Flowershopnetwork

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bloomz

bloomz

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To avoid topic drift on the other thread I will ask this here.

I've been watching these guys for some time and they seem to be doing a real good job - nice websites offered, their own transmission system (I think?) Good email marketing pieces.

Any negatives or other positives?
 
Jonathan,
We were a member for a year and received an email from them every time someone linked to our site from our page on their site BUT upon investigating I found the MAJORITY were search engine bots!
We consistently turn up number one in searches for "Flowers Bay Roberts Newfoundland" etc and they only turned up sometimes but never ahead of us. I hate that new 'Local' feature with the map as it is wrong and I've spent 2 years trying to get them to correct the balloons on the map in 'Local'.
I didn't try their web site feature as ours gets us quite a few orders but they did call once wanting us to fill an order they received. Email pieces are nice.
Rock on...............
 
It's the only system I'm using right now, and don't plan to change. It's affordable, its simple, you can understand their statments, you get a real 20/80 split. When you send out an order you charge a 3.99 relay fee which goes to FSN, that's all they get, no matter the size of the order. Unlike the others that take 7 or 8%. Their website is simple to use, doesn't require a second phone line, will even work well with dial-up (in case there is someone out there still using it). I have one of their paid websites to. They will let you customize it by sending in your own photos if you wish, you can write your own copy or have them do it for you. So, it's somewhat of a custom cookie cutter. If a consumer places a web order, you get the full 100% unliike FloralSource. You don't need to go buy a variety of custom containers and they do a good job listing real florists. But, I use them mostly for my outgoings because it's so inexpensive. However if you looking to fill a lot of incomings there are probably other choices to consider. My incomings are very unpredictable. Sometimes 2-4 per day, sometimes 2-4 days without.
 
Ditto to everthing Buzz said.
I started using them right before I dropped Teleflora last month and I, as a Newbie to this whole biz, find them VERY easy and VERY affordable.
I just couldn't stand paying Teleflora the extra $200-ish dollars every month. I've only received a few incoming orders since I signed on but I'm not so sure that's a big deal or not considering the few incomings that I received from Teleflora were not making me any money... any percentage that I was making was eaten up by fees so I feel like it's a wash.

Kim
 
Any Negatives?

All of you have convinced me not to go with so called Two Biggies. Now I'm considering FlowershopNetwork. I can tell that you have a hard time finding florists in some areas so I think I need something. Does anyone have any negatives with their service that I should be aware of ? Oh, and if you need to convince me of anything else..go for it!
 
have been using them for over 2 years, initially got on board because of their website. Didn't want to take the time to develop my own. Orders arrive via e-mail, that's the only tiny downside, you need to constantly monitor inbox as they only give you 30 minutes to accept or reject the order. (this is a new feature that was just offered to us). Prior to last month they called us every time we had an order and told us to check our e-mail. Now it is done automatically (no phone calls), they 'claim' we'll get more orders this way.
Their commission for outgoing orders is pulled from your checking account, payment for incoming orders arrives by weekly check. Like clockwork!
Someone else mentioned statements, we don't get any statements from them...
When orders come to you, you get ALL the sending customers information, name, address, phone #, and e-mail address so you can market back to them.
Order volume has been very good for us.
 
fax

We use Flowershopnetwork and our orders are faxed to us.
 
I was a member for a year. Not at all happy with the service. Did not receive one in-coming order during that year. After 5 months I wrote to FSN indicating that I was unhappy with their service and would like a refund of 6 months (I pre-paid the year). They refused to do anything. My membership expired in March. April 1 I get a call from a FSN sales person wanting me to join. I told her that I was a member but would not renew and that the hits to my web site did not justify the yearly cost. Then she tells me that I had over 400 hits to my web site in March! She just out right lied. I can monitor hits to my web site and it was not even close (however, I would love to have 400 hits to my web site in a month).

Just do your homework. They promise a lot but we found it came up short in many areas.
 
Those images they use are very nice - does anyone know where they got them?
 
mona said:
have been using them for over 2 years, initially got on board because of their website. Didn't want to take the time to develop my own. Orders arrive via e-mail, that's the only tiny downside, you need to constantly monitor inbox as they only give you 30 minutes to accept or reject the order. (this is a new feature that was just offered to us). Prior to last month they called us every time we had an order and told us to check our e-mail. Now it is done automatically (no phone calls), they 'claim' we'll get more orders this way.
Their commission for outgoing orders is pulled from your checking account, payment for incoming orders arrives by weekly check. Like clockwork!
Someone else mentioned statements, we don't get any statements from them...
When orders come to you, you get ALL the sending customers information, name, address, phone #, and e-mail address so you can market back to them.
Order volume has been very good for us.
Click to expand...
Sorry for the confusion on the Statements. They do not actually send out paper statements. I should have clarified that I was referring to the on-line reports that you can run.
 
purplegirl said:
I was a member for a year. Not at all happy with the service. Did not receive one in-coming order during that year.
They promise a lot but we found it came up short in many areas.
Click to expand...

Our experience exactly.
 
People can get your phone number from their website, and when they call you, you get 100% of those orders.
I've had at least half a dozen people call from out of the area to place an order and tell me they found us on the Flower shop network. I have no idea how many people find us through them and then don't mention it.

For me, the bottom line to why I like them is the fees. $200 per YEAR, or $16.67 a month, vs $250 plus per MONTH with TF. To me, that far outweighs not having lots of incoming orders.

A downside mentioned to me by someone else that used them was that your credit or debit card gets charged each time you send an order through them so it can be difficult, especially with a debit card, to stay on top of it. I use a credit card, so at the end of the week I print out my report, make sure everything adds up and then I make an electronic payment to my credit card to cover the orders. This way I'm on top of the money situation. Now, I don't get a shock every month when I get a $1200 TF bill.

I've been using Flowershop Network, exclusively now, for 3 months and I can honestly say that it was a very smart move for me. I send at least half a dozen orders a week (small shop here) and I've only had one problem and it wasn't anything that couldn't have happened with TF. I have more money in my account because I get to keep my 20 % and I have less of a headache trying to figure out my TF statement every month.

Every shop, big or small, had it's own needs, but I think it's worth checking out if you're tired of the higher fees of TF or FTD.

Good luck.

Kim
 
Flower Shop Network has an analytics page you can access (which I never do). However they send out a weekly email with some basic numbers and charts. For those interested here are some basic FSN numbers for my shop between 10/6/08 - 10/12/08:

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I've always thought it was a decent product however I have a friend in Portland who bought into their site and tells me she spent close to $1000 and has had I think she said 3 orders in 4 months now.
 
bloomz said:
I've always thought it was a decent product however I have a friend in Portland who bought into their site and tells me she spent close to $1000 and has had I think she said 3 orders in 4 months now.
Click to expand...

Haven't tried any of their other services, I only subscribed to their directory which I believe runs about $300.00 per year. I'd say we average about 1 incoming order per month from them, but get luke warm amount of traffic from them as you can see in the analytics report they sent me. However, I'm not sure how many of those hits were bots and how many were actual humans. We get a few conversions and some phone orders from customers who found us via their directory.

I'd say it's at least a break even proposition for us.
 
Those are some impresive numbers.

I just checked our access logs and google analytics.

So far about 140 vistors for the past year.

70% returning visters. (Hmmm)

29% bounce rate (little high I think)

I have a stand alone page that the link points to and again the numbers do match.

I still can't figure out who in the heck is in west hoolywood. Stop looking at my website and move on dammit.

It amazes me that out of the 50 states only 18 states have sent me vistors. To me its not doing that well and will be rethinking about resigning up.

The funeral and hospital sites are not doing well with only 1 visit so far from the hospital site.
 
Been with them for awhile, happier with them than the other ws. I get a nice check every week. The international MO is lower than tf and transmission fee is lower too. Florists can call direct if they want to avoid the 3.99 transmission fee to fsn. Their prices on the arrangements are more reasonable than the ws, and membership fee is so much more reasonable.
 
I get those analytic things also. I am not sure where they get their numbers, but my TF traffic stats do not correlate at all with these...I have been told they are all false and they just make them up, but I don't know...flowershopnetwork doesn't amount to too much in my traffic pattern especially not as much as they say..


Also if you don't send through them you will not get orders...I am going to be dropping them it is just another bit of money out the window..I probably do get enough orders a year to pay for the membership, but it is just overkill for me...I don't send through them and rarely receive, The few orders generated through their directory just doesn't make any sense...
 
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