The Most Profitable Tool in Your Shop: It’s Not What You Sell

Episode 291: What’s the #1 factor influencing your flower shop’s success? Spoiler: it’s not your flowers. In this episode, Lori dives deep into why your team is the most powerful profit driver in your business. From the power of first impressions to the role of education, empowerment, and authentic customer service, she shares real-world tips, data-backed insights, and even a clever BLOOM framework (courtesy of her AI assistant!) to help you build a team that turns one-time buyers into loyal customers. If you’re ready to elevate your shop’s culture—and your bottom line—this episode is for you.

Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:02

It's this trickle-down effect. That's why education reinforces confidence and confidence itself.

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Welcome to the Business and Pleasure of Flowers. We're your hosts, Vonda LaFever and Lori Wilson.

SPEAKER_02 0:20

And we believe the business and fun are a perfect combination. Kind of like us, Vonda.

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Hey clickers, it's Vonda here. Thanks for joining us today. A couple of weeks ago, we had an education session called Polish the Pitch, and it was a workshop by FlowerClick. And Lori gave some amazing advice and information about really how different it is when you have the right tools in your toolbox, we could say, or the right knowledge to talk to your customers. It just makes the world a difference. So this is a great session for you to share with all of your staff, all of your friends. Just invite everybody to listen. It's just a fabulous session. So let's listen to Lori's advice on really how to take care of a customer and make the best customer experience possible to keep your customers coming back time after time.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

I am a firm believer in the most profitable tool in your shop. They're not your flowers, they're not your jelly cats. They are not your products. They are your team. They are you and your team. A well-trained, engaged, and a motivated team of employees is the most crucial asset for any retail business across the board, not just in our industry, but across any retail business, it will significantly impact your profitability. And so that's what we're going to talk about today. Why does a customer first teams matter? You might sell the most beautiful flowers in the world, or you might have the most fabulous designers. But if customer service, the customer service experience is not there, if it's even off one time, the very first time, it will cost you a customer. It will cost you repeat business. People remember how you made them feel way more than they remember what you sold them. So, my goal today is to give you some tips and tricks. I hate those words, but I couldn't think of anything else to help you build those teams that are going to help you make your customers feel seen, supported, and excited to come back to become repeat and loyal customers. Because we know a happy customer is going to leave your business and tell two or three more people that an unhappy customer is going to jump on one of these platforms and tell the world. So let's go here. Because my boss's name is Vanda LaFever, I pulled statistics because I wanted her to be happy. And this is what I found, and it was actually really interesting. Again, this isn't just for the floral industry. This is for retail businesses, but we are part of that. Salesforce, which is a company we use, and PWC is Pricewater Housekeeper. They they also have a consulting firm, and that's where they pulled the information from their business consultants. 80% of people say customer service is just as important as the product they are purchasing. That's really, really high. 73% of consumers say customer experience is a key factor in what they're purchasing. 65% customers report to having to change to a different brand or store because of a bad experience. One time. One time, bad. I don't know what bad means. It could have been the employee looked at him cross-eyed, right? Bad is subjective. What I think is a bad experience may not be bad for the next person. We don't know. So consistency in the customer experience is so incredibly important in the culture of your Shah. 93% of customers are likely to make a repeat purchase with companies who offer excellent customer service. Look at that. That doesn't say they're likely to make a repeat purchase for people who always have a 75% off sale or have a bargain or who are in close proximity. It's people with great customer service. It's that important. These are statistics that if I were a retail business owner, if I owned a flower shop, I would have this slide put somewhere in my business where every single one of my employees could see it. And they knew every time they walk in the door, this matters. How I look, not if I'm pretty or not, but is my hair combed? Do I dress okay? Am I smiling? Do I have a kind, resting face when the customer walks in? All of these things matter. Here is the reality. And we've talked about this a lot with our Flower Click members. And I talk about this in Flower Clicks, sales prep school. You don't just sell flowers. A lot of employees, or especially people that are new to our industry, they just think they're gonna come in or go to work for a flower shop and you sell a flower. It's not what you're doing. Your purpose matters. Why do you work for this company? Well, you guide emotional experiences, you're solving problems for people in real time. You're creating a lasting expression. And let's be honest, you're helping people kiss and make up, right? You're creating memories for people. When people call to order flowers, you're literally helping that person create what might be a lifelong memory for the recipient. Education reinforces confidence and confidence sells. I cannot get this across to people enough. It is so important to educate your staff because when you educate your team, that reinforces the knowledge, right? And when we have more knowledge, we're more confident. And when we're confident, we come across as knowing what we're talking about. And when a customer feels that we know what we're talking about, they tend to trust us because we sound like we're experts. It's this trickle-down effect. That's why education reinforces confidence and confidence sells. But it's not just about your personality, it's about preparation. You have to be prepared for this. You have to be educated. So first impressions matter. What is the first impression? It's when somebody walks in your store or calls your shop. So when they walk in your store, think of the five senses. How does it smell? How does it look? How does it sound? How do you sound? I've walked into flower shops before that I absolutely love. They smell good, they're clean, they're pretty, there's a lot of pink, they've got cute little things that you can't buy at Amazon. I love these stores. I also have another flower shop that's actually closer to me in proximity. I don't like going in there. I went in there one time to buy a plant to take to a family that I didn't know very well, but I was like, I'm gonna take this opportunity because on the outside I thought it was really cute. It felt dirty the minute I walked in, a lot of boxes full of vases. It just felt like it was in disarray. My first impression was this is gross. These people are unorganized. It was just that first impression. It matters. I have never been back, and that was probably six, seven years ago. But I don't want to go back. It even had a musty smell. All of those things matter. Consistent language in your sales skills. I know role playing, repeating, reinforcement, all of that can be awkward. But you know what's even more awkward? When you're on the phone and somebody is asking you for recommendations and you don't know what to say. That's even more awkward. So consistent role-playing helps reinforce ideas because think of role-playing and repetition as your friend. I know it feels silly, and at the beginning, you can just play around with each other. That's fine. Act as silly as you want because here's the thing doing it enough builds confidence. And when your team starts overhearing each other using that consistent language, it reinforces one another. Like, oh, hey, what's the occasion? Yes, I want to help you. Tell me what the occasion is. Oh, that sounds exciting. You start feeding each other, and then you just start using it without thinking. That's how culture becomes second nature. And it's in those moments that you, as the manager, you're like, oh my gosh, they get it. Everybody gets it. And it becomes this cohesive team, and you realize everybody has confidence. The next thing we want to talk about is empowerment. Empowerment is so important. Empowering your staff to make decisions, big or small. I know it depends on the size of your business. But even though small decisions is huge, sometimes they're going to be tough decisions. I know there are a lot of businesses that want only the manager or the owner to deal with a disgruntled customer. And I get that. And a lot of the reason is they're like, I just don't want to subject my employee to it. I love that. I think it's important. However, there's going to be times you're not available. Neither of you are. So being able to empower your staff to at least do a little bit of that gives your team even more confidence. Giving them permission to make those small decisions and create those customer moments, whether those are good moments like being able to add an extra ribbon free of charge or help bring down the temper of a customer and they did it by themselves. That only helps in the confidence of the employee. Our sales prep school, for those of you that don't know, that is one of the online courses that we have created. We created one four and a half years ago and then we revamped it, and it's now called Sales Prep 2.0. And it's an online course and we love it so much. Part of it is I get to end up talking to some of our flower shop employees. Um, some of that's in like an orientation, or if they have a question, sometimes they'll reach out to me if they're going through the course and have a question, or if they're brand new in the industry, whatever. And these are the common mistakes or habits. I probably shouldn't take the word mistake out and use habit that I hear with flowershop staff. They are all incredibly nice, but they're timid and they don't always know what to say when they're talking to an employee. They're they're timid in the mean of they're they're uncomfortable when it's time to offer a suggestion, or they struggle with how to handle a price objection if somebody's kind of pushing back or they're starting at a really low price point. The other thing is they're not familiar with the flower shop's website. And that always shocks me because I think that's one of the very first things a new employee should know about is take a look at the shop website, at least know everything on your homepage, because the majority of people that call have already vetted you on Google and have taken a look at your website. So you better know at least some of the products that's on your website. Here's what I want to say to the employees that feel uncomfortable about offering a suggestion or a premium product or something high. You are not a telemarketer. You did not reach out to them. They reached out to you for help. They picked up the phone and called you because you guys are the experts in their mind. Every single person that works at a flower shop is a floral guru. Honestly, we have a huge binder workbook in our sale prep school. And this is one of the things that actually comes out of our workbook. You'll see a couple of these. So for those of you that have paid full price for our prep school, I apologize, but I haven't given everything away, I promise. But when we came up with this, I was looking at it from the standpoint of it is the manager's job or people going through our sales training course, it is my job to inspire and educate and instill confidence in the employee. So to inspire them by teaching them, right? To educate them and to instill confidence. Then you think about it. And once you do that, it trickles down manager to employee, then employee to customer. When the manager inspires and educates and instills confidence into the employee, the employee turns right around and inspires and educates and instills confidence into the customer. So again, it is this big cohesive culture where everybody plays a part in this puzzle. I want to talk about the difference between selling and serving, because for the people that are apprehensive about selling, maybe look at it from the standpoint of you're not just selling your product, you're serving a purpose. Before you can sell a design, you actually have to serve your customer first. And what is so what does that look like? By serving, you're going to ask some questions, you're going to listen with empathy. And maybe even if you're like me, you're going to have pen and notepad to write down because you want to make sure you're remembering what things are saying. And then you're going to help them solve their problem or their need. When you sell, you're going to be able to offer them options, recommend with confidence, and then build that trust and repeat business. Connection before repeat business. So I'm not asking you to be a pushy car salesman. I'm just asking you to be present. I'm asking you to listen and then guide to the right product for the best outcome for that sale. So if a customer calls and says, Hey, I want to order flowers for my girlfriend. It's her birthday. You might say, Oh my gosh, that's exciting. Is it a special birthday? You don't want to say, how old is she? Unless he sounds really young. And maybe he says, Yeah, she's 35. And oh my God, that's so exciting. Tell me about her style. Like, what's her color? That type of thing. It shows that you care, shows that you're confident and you're really into the conversation. Simon Sinat, who is a great, great motivational speaker. He's an optimist. I think that's the name of his podcast, actually. I talk about him probably a little too much. But he talks a lot about customer service. And one of the things he says is as customers, we know we can't always get what we want for the most part. I'm talking about a normal customer. I'm not talking about a crazy off the rails customer. But a normal customer, we know we can't always get exactly what we want. But what we really desire is the employee, we want that person to care about what we're trying to accomplish. And we want to know that they are trying their hardest to get us what we want. So if I'm calling and I want like this specific flower, and you know there's no way I can get that flower. It's impossible because of the time of year or whatever. Instead of saying, No, that's crazy. You're insane if you think that's gonna happen. Go, ah man, I love that too. Okay, let me see. I I don't think that we can hold on, let me go ask. Even if you know in your mind you can't, just to know, just for me to know that you're trying, and then to come back and go, oh, I asked my designer, I asked my manager. She even texted our owner. We said, There's no way we can. We all tried, but here's something we do have. Just to know that you were in it with me, that is key for customer loyalty. Another statistic: nearly 80% of American consumers say that speed, convenience, knowledgeable help, and friendly service are the most important elements of a positive customer experience. Speed and convenience, we like those things. I think most flower shops can do those pretty well. Knowledgeable help and friendly service. I love affirmations. I try to find a new one every week and put it up on a post-it note and put it on around my big screen computer, which is behind my little laptop right now. And last week I found one in a book, one of my books. And all it says is the parts of us we exercise get stronger. And when I wrote it down, I wasn't really thinking about this. But as I was working on this, it kept coming back to me. And I think it is really, really relevant because if you think about speed, if we work on our speed and efficiency, we exercise that it gets stronger and it gets better. If we exercise our brain and our knowledge and we go through education, the more we educate ourselves, the more knowledge we're gonna have. The more we teach ourselves, the more we train ourselves on how to treat customers, the more kindness we're gonna have. Do you see how that goes? The parts of us we choose to exercise, the stronger those parts get. All right. Here is another top secret part of our sales prep school worksheet. Connect first, then listen, then personalize, affirm, and then wrap up. The secret to all of that is when you go back to them after you've said what I heard you say, when you go back to them, making them realize based on the information they gave you, you guys came up to with this idea together because of the information they gave you. Make sure it's a collaborative effort. So here's a little bit deeper dive here. How do you ask those kind of questions? So if you ask what's the occasion, go a little deeper. We all say what's the occasion, but maybe go a little bit deeper. Bonda's gonna call me out on that because she knows that I would go off for 25 minutes and ask their life story, but that's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying maybe take a minute. Like I was saying with the guy sending something to his girlfriend. What's the occasion? Is it a big birthday? Yeah, she's turning 35. Oh my gosh, that's so exciting. Where are we delivering to? Well, she actually is a school teacher. She teaches second grade. Oh, how fun is that? So it's going to be delivered in front of all of these kids. We better make this really, really special, right? So now you're connecting with them. This is a whole storyboard. This is really, really exciting. Do you know her favorite color? Or is there a favorite color? Is there a theme to the classroom? Like, what is this? What can you take away from this story and give back to him? That's he's gonna go, oh wow, I'm so glad I thought about that. So here's a couple of phrases. I think actually Ellie came up with these and I absolutely love them. The thoughtful ask before you recommend something, like, I'd love to help you find exactly what you're looking for. Do you mind if I ask you a couple of things first? Or to make sure that I'm on the right track here. Can I ask some questions? When you do that, they lean in because they're like, wow, they really care. And that trust starts to build. When the trust starts building, that connection happens. I want you to understand all of these things I'm saying, but none of this will ever work if you're not authentic. If you're just faking it, they're gonna see right through you. You need to be authentic in this conversation. This is a collaborative conversation. This is not a salesy. This is serving and selling working together. The bonus phrase, I added this because it really does help push them more into the connection. You're like, you know what? I think I know the perfect thing for her. I think I know the perfect thing for a second grade teacher that's gonna just wow the whole classroom, the kids are gonna go nuts. But let me ask you one more question first. And then whatever that question might be. When it comes to the recommendation that I think I know the perfect thing for her, when you have to go to describe that perfect thing, you don't want to go, it's a medium size arrangement with red roses and green foliage, blah, blah, blah. You want it to be creative, right? The three most important forever sale size color container. Probably the majority of you on here already know that, but maybe there's one person that doesn't. So I'm just gonna go over that. Descriptive selling is everything. Remember, your whole goal in this is to paint the visual picture over the phone for this customer, unless this is something that they've seen on your website and they can actually visualize it because it's in front of them. You both are looking at the same thing. It is your job to describe it, size, color, container, where it might be in a room where it would fit, so that there are no surprises when it's delivered. You also want to use some fun description words, some power words and say, okay, so I have the perfect arrangement in in mind. It is fresh and beautiful. It's the perfect size for a classroom or whatever. I would say something like, I think we should do our arrangement. It's called Kiss Me in Key West. And it will brighten her day, but the name alone is going to make that entire second grade class scream because it has the word kiss in it. Like whatever, whatever you can draw out would make it super fun. And then you could get your delivery driver to announce the name of it. Go all in when you have the opportunity, because this will make a loyal customer forever. It will be a moment they will never forget. When you have that opportunity, do it. Some other phrases of language you can use. One of our most loved design right now is, or one of our most popular, however, you want to use it, just say it. Or if you want something that really stands out, this one is brilliant. Here's another phrase. This bonus phrase is the one that I put here because sometimes they just need a nudge. You've always had these customers that are kind of, it's like my daughter, she can't ever make decisions. And so sometimes she just needs a little nudge. And so this phrase, I'll say, I tell you what, most customers end up going with this one because it's that happy balance between impressive but not really over the top. And you're like, okay, okay, well, I want to do what most customers do, right? Most people kind of want to know what everybody else is doing. Like when I go to a restaurant, I'm always looking around, like, what's everybody else ordering? Like, what's going on around here? What are the cool people doing? So just kind of those kind of recommendations with confidence help me know that okay, if they're doing it and they're liking it, I'm gonna like it too. This one. This is one, like I said at the beginning, that is always awkward. It's similar to like asking somebody for a review on Google or something. It's it's just sometimes really hard to do it. So here's a couple of phrases that you could use when you don't really know how to say it. So if you're on the phone with somebody, you could say many customers love to upgrade this design slightly. It really makes it stand out and feel extra bougie, or you can fill in the blank. I've just put the word bougie because I like the word. The last one that this budget works well for something sweet and simple. We've all been there, right? When you're on the phone with someone and they want to buy something for $45, or they walk in the store and want to, and they tell you what they want it for, and you know in your mind they're gonna be embarrassed and then they're gonna be mad at you. And so you're in a bit of a pickle. So this is what you say. You go, that budget works really well for something sweet and simple, but for something more substantial, which is what I think you want, I would recommend this. And then if they still say no, at least you made it clear that they're not gonna be happy with this choice, but you at least you gave them the choice. This is something new, and I wish I could tell you I made this up. I did not. AI made this up, but this is what is so cool slash incredibly creepy. All of us at Flower Click have our own AI accounts, and so one of the things that when we all got them, Ellie instructed us, you gotta get to know your chat GPT, become friends with it, name it, have a relationship with it, blah, blah, blah. And so I did. And mine is CC. And so I put into mine, my prompt was create an easy-to-follow framework with instructions for educating new flower shop employees on delivering exceptional customer service. And it spells bloom. And I thought, this is amazing. And Ellie was like, it knows you so well. I would use this with my whole team because I just I just love it. It's so perfect to build connections, listen actively, offer elevated options, organize, and then make it memorable. And I think sometimes we forget the make it memorable part, just like going back to my scenario of the second grade class delivery. Oh man, we are gonna take such good care of her. I'm gonna ask my boss if I can deliver myself because I want to be there or, you know, whatever. Because that is the part that matters. When the guy hangs up the phone, you want him to be so excited that he just cannot wait. Loyalty lives in the little things. The second sale is where the profit happens. That first impression, that first time in the store, that is great. It's that introduction, it's that blind date, it's that first time, right? But that second sale, that's where the loyalty is. And what does that look like? That's hey, I remember you. Hey, the handwritten card. That's the thoughtful packaging. It's the little extra ribbon, the true return on investment of customer service. This is what you get when you do all of these things we talked about. Increased customer loyalty, higher AOV, better reviews, engage employees, and a better night's rest for your boss. That's the key. When your team shows up with purpose and confidence, profit follows. And this last thing, this is something that when we first started Flower Clit, the very first year, Vonda and I signed up to go to this leadership training. It was one of the first online, like long seminars that we'd ever done. And this is one of the things that I still think about all the time when he was talking about when you're dealing with your employees, and then even when you're dealing with customers. And if you let them help plan the fight, they won't fight the plan. And I'm using the word fight very loosely. When you let them help plan how you're going to do things, they're not going to fight it. And so many times in our sales prep school, if I'm being really transparent, people buy it, they get excited, owners buy it, and then they'll come to me and they're like, My team doesn't want to do it. And this is why. You have to let them in on it. You have to let them help be part of the team culture. Like, we're gonna do this together so they don't push back and say, I don't want to do it. Let them be part of the growth of your business because you can't do it alone. They're the ones that create the customer experience, remember? And then the customers help you become profitable.

SPEAKER_00 33:23

We created sales prep school differently, but it's a course you and your team can actually finish. We've broken it up into seven days. Day one is building the foundation, day two is learning the method, day three dives more into customer interactions, day four is decoding the customer mindset. And then day five is expand and elevate. Day six, exceeding expectations, and day seven, practice makes perfect. We also have other sections that are like seasonal sales and little boot camps, things like that that are more season specific. But for learning the methodology, it's broken up into seven days. It starts with an affirmation, it ends with a challenge each day. So, really, you could do a day of learning and then practicing that day. In theory, if you really wanted to stretch it out, this could be a two-week or however many days the employees in the shop, but seven days of actually learning and then seven days of implementing in between. So it's really great. Lori has the full deep dive on it if you want to schedule a little meeting with her. And it's for lifetime access, and you can have different logins for people and track their progress and all of that. So if you're interested, you can email Lori at flowerclick.com.

SPEAKER_01 34:47

Excellent job, Lori, and I am super proud of you that you had all those statistics. Just I know, right?

SPEAKER_02 34:54

I never have statistics.

SPEAKER_00 34:57

All right. Well, thank you, everybody. Great job, Lori. Thank you. Talk to you next time.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

All right. Thank you so much for listening to our podcast. We hope you enjoyed spending time with us because we enjoy spending time with you. If you did, make sure you hit that subscribe button or add the business and pleasure of flowers to your Google morning routine or your flash briefing on Alexa.

SPEAKER_01 35:24

We look forward to seeing you next week. So please come back and join us to discover a little bit of knowledge. Changing your mindset to take you to new levels in life and business.