There are more than 25,000 species of this rare and beautiful cone-shaped flower. Some of them are extremely expensive and hard to come by, but other varieties are affordable, available and simple to grow at home.
Hibiscus
There are 10,000 named varieties of the tropical Hibiscus flower. These beautiful and colorful flowers are emblematic of the tropical environments they come from, such as Florida, Hawaii, Jamaica and India. Hibiscus are wonderful for decoration because the -even without water. Opening buds may be picked early in the day, stored in a cool place and brought out for the evening. Storing Hibiscus in the cold slows down the flowers closing by a few hours.
Torenia
Also known as the Wishbone Flower, these annuals and perrenials originate in tropical Asia and Africa. Torenia grow to be about a foot tall, with toothed, ovular leaves. Torenia produce a striking amount of beautiful pouched flowers that can grow to be an inch across. Torenia flowers are noted for their wide array of beautiful colors, such as white, blue, purple, mauve or lilac. Tornias can be grown with proper care in an environment that has a temperature of 70 degrees or more.
Lamium
Also know as White Nancy, Lamium is a beautiful ground-covering plant with white heart-shaped leaves and short spikes of pink flowers. Lamium blooms in the summer, grows up to eight inches tall and can tolerate a wide variety of soil conditions. It does best in shady woodland areas.
Portulaca
Portulaca is a group of annual flowers that comes in several varieties. Native to Brazil, Portulaca grow spiraling stems up to five inches long and have cylindrical leaves and bright, colorful flowers up to an inch in diameter at the end of the stems. The flowers can be purple, yellow, pink, scarlet and many other colors. To cultivate Portulaca successfully you need to place them in a spot with plenty of sunlight and sandy soil.
Pentas
Simple to cultivate, easy to care for, and beautiful to behold, Pentas is a wonderful choice for your garden. Pentas is native to tropical Africa and its beautiful red, pink, white and lavender blooms are well-known for attracting hummingbirds. The plant grows up to three feet tall and wide and does well indoors, potted in a sunny spot or outside in warmer climates.
Lavatera
Though named for a Swiss botanist, Lavatera are native to the Himalayan Mountains, Siberia and Australia. These plants come in several varieties, both perennial and annual, with bush-like growth or tall straight stalks. Their large, beautiful flowers last only a day or two before wilting, but the plant produces new flowers for an extended period of time.
Sedum
Sedum, which come in hundreds of varieties, are easy to grow, late-blooming, hardy and beautiful plants. Sedum plants have thick stems, fleshy leaves, and flower heads that resemble lavender broccoli. These plants do best in well-drained soil and can tolerate both droughts and rainy weather. Because they bloom so late in the year, they often remain attractive through the winter.
Abutilon
Also known as the Flowering Maple, the Abutilon is a beautiful plant that does well indoors. Abutilon's lovely blossoms range from reds, yellows, blues and shades of orange, and its foliage is usually pale green. Depending on how much space it has to grow, Abutilon plants can grow to be very large, which is why the plant is best kept indoors in a small to medium sized pot.
Gazania
Gazania, native to South Africa, is a beautiful, perennial ground cover with colorful daisy-like flowers. Gazania flowers boom in late spring to early summer and come in shades of yellow, orange, white and pink. Gazania thrive in sunny locations with well-drained soil.
If you can agree with me that traffic building is important, do you know how to go about improving your site traffic?
If not, let's take a look at ten rudimentary marketing tips that can result in more visits, more customers and a greater income.
1) SEO. These three letters stand for Search Engine Optimization. SEO is a skill set designed to help you construct your website to appeal to the automation that reviews your site for determining site rankings in a search engine. If you don't pay attention to SEO you may not find your website ranked well.
2) PPC. This strategy is also known as Pay Per Click. This is an advertising strategy designed to encourage people to visit your site via a third party site that features products, services or content that relates to your website.
3) Email marketing. By developing a list of email contacts that have expressed an interest in your website and/or product you can send periodic emails that encourage them to visit your website for new offers or freebies.
4) Blogging. Individuals and businesses use this as a way to keep site visitors informed of industry related news in a very personal format. Blogs encourage visitors to drop by your main site and promote traffic-building objectives.
5) Forums. These are online bulletin boards where interactive conversations are encouraged. In virtually all situations links to your primary business can be included in something called you ?signature? and can further enhance traffic to your online location.
6) Podcasting. When you develop an audio program that can be downloaded through your site this is known as podcasting. Many consumers are interested in audio downloads like a podcast that can either entertain or inform. This strategy can keep customers coming back for more.
7) RSS. This service provides customers with a notification when you ad new content to your site. The three letters stand for Real Simple Syndication and allows you to syndicate or distribute your content to subscribers.
8) Social media. Examples of this service would include sites like MySpace or FaceBook and allows you to connect with a wider group of individuals. You can post web links that will draw others to your primary website.
9) Search engine marketing. Like PPC this strategy is advertising based and requires payment for advertising use and click throughs. Using this method can allow your website to appear in an advertising section of various keyword search terms when individuals use a search engine to locate businesses like yours.
10) Video streaming. When you incorporate video into your site you may find that individuals may come either for the entertainment value or for the information it can provide. The effects of this tip can be enhanced when you add RSS to all new video streaming files you add to your website.
Make SEO your starting point in traffic building and then work on mastering as many of the other nine skills as possible.
Both Amy Nutt & Scott Lindsay are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Amy Nutt has sinced written about articles on various topics from Culture and Society, Recreation and Sports and Women. Tidy's Flowers offers arrangements which are suitable for a wide array of occasions such as corporate events, birthdays, anniversaries, grand-openings, h. Amy Nutt's top article generates over 368000 views. to your Favourites.