The Floral Hustle

  📍 Hello, flower friends. This is Jen, and you're listening to the Floral Hustle podcast on this week's Minisoad. We are going to talk about what business tools that you need in 2024. I have seen a ton of posts lately in all the Facebook groups where everybody's got that renewed energy to like, Kick ass and take names.

And they're like, I'm looking at all these proposal software and I'm looking at this and I'm looking at that and Honestly, like you need to make sure for one before you take those on expenses on That your business can support this that expense. I've seen so many people go in the deep end on Getting a studio go in the deep end on getting whatever for their business because It's, you know, it's shiny and fun and has all these big, huge promises, but you're not at a point that you really can afford to make those decisions.

So sometimes you have to be scrappy. And I personally do not use a proposal software. I don't use a proposal software. Because for one, I feel like my proposals currently are beautiful and I feel like they're very doable for me to do because I've streamlined that process. Uh, I don't have a CRM like HoneyBook or anything because I feel like I have that process pretty nailed down as well.

So here are a few things that I use that I feel like are critical for my business. For one, um, Canva. Canva, I use so much because Canva helps me make my proposals, so I do my proposals 100 percent in Canva. If you are on Facebook, if you want to head to the Floral Hustle Facebook group, I have an amazing training on creating proposals that sell.

It's pinned to the top of the group, it's a florist exclusive group, and I'm happy to approve you because I manually approve everybody. To make sure that we're cultivating the right people in the group, and that is It shows how I use Canva. It shows all the ins and outs of even making, um, 3D digital mock ups, because I feel like that is super, um, cutting edge and a way for you to really elevate your business with these beautiful designs that you've been dreaming up that your bride just can't dream up because they're, they're not her ideas.

So that's one thing that I think would be super, um, helpful if you are interested in using Canva. I use Canva to create graphics for my, uh, social media. I use, I just, I just use Canva in so many ways. It's so worth it. Then, my second is QuickBooks. And I did not always have QuickBooks. I used QuickBooks, um, about two years ago when my business was like, holy shit big and I needed to do something to get organized.

So I, I got QuickBooks then, and I at that time also got an accountant that really helped with payroll and all of those things to make sure that I was compliant with what I should be doing to run a business. So QuickBooks, I have the online version and then my accountant has access to my exact account, which is really helpful.

Uh, because I can tell her like, okay, looking in my account, how much did I pay myself this, this quarter? And, you know, she can really have transparency into everything. Then, The third thing is, I have an app called PS Express, and Photoshop Express is where I edit all of my iPhone content that I take, so I brighten my photos, I can um, Literally erase things on photos very easily and I just, I love it and it's, it's fast and easy and I think it's 5 a month so it's well worth it for me not to have to dink around with a bunch of other things and I'm really used to it at this point too, which is super helpful.

Then, I also use Evernote, but you can use any note taking app. I constantly have this brain, um, my ADHD brain that's moving 100 miles an hour. And sometimes, like, I need to capture things that are in there. And so I will make notes based on different subjects. And those might be podcast ideas, that might be bride video ideas, or couple video ideas.

That might be things that I need to look and start sourcing. It could be just a myriad of different things. But I need a place to catch all of that information, otherwise it gets really complicated. Um, then, um, my next tool, and if you are watching this video. Um, you can see it is a planner. I have a paper planner that all of my weddings, once I receive a contract, all my weddings go in there and in that planner, then that's where I schedule all my freelancers because I can just grab the book and I'm not looking at 10 people's, you know, schedules that I popped into my planner.

Just look at my paper copy. Yep. I could really use some extra help if you want to come. So super easy and I usually just order it. It's a monthly calendar off of Amazon. Then the next business tool that I use and I actually There's a lot of tools that I use but I'm just doing some of the common ones but payment processing systems I use Square and Square is for like my invoices that I send and a lot of like the essentials that are in my business from a billing standpoint.

Uh, I also use Zelle and I use Venmo as well. So when someone inquires, I'm using um, you know, like They want me to send them the contract. I'm sending them a PDF version of my contract, or I can send them a digital version. And I charge for my credit card fees, because I don't want to have to eat the credit card fees if I don't have to.

So, I also have it listed in my contract that, you know, they pay 3 percent credit card fees if they pay with a credit card. And sometimes they actually do that, which is kind of crazy. I have Square because I felt that it was just really easy, and the invoices are really easy, and then they have Square contracts, which is included in your, um, your package.

It's not like an additional fee to be able to capture that service. So that has been super helpful. Uh, I do also, um, Um, they have great reporting. So if you plugged everything in there and you didn't have a reporting system for revenue, you'd be able to easily track your overall gross revenue if you put all your transactions in Square.

Because they have reporting, you can separate, uh, taxes out very easily. And I just, I think it's absolutely great. And then the last one that I use often is Gmail or G Suite. So I have claimed my web domain email address. So I have jenny at green goddess, laurel. com. If you have a business account set up in Gmail, you can do the same thing and claim your, whatever your name is at your business name.

com. I'm just telling you, I see so many people rocking Gmail, Yahoo, whatever. Doing this is not very hard. It's Google will. You can Google it and figure out how to do it. You need to, you know, enter your DNS off of your website. You could even call your website company to help you like find that information in your backend tool.

But to me that was so e easy, like. And it looks so professional. When I see somebody at your business name at gmail. com, like I don't think that that person is potentially taking their businesses serious, um, as a consumer. So like if I have a plumber and they're telling me it's, it's. bobsplumbing at gmail.

com that to me just doesn't look like He is really running a business. It looks like he's running an at gmail business And so if that's not something you have look into it. It's really not that hard I'm paying six dollars a month to have that I can use Google Drive I can use the email system then and what I love about gmail email is They nudge you when somebody doesn't reply or when you forget to reply.

So they send you a little nudge, Hey, it's been three days since this email has been touched. And so that keeps me on track knowing what I need to do because it's like popped it to the top of my inbox. I'm like, okay, great. I will go in and respond to that. Super easy. Thank you so much for listening flower friends and you have an amazing 📍 flower filled week.