SOCIAL MEDIA ESSENTIALS

Identifying the right networks for you: Creative social media strategies will help spread the word about the benefits of flowers and buying them from you, all while putting a smile on peoples’ faces. There are a lot of social media networks so it is important to understand their capabilities to see which is best suited for your business. The following are some of the most popular networks and quick summaries of how to use them to further your business.

Instagram

Instagram is a photo and video-sharing social network that allows users to upload media that can be edited with filters and organized by hashtags and geographical tagging. Users can browse content by tag and location, view trending content, like photos, and follow others to add their content to a personal feed. Instagram is a visual platform that allows you to curate your page to be beautiful and engaging.

Instagram Features:

• Reels– short fun content videos (get tips for filming and posting here)
• Stories– casual sharing that only lasts 24 hours
• Direct Messenger– connect with other businesses or customers through video, call, text, or photo message.
• Shopping– create a storefront and let customers browse and shop directly on your page.
• Live– film and share live videos with your followers.
• Get started on Instagram

YouTube

YouTube is helpful for showing customers videos of your work, creating a hub for fans, and building a long-term home for content. Many use Youtube for demonstrating their work and posting how-to videos because viewers come to Youtube for instructional demos and long-form videos. Uploading content to Youtube creates a hyperlink that is convenient for sharing across most social channels and sending videos to clients.  For more information on how to get started on YouTube Click here.

Tips for video posts:

• Help your viewers learn by providing them with videos on how to care for their flowers or arrangements.
• “Favorite” and comment on the videos of your followers.
• Tag your videos with keywords to optimize them for search.

Examples:  McQueens Flowers’ Crafted by You video to promote their flower subscription, Gillespie Florists posts wedding setups, tutorials, and pricing strategy videos. 

Facebook

Facebook allows you to showcase your business’s unique offerings, build a community, and market to Gen X-ers, Gen Y-ers, and Millenials. Users can upload photo albums, or videos, create status and location updates, add stories that only last 24 hours, check-in at locations, post live videos, and send direct messages to other companies. Learn more here. 

Tips for posts:

• Do not over post: Limit your posting to about 5 times per week. This will prevent your followers from un-following your page due to information overload.
• Facebook users respond well to images. Whenever possible, include captivating images in posts (luckily you have beautiful arrangements to help with this!)

Example: Bloomtastic Florist uses Facebook to offer weekly deals to their page’s fans. They also use contests to help spread awareness and increase follower engagement. Highlighting recent flower arrangements on your page can help spark customer interest, especially around major holidays.

Twitter

Twitter facilitates open dialogue by allowing you to interact directly with current and prospective customers. It provides a way for customers to share with you their flower questions, concerns and more, within 140 characters.

Tips for tweets:

• Be sure to include links to your website or at least a way for potential customers to get in touch.
• Follow flower-related Twitter handles (@FlowerFactor, for example) and retweet relevant posts to your followers.
• Use popular industry or event hashtags to attract users (e.g. #FlowerFact, #MothersDay)
• Twitter conversations typically occur in real time, making for a short post lifespan. As a result, it is encouraged to post more often on this channel than you would on Facebook.

TikTok

TikTok is the leading destination for short-form mobile video. In 2021, TikTok became the most popular web address in the world, according to cloud computing services company Cloudflare. Instagram, Facebook, and google may be the primary online drivers for florists today, but TikTok may soon follow, especially since the social media platform is popular among Gen Z and millennials — florists’ future customers.

• Getting started on TikTok
• SAF Resources: 6 Tips for Getting Started on TikTok |safnow.tempurl.host
• SAF Resources: Floral Management Magazine : November/December 2022

Pinterest

With virtual “pinboards,” Pinterest is a social bookmarking tool that lets you collect and arrange images that are often linked to a web page for more information. You can also post your own pictures to your Pinterest boards. Customers can follow you and you can follow them. It is an aspirational environment primarily for women, to collect items they are interested in. For more information on how to sign up for Pinterest, see “Pinning 101.”

Tips for pins and pinboards:

• While you can pin images from your own site, it is also good to pin pictures from other sources.
• You can tweet or share your pins to Twitter and Facebook to help expand your network across all three platforms.
• Be sure to tweet and “Like” other users’ pins, which shares the item on Twitter or as an image on your Facebook timeline. Sharing helps increase online WOM recommendations for specific products, and maximizes the potential of getting in front of a new audience in a more authentic way.
• Consider other lifestyle extensions of your florist boutique. Recipes and food-related items are popular on Pinterest; consider making an edible flower recipe board. Similarly, because women’s apparel and hairstyles are often quite popular, consider a board of floral clothing prints or one of flower head pieces.
• Add a home decorations board of how flowers enhance different rooms. For example, Gramercy Park Flower Shop’s Home Decor Board

Example: Some florists have Pinterest boards that reflect their brands’ essence, design, inspiration for products and services, or company culture. Customers “pin” pictures from florists’ boards to their own, sharing the beautiful creations with their friends. Take a look at Concord Flower Shop

CREATE COMPELLING CONTENT FOR YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA CHANNELS

Content is the core of any social media strategy.

Voice

Your brand personality – People have personalities and are interested to know more about your company if it has a personality, too. Do not talk at them, talk to them. What you post on your personal profiles is the same. It is a scrapbook of your brand’s “life,” not a snapshot. In addition, it is not a media channel solely for promotions, but a friend, too, so get to know your followers.

Authenticity – In order to engage in honest conversation you must be authentic when you post on social media. Your messages should connect with your followers and add value to them. Brand stories need to be real. Audiences are much savvier now, and they do not want to be sold anything. They want to believe that they came to these decisions themselves, and if brands lie or deny who they are, audiences will see through it.

Consistency – Use a voice that is consistent throughout your social media sites and is in a genuine and engaging tone of voice. Have a seamless presence across all social platforms with content and interaction. Your audience will get to know and trust you when you do this.

Content planning

Content themes – Synthesizing messages and content into a small set of stories or story themes that can be expressed many ways over time. You want to tell consistent stories more than simply stay “on message” and focus on “ownable” topics that support the business.

Content calendars – Use tools such as Google Docs and Google Calendars to create a calendar of your posts. You can reschedule posting dates by easy drag-and-drop. Using Google Docs allows you to create different views of your calendar to get a deeper understanding of what you are posting, when and why. Content calendars are great because you can have posts around major holidays prepared and in the calendar, at least a month in advance. You can also integrate occasional Facebook posts and tweets into content calendars that highlight specific Pinterest boards (e.g. Easter or wedding flowers).

Content types

Original content – When developing any social media content, you want to make sure that it is interesting, valuable and relevant to the audience.

Engagement – Keep your audience engaged with a continuous stream of interesting and memorable content. Invite them to answer open-ended questions and participate in polls.

Shareability – Make sure your content is “snackable,” so good that people feel compelled to share it. It cannot be too big and it must be easy to share. Sweepstakes, competitions, videos, and pictures help increase reach and follower engagement. When followers share your posts on their own social accounts, they market your product for you and help drive follower acquisition growth.

User-generated content – Researchers have found that today’s consumer is less influenced by owned media, and more swayed by real people. Let your consumers do the talking on social media by inviting them to submit pictures of their bouquets and discuss their experiences at your flower shop.

Third-party content – Positive mentions in social networks, blogs, forums and micro blogs drive increased sales and long-term customer value for small businesses. Compelling and relevant social content paired with influential third-party endorsements will significantly improve social network results. For example, when a blogger shares a video from your YouTube page, on his or her blog.

The power of pictures – Standing out in followers’ newsfeeds has never been harder than it is today—but visuals have proven to have an engagement that is 120% higher than any other on Facebook. Boring product shots do not provide value to you or your followers. Pictures must be relevant to your audience. For example, post pictures of unique flower arrangements to further promote your store’s offerings.

BUILD A HEALTHY FAN BASE

Point of purchase

Once you have set up pages on different social media channels, make sure your customers know about them.

• Remind customers to “Like” and “Follow” your social channels.
• Have links to your pages printed on your business cards and on receipts. You can also include these links in your signature on business emails.
• Distribute handouts and other print collateral to promote your channel. For example, printing the URLs of your social sites on the boxes and wrappers of your flower arrangements.
• Provide incentives. For example, only inform people about deals on your social media platforms instead of in the store, encouraging current and potential customers to visit your pages.

Website

Make sure to fill out the bio section on all of your social profiles. Include an overview of your business, contact information, and a link to your website. This will make your communication strategy cohesive. In addition, you can integrate social feeds on your website so your customers can see in real-time what you post. This brings attention to your social channels and may encourage them to follow you.

WOM

Creative messaging on social media encourages Word of Mouth marketing. 84% of peers and colleagues are influenced to make a purchase by WOM. Florists must stimulate WOM throughout the sales and marketing process and into the customer relationship management cycle by offering them something new to talk about and reminding them to spread the word. Hosting a contest or handing out coupons from your shop are great ways to produce WOM marketing.

Paid media

Facebook and Instagram

The two platforms work together using the Meta Ads Manager, which is a unified ad creation tool that you can use to create and publish ads to Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram. Adding dollars to your posts drive a select target audience back to your page to increase the likelihood that users will follow your page.

• Posting ads for Instagram and Facebook through Meta ads Manager: See how to start your ad campaign here.
• Posting ads through Facebook
• Posting ads through Instagram 
• Tips for the best-performing Facebook and Instagram ad formats.
• Facebook boosted posts – A boosted post is a post to your Page’s timeline that you can apply money to in order to boost it to an audience of your choosing. This is the simplest way to advertise on Facebook. Boosted posts differ from Facebook ads because they are not created in Ads Manager and don’t have all of the same customization features.