Flower Arrangements Made Simple

by Judith A. Babb
(Monterey, TN, USA)

Genre: crafts and hobbies

Being a retired Federal Employee and housewife, I do not profess myself to be an author. So I toyed with the idea of where to begin my story, and the old light bulb went on, why not start at the beginning.

I never imagined I would be producing a book on how to create flower arrangements. I have always loved flowers and putting them together into all different types of floral designs for my family and friends, so what was more natural than to take advantage of something I was already doing for sheer pleasure already?

Flower Arrangements Made Simple is just that, my own unique way of doing flower arranging in quick easy to understand steps. I just wanted a way to share my love of flowers with everyone else. Using containers you already have around the house can save you quite a bit of money, so can using local grocery chains, Wal-Marts, Sam's Clubs, etc. for flowers rather than going to a florist.

I even developed a monthly newsletter "Flower Talk", which includes a quick floral arrangement lesson each month. My first issue launched in January 2008 and went out to 42 subscribers. Within the first five months my subscriber base has gone to over 300, with 3 or 4 new members being added every day. Another phase in my life leaving me feeling simply awed.

My marketing/publishing experience all began as I was watching one of those infomercials on television. You know the one where "you can make thousands of dollars from home in your pajamas." Well, I found out very quickly it doesn't work that way. I sent away for the books and CD's that were offered, listened, read, listened, read, again and again but never really learned from them. If I remember correctly the course offered ran something like $99.95 and was a total waste of my time. The problem was I had no one to turn to if I had questions to ask. I had no idea of what to do or where to go to start building my website. I just wanted to do something to earn some extra income in my retirement, but no idea how to accomplish it.

I eventually came across a company that offered the training I needed while surfing the internet. So, I enrolled in their program and met my first mentor in 2006. Together we found my marketing niche "flower arranging". But it took a year before the Website was ready and the book became a reality. I had much to learn about internet marketing. First of all was finding my niche market by testing various keywords and markets to see what would work best. At the time my husband Bill was also involved and we thought maybe fishing lures might be a good market to get into, but flower arrangements beat him out and we started to concentrate on it.

I continued to learn about how search engines work within the internet community and how important they are. Until then I had no idea how important it was to be on the first page of a Google search, or even what Google was. As the year progressed we got the website developed and the eBook cover designed. I was working on getting the book done and needed to get the photographs finished for all the step-by-step guides. To do this I needed to order flowers, and lots of them.

I got on the internet and ordered the flowers from one of the wholesale florists and had them delivered to my home. In the meantime, I got prepared for the delivery since I was going to have 3 huge boxes of flowers coming I started to panic. Where in the world am I going to put all these flowers? I just hope most of them will fit in the refrigerator. Well, they arrived, and they didn't all fit. Luckily, the basement was cool enough to keep them as I worked on the various arrangements for my book. For the next two days I was doing nothing but making flower arrangements and photographing them as I put them together step-by-step. Needless to say, my neighbors ended up loving me since they reaped the benefits of getting free floral arrangements. What else was I going to do with so many arrangements? I could only use so many in the house for myself.

Well, I got the photos done and the book finally put together and we got the website put on-line. Now I thought, just sit back and wait for the dollars to rolling in! (Wrong, again.)

Shortly after we got the website going my mentor ended up moving in September 2007 and took on a job with another company. He referred me to my current mentor who has been coaching me on how to market my book.

I have learned how to get listed in various directories, submitted articles to article directories and learned how to submit Press Releases. These are all things I had never even been aware of before. My page ranking in Google went to a PR3 since November 2007.

As part of my marketing program I established an affiliate program offering 50% commission to anyone selling my book.

Rewriting my sales copy based on keywords and search engine optimization. Next, figure out what else we need to do to get more sales. It is a non-stop world of internet marketing. Every time I turn around, there is something else to learn, or something new that has just hit the market.

My latest venture is having CD's made of my eBook that I can sell on EBay. So I ordered 20 copies from lulu.com and I will see how I fare on EBay.

What I have accomplished in the way of self-publishing and internet marketing for me would not have become a reality had I not looked into having a mentor to guide me through the process, and continue to guide me today.

Visit Artistic Flower Arrangements.