Use An Automatic Florist Website To Make Dales On The Internet
Internet came to Toronto as a public media and started gaining public acceptance, circa 1997. Lots of writing and wild predictions accompanied Net’s arrival in newspaper, magazines and books. It is interesting to look back more than dozen years later and compare what we see about Internet today with the predictions, at the beginning. Internet and shopping on the Net was primarily associated with new efficiencies of doing business leading to better pricing for products and services for the benefit of customers. Internet gurus predicted massive and almost compulsory adoption of Internet as a main merchandising media, in all sectors of the economy. Those businesses not willing to adapt the Internet fast enough were in business jeopardy.
At the beginning I was a member of gifts and florists retail category in Toronto, today I can reflect back on this sector. I compare the predictions with our situation today. Florists in delivery business were expected to be one of first sectors to do business on the Net and serve clients in a better way. Florists in Toronto were mostly pragmatist business people, not a technology fans and never great risk takers, willing to jump into the unknown. Most of florists did not know what to do, how to do it, but we were quick targets of so many web design companies looking for business and many using scare tactics to get florists to sign up for web designs. Web design companies were pointing to the International organizations being engaged in sending flowers world-wide and using them as the business model for any small florist in Toronto, willing to be fast and create a website. People were expected to do all shopping on the Net, with very little business remaining for the traditional retailers, left behind. Some scary thoughts and predictions were being cultivated, including by the futuristic trends, assessing book by Faith Popcorn, very popular at the time.
Other than smelling the roses and purchasing flowers for themselves or taking them home, people were expected to rush to the Internet and do all flowers ordering and paying online. Clear efficiency of doing our shopping online 24/7 would lead to the lower prices and the online florists were expected to adjust their pricing to the new conditions. After all, flowers and gifts belong to the categories with one of the highest retail mark ups in the service economy.
Shopping on the Net means a shopping from a photo accompanied by a product description. Online shopping was explained to be done in a fully robotic way, with no live person from the merchant side involved. This kind of shopping means great convenience for the consumers since there is no need to go out, but shop from the home or office 24/7 and pay online with your credit card in a secure manner.
That was the blue print for florists in Toronto, but how does it match with real live execution and experience that local florists gained over the years? Definitely there was a dramatic shift to the Internet shopping in Toronto and GTA for flowers and gifts, when more people gained their confidence in safety of online shopping. Some traditional floral retailers in Toronto have moved out of their retail stores to the more economical locations in industrial parks and concentrated their business entirely on the web. Majority of florists in Toronto kept their retail location and just added a website to complement their traditional way in retail business. First were brochure type websites soon to replaced with new websites providing full automated shopping basket and credit cards processing. Secure transmitting of credit card information to the merchant for a manual bank approval is more preferable to the florists for number of reasons.
There are some business reasons behind this preference. Business requires flexibility in prices due to possible substitutions. Many times, prices have changed and website update lacks behind or products ordered might not be available. Substitutions are common place in floral business online.
Toronto florists have come to a conclusion that floral business online is not exactly as painted in the beginnings. Web design companies that were introducing florists to the Net, never explained the real complexities and costs of doing business online. It was in their self-interest to discuss web design costs only and keep florists in the dark about all additional costs connected with traffic to the website and its promotion. Many florists-retailers were under a false illusion that after the web design costs and monthly hosting, all additional costs are free. Recognition that traffic coming under popular keywords can be expensive and equivalent to the price paid for rental location in Downtown Toronto.
Traffic is very valuable and having a website does not guarantee any placement on search engines quarry results. Your floral website has to be optimized to appear in the top three search results and any lower ranking means much lower results on a business side.
Ad Words or pay-per-click are additional promotional programs and it can be an expensive alternative. Participation in the program should be left to the expert who will charge a monthly management fee.Unless you have a plenty of time, it is better to leave pay-per-click to the expert. You have to compete with other florists for the top position on sponsored search results, driving the price for your keywords up. Since seven of ten searchers prefers to click to the natural search results, rather than a sponsored searches, it is better to pay to have your web site fully optimized. Your monthly costs of harnessing the traffic to your web site might be equivalent to the monthly price to pay for a prime location around Yonge and Bloor.
The next fallacy of doing business on the Internet, had been an expectation of automating all retail functions and having a lower payroll. Although Internet shoppers order online, they still require personal service and assurances that their order is safe and nothing will go wrong. There is nothing better for a shopper than to be able call your local Toronto online florist and discuss details of order, you have just placed online.
If a Toronto florist does not provide a phone number along with his business address, listed on the web site, Internet shoppers will move on to the next available website. Net shoppers are looking for a local Toronto florist with a real store in Toronto and selling in Canadian dollars. Shoppers request talking to a well informed employee, regarding the details of their order placed online. Net purchaser would like to avoid placing an order with a flower-broker, w website soliciting orders online, only to sell to a real florist to fill the order. Regardless how well you explain on your website your products, business and delivery policies, Net shoppers will call and ask the same questions about it. People are looking for comfort that their orders for the loved ones are well taken care of. Customers’ service in the age of Net shopping is still alive and necessary part of doing business online. It is necessary to keep the phone lines open 7 days a week minimum of 12 hours a day. Customer service personnel should have a great product knowledge and ability to handle all situations including the problems.
Just providing few short notes based on personal and business experience doing a business as a traditional Toronto florists and moving online, where most of business comes from these days.
Are you a Toronto flowers delivery shop looking for online promotion? Check out the Toronto flowers online directory, that has a separate section for Mother’s Day flowers delivery.