers and supplies composed to build your proposals can help generate a shopping list to order flowers and supplies.
Use BloomsBy proposals on your own computers, choose the best platform for you. Available on PC/MAC and iPad App.
BloomsBy understands that florist wedding and events are a core part of a floral business and creating beautiful proposals can be challenging.
We’ve all been there before: notes, images, spreadsheets, word documents and countless emails sent back and forth between your clients can be a nightmare. So why not use one program to make professional proposals and keep everything organized?
Get rid of the multiple programs and keep everything organized with BlooomsBy Wedding Floral Management Software.
Start giving your wedding and event proposals more impact with BlooomsBy Wedding Floral Management Software today and focus on what’s really important, your floral business!
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Floranext makes great florist software. Florist websites, floral POS, florist wedding/event proposal software, and florist technology. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.
2019 CONVENTION
July 26 – 28, 2019
Holiday Inn Louisville East Hurstbourne
More details TBA
For more information, please visit the Kentucky Florist Association website.
The Texas Floral Expo will offer two courses of study rather than an exclusive focus on design.
The Design Course of Study and the Business Course of Study relate to the needs of the individual offering the best possible education whether your passion is design or whether you feel the need to expand your business skills.
If design is your focus then you will be able to register for presentations that cover a multitude of design topics presented by the best in the industry.
If you are all about business there will be two and half days of specific programming covering a range of topics! Additional information can be found at the Texas State Floral Association website.
OAF Cultivate’19 will be held July 13-16, 2019 at the Greater Columbus Convention Center.
For more information about this year’s event, please visit OFA Website.
2019 – AIFD Conference – Awaken – Las Vegas
More information TBA
For more information on this event, please visit the AFID website.
Google is not only helpful for consumers, but it’s also good for businesses. As long as you can use that to your advantage by strengthening your business’s online presence, your floral e-commerce website can succeed.
Google My Business is Google’s one-stop shop for all things online for your business. It is an online platform that contains tools where you can manage how your business will look like in Google and Google Search.
Google My Business (GMB) improves your local SEO by:
* Giving you the options to add your business and the relevant details to Search and Maps
* Viewing and replying to customer reviews
* Adding photos
Google My Business’s Local guides allow people to contribute to the following:
*Adding information to Maps
*Adding photos
*Updating information on businesses they are familiar with or local to them
*Adding new places to the platform.
The program differentiates individuals into tiers, depending on how much they have contributed to Maps. The goal for them is to keep Maps updated and help other people be fully informed about the businesses and places around them.
Aside from adding data, Local Guides can also add reviews to business listings. However, they are considered to be more reliable users, thus their reviews appear more frequently and on top of the reviews list.
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Customers who come across your business, those who make a purchase or require service can be a Local Guide. It can be hard to tell Local Guides apart from normal customers. Local Guides reviews are trusted more by people just with the sheer fact that their reviews are given priority when displaying reviews on your listing.
You cannot just pick out Local Guides from your customers and give them the best service you can. The key here is to treat all your customers the same and give the best service as much as you can to everyone.
Encourage customers to leave reviews for your business listing in Google Maps.
When receiving Positive Reviews:
*Reply to reviews in your listing
*Make sure to thank the reviewer
*Offer them to return
*Try out a new service that you might have started on your business.
When receiving Negative Reviews:
*Be polite and courteous
*State the status of the concern or issue the review was having problems with.
*Apologize for the issue or concern
*Offer to replace or fix the issue
Doing this will give people the impression that you are very mindful of the concerns that your business has and responsive to your customer base.
Image via Shutterstock
The tools that GMB provides are beneficial in boosting your online presence, and most especially in the local setting. Taking advantage of these tools is thus invaluable in helping out your business grow.
Florists, have you been using Google my Business: Local Guides? Please share your thoughts and comments below!
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Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.
Over the past weeks, cybercriminals have attacked computers in Baltimore and other US cities, freezing computers, shutting down email, and interrupting real estate sales, water bills, health alerts and many other services.
We have collected some helpful tips so that your flower business won’t be the next victim of similar kinds of hack attempts!
Image via Shutterstock
Without having the most recent PC operating systems, like Windows 8.1 or 10, or up to date security patches, your floral business is at a high risk to be hacked. Many businesses who do not have up-to-date operating systems or security patches can experience the following:
Image via Shutterstock
1. Apply the latest patches: Make sure you have all your security patches up-to-date on your PC’s operating system. On Microsoft, here are some helpful hints for checking if you need a security update. If you’re on Mac, this article has instructions.
2. Don’t use outdated software: Use the recent operating system that Microsoft offers (Windows 8.1 or Windows 10). Windows 7 will no longer be supported by Microsoft starting January 14th, 2020! Older operating systems like Windows XP no longer receive security patches and are a huge security risk.
3. Download a Password Manager: Passwords are easier to guess than you think! Don’t use the same password for different sites. Use a password storage tool so save and protect passwords. If one of your passwords is compromised, other sites will not be compromised as well. We like 1Password.
4. Use two-factor authentication: Add an additional layer of security for at least your most critical services like banking, accounting, and email. When you log in with two-factor authentication (2FA), you will be sent a text message or verification code from an service like Authy or Google Authenticator.
We hope this information is helpful and allows you to run a successful and secured flower shop. Florists, please feel free to post any questions or comments below!
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Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.
A big thank you to everyone who participated in our annual Mother’s Day survey. Once again we received a strong response from our readers and members.
Results were based on the 347 retail surveyed by Floranext between May 15th through February 22nd.
List of a few randomly selected comments:
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Florists, was this Mother’s Day successful and resulted in more sales? What would you consider to implement that next year? Do you have any feedback on your 2019 Mother’s Day sales season? Your fellow florists would love to hear about it—please feel free to share in the comment section below.
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Floranext makes great florist software. Florist websites, floral POS, florist wedding/event proposal software, and florist technology. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.
May is officially here! A month of Spring Flowers, Mother’s Day and a month to cherish our four-legged furry friends!
As florists, you may have been asked the question time and time again, what flowers or plants are safe around animals?
Every pet owner knows their furry friend will chew on anything it can get into, and at some point it will gravitate towards plants and flowers. As beautiful as plants and flowers are, some can be particularly dangerous to our furry companions. Pets are members of the family, so the last thing we want is for them to get sick from flowers or plants that are toxic to them.
Of course, as florists, you don’t want customers who have pets to stay entirely away from all flower arrangements and plants, but it is good to be aware of what plants and flowers are toxic.
We hope this Florist Guide to Pet-Friendly Flowers and Plants are useful for your floral business and your customers!
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Aloe Vera
Amaryllis
Azalea
Baby’s Breath (toxic to dogs, safe for cats)
Begonia
Birds of Paradise
Carnation
Chrysanthemum
Daffodils
Dieffenbachia
Eucalyptus
Iris
Ivy
Mother in Law’s Tongue/Snake Plant
Narcissus
Oleander
Poinsettia
Tulips
Wisteria
Image via Shutterstock
Aster
Alstroemeria
Daisies
Fern Varieties
*Lilies (safe for dogs, toxic to cats)
Marigolds
Orchids
Pansies
Petunia
Roses
Snapdragons
Sunflowers
Spider Plant this
Violets
Zinnia
Image via Shutterstock
If you suspect that a pet has ingested a toxic plant or flowers, please contact your vet right away. Here are some signs:
For a full and complete listing of toxic and non-toxic plants, we recommend the ASPCA website for more information.
When customers are ordering flowers or a plant for a pet-friendly household, just take a few extra minutes to check the list! This will help strengthen the relationship between you and the customer and provides confidence to keep them coming back.
Florists, do you get asked a lot what is pet-friendly? What do you offer your customers when asked this question? Please share your thoughts and comments below!
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Floranext offers great florist software, florist POS, florist websites and florist wedding proposal software. Our florist technology products are built by florists, for florists. Let us know if you want a free demo or try our software for free here.
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