11 Must-Haves for Your Floral Business Website

Choose photos for your website that represent you, your brand, and the type of clients you’re looking for.

Whether looking to buy or sell flowers or floral supplies, businesses and consumers alike increasingly turn to the internet for inspiration and research. In this day and age, a professional website is an absolute must.

Rather than only relying on the traditional glossy coffee-table books and magazines, new and experienced flower lovers are finding information online with gardening apps and searching floral websites.

If your website is filled with great content presented in a clear and powerful way, your visitors will be excited to buy the solutions you have to offer.

Your content must be useful, informative, and beneficial to readers to show your best self and cultivate deep, lasting friendships and relationships with your customers.

To make sure you’re website is working its hardest for your business, include these 11 essential elements to create a beautiful, functional website.

1. Your Website Should Have a Clear Site Identity

When people find you online, it needs to be clear where they are and what your website is about. Your homepage should be present clear communication regarding your business, including company name, logo, a customer-focused tagline, and a headline identifying what's there for the visitor.

2. Offer Helpful Information About Your Business

Who are you? What makes you different than your competitors?

An "About Us" section should describe what you can give to your site visitors, not just biographical information about you or your business.

And your contact information should be stored in the footer of your website, including company name, your physical address (if you have a storefront), phone number, a live working link to email you, and your privacy policy.

3. Provide Clear Customer-focused Content

When visitors arrive at your site, they decide in seconds whether to stay or not. They are often searching for answers and solutions. Your homepage should clearly describe what your company does, why it offers the best solution, and answers to the common where to find, how to do, and how to buy questions.

Use language that explains the unique benefits of your products and services and how they can solve your customer’s issues.

4. Provide easy-to-read copy

Give your visitors enough information to understand what you do and how you can help them, 500–600 words at a minimum.

Keep adding current, fresh content that's timely to your visitor's interests and needs, like routine blog posts that correspond to seasonal offerings.

Use relevant, solution-focused headlines, short paragraphs, bulleted copy, and recap often why visitors should choose you.

Finally, provide a strong, clear call to action, such as a “buy now” or a “schedule a consultation” button.

5. A strong, clear call to action invites your visitors to engage in some way

There should be something for your site visitor to do, an action for them to take, even if they don’t make a purchase or schedule a consultation.

Make sure your site asks your visitor to watch a demo, sign up for a newsletter, join your Facebook or Twitter page, schedule a call, or participate in a survey.

6. Your Navigation Should Be Clear

Your primary site navigation should run across the top of the page. Use standard naming conventions, such as Home, About Us, and Contact Us.

If you have a shopping cart, the access button for it should be on the upper right-hand side.

Professional photos for your website are the way to go! Try not to use pictures that are grainy or those that have a filter.

7. Link to discover New Content

Use the standard blue link color to help visitors find hyperlinks to other pages and tools.

Be specific, labeling them using language such as "Download your free flower guide here" instead of "Click here."

Indicate where the link will take your visitors such as a PDF, video clip, audio clip, or email window.

8. Optimize Your Website’s Graphics

Graphics should be optimized to web-appropriate size. Use relevant photos that support your content and real-people photos of your clients and floral work (not stock photos) whenever possible. 

If you're using photos taken by professional photography, be sure to include their name or business name appropriately.

9. Choose Your Web Fonts Wisely

Use reader-friendly fonts, limiting font styles to two or three maximum per site. Limit special font styles such as uppercase letters, bold, and italics sparingly.

Use black type on a white background for easy reading, especially for big chunks of body text where there's a lot of copy.

10 . Your Website Should Be Mobile-Friendly and Responsive

Your site must be mobile responsive to give customers the best experience possible, whether they’re browsing from a smartphone or their computer.

Websites must be adaptable to both smartphones and tablets. Use short headlines and place the most important information first after the headline, and follow best practices for using inviting content with calls-to-action.

11. Don’t Forget About SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Search engine optimization (SEO) is essentially how search engines like Google, Bing, and others find your website when someone searches for content. This is where publishing quality content will help potential customers find you.

Make sure every page of your site includes keywords that the search engines can find to send visitors to your website. Include them in headlines, subheads, bold text, link text, and picture captions—but be sure not to “over fill” or “over-optimize” your webpages. That can actually hurt your website long-term. If you have questions, make sure to talk with an SEO professional. It’s a worthwhile investment!

Your Website Can Be a Powerful Sales Tool for Reaching New Floral Customers

Remember: People are looking on your website for a solution to a problem!

While there are more than the 11 elements listed above that make up a beautiful, functional website, these elements all fall into three core groups that, when combined, can create a successful “digital storefront” for your floral business.

• Persuasive copywriting that makes your content interesting, useful and uniquely engaging for your visitors.

• Keyword research and strategic placement of key phrases in your customer-focused content and optimized for search engines.

• Understanding basic technical web principles help guide your visitors through your site.

Using a combination of these essential elements to create your website can drive people to your site and turn them into loyal customers who come to enjoy the floral design experience that you provide!

Photo Credit: Design by Kelly Perry, Photography by Almond Leaf Studios