Why WSs are out-selling most florists

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CHR

CHR

Design matters
Nov 28, 2002
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Anaheim
www.avantegardens.com
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CA
Unless you're on an email list, you simply cannot believe the barrage of deals being thrown at shoppers by WSs/OGs.

While checking out prices for V-Day comparisons, I was in a number of WS shopping carts to see how delivery/services charges and discounts were applied. I never completed any transactions, but one company - FTD - used the email address I entered to begin a virtual onslaught of marketing messages. In 16 days I received 17 email offers.

I've attached some of them to this post. I hope every florist, especially FTD members, sees how few - if any - of the advertised products were florist delivered. Also note just how deep the discounts were.

The shocker was their V-Day offer - sent when they clearly weren't able to handle consumer complaint calls. The one Friday 2/16 - Roses & Alstroe for $18.99 - makes most every local flower shop look like a rip-off.

I could have opted out of receiving the emails after the first one, but chose to continue to watch their sales pitches as the holiday progressed. How many consumers simply wait until the price/product hits their target and hit 'buy'?

These are attractive pieces with highly competitive prices.

To FTD members, are they offering you comparable campaigns to your customers? When we had a TF site, they sent 2-3 on a major holiday but never included a discount or incentive. (Last year TF sent out our Christmas images for V-Day, but that's another story.)

To other FC members - are you using email at even 1/10th the potential as FTD?

As much as we know these guys hurt our bottom lines, are we failing to really aggressively compete?

(See more offers on the second post.)
 

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simply more examples of how DSs are marketing companies, not flower companies. These corps will not rest until they totally destroy any connotations between the words "value" and "local florist" in the minds and hearts of the typical flower consumer.

It's war, I tell you, and the funny thing is that you FTD "partners" (excuse me while I snicker) are providing the marketing capital to the very company that is actively soliciting *your* local customers to bypass you and order direct.

Doh!
 
CHR said:
To other FC members - are you using email at even 1/10th the potential as FTD?

As much as we know these guys hurt our bottom lines, are we failing to really aggressively compete?
Click to expand...

At this point, I am not interested in an aggressive campaign that involves junk mail or discounting. I have spoken with a few customers about the online selling of flowers and they offer an interesting point - they are inundated with "(favorite profanity) flower ads." Every time they open their credit card bill, magazine, e-mail, etc. they see ads for flowers. Some customers will name a brand like FTD or Teleflora, but they are lumping them all together under the umbrella of florists.

I think real florists need to separate themselves from these companies. Not follow them. I don't have the answer, but I won't play the games that the OG's are playing.
 
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12BUcks

12 BUcks, why are you so negative? Talk to those on this board that are FTD and they will tell you how they are using FTD and FTD is not using them. Right, bloomz.

Guys, like bloomz, have the money and marketing knowhow to battle FTD. Ask him, florists are winning the battle and FTD is failing. Heck, every florist is seeing revenues grow by millions every quarter, right guys.

And supporting FTD to direct the consumer to directship product vs florists delivered product is not working. Those millions of dollars in sales, they continue to capture from florists are just smoke and mirrors.

Now if you don't believe me just ask? I think Boss said he's using them too!

Now let me sit back take a big toke of this funny stuff and go back into the world of most florists.
 
sfox said:
12 BUcks, why are you so negative? Talk to those on this board that are FTD and they will tell you how they are using FTD and FTD is not using them. Right, bloomz.

Guys, like bloomz, have the money and marketing knowhow to battle FTD. Ask him, florists are winning the battle and FTD is failing. Heck, every florist is seeing revenues grow by millions every quarter, right guys.
Click to expand...

Fox you have been smoking something or have you still just not had a good night's sleep? I surely don't remember ever saying we are beating FTD. But that sure doesn't make me want to curl up in the defeatist corner. I know of know that are winning the battle but I do know of many who have given up and lost the battle and gone out of business by not fighting modern technology with modern technology.


Cathy - I'm glad you mentioned that. I get on everybody's mailing list and I get an ftd or florist.com, with the occasional flowersua.com one, pretty much every single day. I once heard Soenen say "without email we would be dead". So their research has shown it's worth it to inundate consumers. And I'm afraid to send more than once month.

I don't know how I got on From You Flowers list - but they are incredible spammers - they should be selling viagra. I get their pieces, often 8 at the exact same time, sometimes 4 or 5 times A DAY! Last week they probably spammed me 200 to 400 times. They were still sending at 4PM ON VD. And they have no "remove me" link. I'd just bet they are violating laws.

But all of this leads me to believe I/we should greatly up our emailings. I just hate spam so much I'm parenoid to do it.
 
bloomz said:
But all of this leads me to believe I/we should greatly up our emailings. I just hate spam so much I'm parenoid to do it.
Click to expand...
Floral Management -Harold Hoogasian said:
“Initially, I was concerned about contacting people too much,” Hoogasian
says. “But last year, I sent out an e-mail reminder to encourage people to order early for Valentine’s Day. Out of 7,000 e-mails, only 12, 15, maybe 20 said, ‘Take me off.’ I realized the frequency that people object to e-mails is low.”
Click to expand...

I think customers, real valid customers who have had some access to your name, your store, don't mind hearing from you - especially if it's not all promotional stuff, or should I say obviously promotional.

tracy
 
Tracypieface said:
I think customers, real valid customers who have had some access to your name, your store, don't mind hearing from you - especially if it's not all promotional stuff, or should I say obviously promotional.

tracy
Click to expand...
Absolutely correct !! In line with what Harold Hoogasian said, We sent out 20,000 e-mails (McShan Florist) on 3 seperate days within a 10 day period for Valentines Day and got a total of 23 spam reports. I must say we were concerned more about volume than spam. Yes, Valentines because of this was a tremendous holiday.
By marketing your customers properly with e-mails and not just selling something all the time they will become more receptive to repetitive e-mails.
Believe me it works..
Try it for Secretaries Week, Easter and Mothers Day... Get your customers to read your e-mail first not your competitions.
 
yes i too started a very effective direct mail campaign this valentine, sending 3 bulk out in two weeks, using this free, open source PHP mailing software. Our db contains about 500 customer email, and I believe only one opt-ed out of the two weeks of our mailings.

In fact, many customers actually thanked us for reminding them about our services. This bulk mailing list software is so easy to use that I am willing to provide free bulk mailing setup and support for any FC member that need a bit of help with it.

The emailer sends the mail in batch format, so most if not all spam filters are defeated by it.

If you have a database of customer emails, and are looking to start a email campaign, contact me and I will work with you as time permits to get your marketing started.

Why let the big guys have all the fun...BTW, the email is available in both plain-text and html format, if you are interested in design service etc etc.
 
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We have to compete !
Ironically they do well with their methods and we, the florists, need to refine and capitalize on their eforts in a suitable way to enhance our businesses. We are not like them, nor will we ever be, but there is a valuable lesson being taught to us by the use of emails. Heck, FTD, 800 and TF believe that is the future as I have heard hundreds of times.
 
one of the most important things i can do for my shop, yes, even in this little town of mine, is keep my name and my products at the top of my customer's minds all the time. (Marketing success for me would be to hear someone say "well, you are the only shop in town aren't you?") not only does this make your customers more aware of my shop, they are also more aware of flowers as a gift.. the competition is so great for our customer's $$ on what we would consider our holidays Valentines and Mother's day.. how can we keep silent??!! Yet so many do.. "oh it's a small town and everybody knows what we do.. bla bla bla.." that's not enough!
there are so many non-intrusive ways to do it.. newsletters, reminder service, thank-yous, etc etc
individual shops can make a huge difference in their own markets with more agressive marketing..reaching out to their own customers.
 
bloomz said:
I don't know how I got on From You Flowers list - but they are incredible spammers - they should be selling viagra. I get their pieces, often 8 at the exact same time, sometimes 4 or 5 times A DAY! Last week they probably spammed me 200 to 400 times. They were still sending at 4PM ON VD. And they have no "remove me" link. I'd just bet they are violating laws.
Click to expand...
Definitley a violation of the CAN-SPAM Act:
  • It bans false or misleading header information. Your email's "From," "To," and routing information – including the originating domain name and email address – must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the email.
  • It prohibits deceptive subject lines. The subject line cannot mislead the recipient about the contents or subject matter of the message.
  • It requires that your email give recipients an opt-out method. You must provide a return email address or another Internet-based response mechanism that allows a recipient to ask you not to send future email messages to that email address, and you must honor the requests. You may create a "menu" of choices to allow a recipient to opt out of certain types of messages, but you must include the option to end any commercial messages from the sender.

    Any opt-out mechanism you offer must be able to process opt-out requests for at least 30 days after you send your commercial email. When you receive an opt-out request, the law gives you 10 business days to stop sending email to the requestor's email address. You cannot help another entity send email to that address, or have another entity send email on your behalf to that address. Finally, it's illegal for you to sell or transfer the email addresses of people who choose not to receive your email, even in the form of a mailing list, unless you transfer the addresses so another entity can comply with the law.
  • It requires that commercial email be identified as an advertisement and include the sender's valid physical postal address. Your message must contain clear and conspicuous notice that the message is an advertisement or solicitation and that the recipient can opt out of receiving more commercial email from you. It also must include your valid physical postal address.
Most likely an aggressive affiliate but FU Flowers is still responsible for the spam.

If you haven't deleted them, forward them all to the FTC at [email protected].
 
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David -

I'm a bit surprised those 1-800-Flowers emails don't promote multiple products. I guess they believe their customers are more persuaded by '$10 off' than by any particular floral design. Interesting. (This also reinforces my belief that 1-800's lack of profits reflects their reliance on discounts to drive traffic.)

We're very pleased with the results from our V-Day email campaign and got calls of 'thanks for the reminder' as well. No one has 'opted out' as a result of the mailing. :)

I'm with Bloomz and am far too afraid of being perceived as a spammer by barraging customers with emails. Don't like it myself and fear we'd alienate good clients.
 
CHR said:
...
I'm with Bloomz and am far too afraid of being perceived as a spammer by barraging customers with emails. Don't like it myself and fear we'd alienate good clients.
Click to expand...

I think I've seen web studies that show that the maximum number of marketing email people are willing to recieve is about one a month, without considering it spam.

Obviously, if you are promoting an exceptional deal, or are offering a more informative email then a "buy buy buy" one, I think people are much more forgiving and tolerent. Also, if they have a semi-personal relationship with your store and employees, they are always interested in "whats going on" tidbits...

Well, keep pounding that pavement...the only road to success in this business is to keep growing. Cost cutting alone will *not* lead you to financial success.
 
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CHR Working on the full blown Email list !

What we have been doing is sending out literature with every order as a public service to our customers. It has been received very well.
As far as Emailing, we have also done a public service announcement type campaign, geared toward the re-education of our customers.
I have yet to hear a negative from anyone and have received much praise for our dedication to the consumer.
We push the RF's to the max and provide extra information so the consumer can research on their own should they care to validate our statements.
If our campaigns bring us a 20% positive response we're happy, and some have been much higher.
Surely the day may come when someone says something negative but until that day arrives I'm more than willing to take the gamble.
The bottom line is that I want the business back, and agreesive measures are the only way it's going to happen.
 
We send one a month, with two - three before major holidays. It works very well for us. May have to change away from Constant Contact though. Like other people here, CC decided two days before V day that we might be spamming people and didn't want to send it--although they finally did.
 
Just noticed that the latest FTD email offer included the Birthday Bouquet of hydrangeas & gerbs. This is still delivered by florists only, right?

I have not done as much with emails I should. Got the right tools for sure, just need to do a better job of timing and delivering the right messages.
 
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