Each year I plant in pots and hanging baskets at the front of my house. They start out small, and after a month or so they look great.

A few weeks later they start to look tired: too long, not many flowers, dead or yellowing leaves etc. Ideally, I would like my pots & hanging baskets to look great for the whole season (approx 5 months), not just for 1 month.

I fertilize monthly and water daily.

Should I be doing some drastic trimming back?

I hate to cut off stems with flowers on them because I don't want the baskets/pots to be just full of green stems... Perhaps I should be cutting back 1/2 of the plant, waiting and then cutting back the other 1/2 later?

Please let me know what I should be doing. I'm fairly new to gardening, so any advice would be great.

Thanks in advance!