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January
In between the mulled wine and mince pies many of us are thinking about the coming year and what we can do to achieve our business goals. At least that’s what we tell ourselves we are going to do. With the economic climate still looking uncertain at best, this makes that process even harder.
What’s worse, is that our inability to set out our priorities for the coming year (other than survive) creates anxiety as we go through the year. So that come the end of the year, we’re so frazzled and drained, that all we can do is eat more mince pies, drink more mulled wine and start all over.
I used to go through this cycle, year after year and as the financial crisis hit in 2008, would regularly find myself starring into the abyss of my computer, alone and helpless. Shortly after 2008 I decided to do something about it, but there was very little available for the jewellery trade as a whole and for the creative designers even more so. That is when I decided to do something about it.
If you have received my recent emails, or my invitation card, you may already know that I have decided to share what I’ve learned in the past few years on how to deal with the extreme economic crisis that we are all currently living through. I am a firm believer in creating a vision and setting goals. So from January, I will be launching my Creative Year Planner. It is a free monthly guide that will take you through the steps that are essential to get motivation and clarity in your business and most importantly, how to take it forward.
Vision and Goal setting is a much tried and tested successful method for me. I have found that setting goals gives you a long term vision with short term motivation. It minimises distractions and focus’s the mind, in fact goal setting is one of the strongest keys to a successful business. Clarity and Vision ensure that your efforts are focused on achieving a clearly defined outcome.
It all sounds like hard work, but it really isn’t. It does take time, direction and a little dedication.
Good news is that there is still time to sign up for the Yearly Planner, just follow the link www.thegembank.com/yearplanner
Share your visions and goals!
Happy New Year!
Richard
Luxury by definition is very hard to pin down, as luxury means different things to different people. In this industry however, luxury is the highest measure of quality.
So, how are you going to convince your customer that when they buy from you they are not just getting another piece of jewellery? That when they buy from you, what they get is a piece of luxury, that their purchase is a quality piece of jewellery that can last a lifetime.
Whether you are a modern, contemporary or traditional jeweller, the rules for proving that your jewellery is luxury are the same. Ask yourself, do you strive to meet every individual customers needs? Are you prepared to tailor the service to meet their requirements? Is every piece of jewellery you produce important to you?
In every business, customer satisfaction is the key to success. When selling your jewelry, it is important to deliver ‘the luxury experience’ to every customer. Try to make every customer feel special, individual and distinct from everybody else. There are many ways in which you can convey to your customer the quality and luxury of your products, by the piece of jewellery itself, and the experience of choosing and buying it. These factors will give them piece of mind and confidence in your product.
The luxury experience starts with the first point of contact, which is as soon as they walk through your door. Treat every client as an individual; give them a highly interactive and personal service. Whether the customer is choosing a piece from a collection or inquiring about a bespoke piece, show them that you care. By giving them a perceived personal connection it makes each potential buyer feel important to you. By indentifying their requirements and striving to achieve them, this ensures their confidence in the quality and therefore luxury of your jewellery.
Set yourself and your jewellery apart by showing your pride in each piece. Tell the customer what is it that you do that makes your jewellery special. Tell them about the quality of the materials you use, and give them the information on how they are sourced. If they are looking for a bespoke piece to be made, you could let them be part of the process, perhaps letting them choose the gemstones that will be used. This will make the experience of buying from you rewarding and fulfilling for the customer.
Where luxury products struggle is when they are sold on the price tag alone. The customer who buys solely on price is probably doing so just to be showy and to flaunt their wealth. When this occurs, the emotions between seller and customer are different. Instead of the customer feeling special and individual, the connection is not made, and the experience for both parties can be an empty cold one. By not connecting with your customer any chance of repeat business is very much reduced.
With Christmas behind us and the future plans being prepared, some of you are probably considering your approach.
Did you find yourself selling from your existing collections or did you find yourself increasingly being asked for customised or bespoke jewellery pieces?
With a slight shift in luxury and consumer’s approach to buying it, is there an expectation by our customers for bespoke pieces?
How do you fill your shelves if all you sell is bespoke jewellery?
As a jewellery retailer or designer jewellery maker, when you consider how you fill your retail space, there are 2 approaches that immediately present themselves. You either establish a collection of jewellery – whether it is designed and made by you or bought in, or you can offer a bespoke service. It is clear, that most jewellers fall somewhere between the two. Offering an established jewellery collection – i.e. ready to buy ‘off the shelf’ jewellery, gives many advantages. The most obvious being to take advantage of the impulse buyer. Not everyone wants to wait for your moment of inspiration to have that one off creation, nor does the man who forgot his wife’s birthday and who needs something NOW!. But every so often and that might be more often than not, you get someone in who wants something DIFFERENT, or wants to be INVOLVED in the jewellery design process, they like that one, but have you got it with some VARIATION or another? So you end up taking on a lot of commissions and doing more bespoke work and your jewellery collection starts to collect dust on the shelf and you begin to wonder ‘why did I bother making that stuff, it never sells’. If you didn’t, how would people know what you did? How would they be able to get you to make something different if you didn’t make anything at all and only offered a bespoke jewellery service?
The Catch 22
So it appears a catch 22 has evolved. What your established jewellery collection does, is set the tone of the shop, your work and your style. The style of collection, the gemstones used, the quality and the manner in which they are displayed, will very much send out a signal of what your jewellery business and you are capable of. What YOU need to do is make sure that everything goes towards highlighting your talents and maximising your profits. Now I could go on about how the secret to profits are in making your jewellery more than just the sum of its parts, but I’ll save that for another occasion.
Do customers have the right to expect bespoke?
One thing I have noticed, and it’s really the big brand name jewellers (as well as the high street chains) that are, for many reasons, only able to sell rigid collections and they do ok. In fact, only if you’re a super important customer, and I’m talking exclusively about the higher end right now, will they even contemplate the idea of creating bespoke jewellery. Set that against the designer maker.
The benefits of bespoke.
Most designer makers I know would be only too please to work hand in hand with their customers to create a customised jewellery piece for them. Think about it, not only do you have a very happy customer, but you have an evangelist who will be so proud of the jewellery they were involved in the making with you, they will spread the word far and wide.
Opportunities knocking
As you build your relationship with your customers, you build further opportunities to sell. It could be that through working with them on a particular piece, you find out that there is a follow up occasion being celebrated, offering another opportunity to build on their new jewellery collection might keep them coming back for more.
It may be this process that sets you apart from other jewellers in your area, who may not be willing, or indeed able to offer a bespoke/customising service. It is exactly this type of service that sets jewellery artisans and designer makers apart from the run-of-the-mill jeweller, or the big corporations that would rather not get involved in any activity of this nature. I understand why they wouldn’t, or in fact can’t.
By customising, tailoring, or creating one off pieces of jewellery for your customers, you have an opportunity to build a relationship that few other businesses have.
Take it and run with it.
Your collection may establish you, your bespoke jewellery service will build a special relationship with your customer.
Do you ever find yourself in a buying situation where you are looking for some good advice on something but you feel better qualified than the person you are talking to? Think about it. You went to buy a TV and a sales assistant comes along, you ask them for information on a product and they say confidently “sure I know about this” and they then proceed to read you information off of the box of the product or the big labels they put on the display model. You stand there and think to yourself – what does this guy take me for?
Now take this situation one level up and instead of buying, you are supplying.
Your the supplier of a product and your being told by your customer that they have been asked for a product that either doesn’t exist, can’t be found easily, or won’t look right. But instead of the person you work with realizing that and telling their customer straight away, they let their customer go away thinking that anything can be done. You can see where this is heading.
I recently had the opportunity to work with someone who when it came to the crunch, didn’t give the impression that they were comfortable with the job they were doing. They’d just taken up a post in a big jewellery firm having come from a relatively small one and found themselves in at the deep end. They turned to me in search of a set of stones that was needed for an existing jewellery piece and I did pretty well considering the range of sizes and shapes. But they had issues with depths of some of the stones and colours, even though once set, these issues would have largely been overcome. Because they were hung up on the absolute sizes (we’d told the customer it could be done), these stones had to match weights of the original set (an impossibility as they were tring to swap sapphires for emerald) they were not able to fulfill their order, a customer probably didn’t get the service they were looking for and they probably lost a client.
What frustrated me about this was that it didn’t need to turn out that way.
The right person, with the right qualifications, in the right place, could have managed a better outcome.
So what should they have done? Well with a bit more understanding of the stones would have been a good start. An understanding that you can put together a range of stones and that minor variotations may occur, but they’ll be evened out once set. If it was a problem handed to them by an over eager salesperson then a word with that person to clarify issues with the customer might have tightened the communitation loupe and given the customer more confidence in the buying process. If some experience was missing, then turn to the nearest expert to work out the solution and pass that on that solution to your customer.
if your staff know their product, they can achieve many goals.
They will be more confident in the sales process.
They will bring their customers round to a more realistic outcome.
They will get business done and make more money for the business.
If they don’t know the product, you’re letting money walk out the door.
I went to week one of goldsmiths’ fair with a very fresh perspective. With everything that’s been going on with the economy and the impact it has had on luxury and jewelley, I now see events like goldsmiths’ along with their exhibitors as representing the future of the industry.
When you first walk in to the hall you get struck by a sense of history. The fact that they still have uniformed commissionaires sets the tone of the whole event. Very formal and grand, well on the outside anyway. Those very grand surroundings of the hall are quickly put into sharp contrast by the very contemporary designs on show.
Firstly there is the silversmithing. If you are not familiar with the kind of work they show there, forget the stuffy dated image of candlesticks and goblets and feast your eyes on the craftsmanship on show. Designers like Jenny Edge, Ndidi Ekubia and Heather O’Connor, have taken this ancient craft and moved it right into the 21st century. Their pieces incorporate materials such as silver, wood and glass to truly amazing effect.
Then there are the Jewellers. There are the regulars such as Eric Smith, Paul Spurgeon, Mikala Djorup, Liz Tyler, Shaun Lean and David Marshall to name but a few. And there are the newcomers such as Maria Militsi and Jenny Deans, who collectively could teach the Bond Street set a thing or two. In fact they could teach the whole industry a thing or two as the principles that guide them – creativity, commitment, care for all materials used, skill in putting it all together and passion about their craft really shine through in the final product. It’s a shame more of industry doesn’t operate in this way.
It is definitely a must if you can get there. I’m looking forward to week two.
http://www.thegoldsmiths.co.uk/exhibitions-promotions/goldsmiths’-fair/
If you are not on the web with your jewellery business then you are leaving profits on the table that could otherwise be flowing in your direction. Even the smallest stores can easily start selling online using an ecommerce website of their very own, and at a cost that is much lower than you might think. All it takes is a little bit of creativity and you’ll soon be enjoying the benefits of making money off of two storefronts – one that is “bricks and mortar” and another that is on the world wide web!
Getting started with an online storefront
Even if you have never had any experience with ecommerce before, it is incredibly easy to get started with an online storefront. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of website providers out there who can provide you with an easy, turnkey solution if that is what you want. Or, if you want to go a little bit farther you work with your website provider to add in more customisation, personalisation, and so on.
Look for a website provider with a demonstrated track record in putting together websites that not only look good, but that also deliver on sales. Check with a range of providers such as your local internet service provider (ISP) or local media design firm.. You can also do a simple search online and come up with hundreds and hundreds of different providers as well.
Another really good way to find a website provider is to go to some of the online ecommerce sites you like to visit and look down at the bottom of the page. There you will find information about the company hosting the site and very likely about the company that designed the site as well. In general, if you find a site easy to navigate, easy to use, and easy to buy from, that provider would be a good one to consider for your own online storefront.
It takes more than just a website to make money
Having your own ecommerce website is important, but so is promoting it to potential customers. Just as you advertise to attract customers to your “bricks and mortar” store, so too should you promote your website to attract customers there as well. Most website providers also offer promotional, advertising, and search engine optimisation services to go along with their website development services. It’s a good idea to take advantage of these services if you want to get your brand new website noticed and making money as fast as possible. Remember: You don’t need to send thousands of pounds to get your website up and running and you don’t need to spend hundreds of pounds on search engine optimisation. I’ll cover this topic at greater depth later.
You should also promote your website in every way possible as part of your regular advertising and marketing tactics. Add the URL of your website to every print advertisement, brochure, flyer, poster, and anything else you print up. Have your business cards updated to include the website address and also add the URL to your main storefront sign as well. You could even run a special advertisement announcing your new website that includes promotion or special offer for online customers.
In the end, adding an online storefront to your jewellery business is a really smart move because once it’s created the hardest part is over. A website is a terrific way to increase your revenue each month but it takes care and attention to detail to make it stand out from the crowd.
If you would like to find out more about setting up or promoting your business online, please contact me by email: Richard@thegembank.com
If you website is providing you a steady income alongside your traditional store, let us know. How have you made your website work for your business?
Please leave your comment below or read other peoples’.
The most valuable commodity in your business is not your inventory of gemstones and jewellery. Rather, it is your database of past and current customers. If you want your business to stay profitable and succeed over the long term it is critical to make the most of this valuable base of customers by reaching out to them in a variety of ways. This kind of proactive outreach is the best way to stay connected with your customers, build and strengthen their loyalty, and keep them coming back for repeat business year after year after year.
What is the value of a past or current customer?
It may be hard to put an exact value on a past or current customer, but most business experts will tell you it costs anywhere from five to ten times more to attract a new customer than it does to keep an existing customer. This is a huge amount of money and should be a major driving force behind your efforts to reach out to your customer base.
Another way to measure the value of a past or current customer is to look at their past purchases, their potential future purchases, and the referrals or recommendations they give that attract new customers to your business. In fact, referrals and recommendations are the single biggest reason why most new customers will come into your business, just another example of how taking care of your current customers is an extremely cost effective way to bring in new business over the long term.
The best ways to reach out to your customer base
So how exactly can you reach out to your customer base efficiently and effectively? There are a number of methods you can use, both traditional and modern. Some examples include:
Regular contact – Maintaining regular contact with your customer base can be done in a huge variety of ways. You might send out a quarterly newsletter via regular mail or email, or send a message when you have a particularly interesting promotion or activity going on in the business. The key here is not to overdo it by bombarding customers with contact, but rather to “touch base” with them just enough to keep your business in their mind in a positive way.
Treat them as a friend – A good way to personalise your interactions with the customer base is to treat each one as you would a friend. Send a note to them on their birthday, remind them periodically that you’re happy to clean their fine jewellery for them at no charge, congratulate them on an anniversary, and other happy occasions.
Ask them for their preferences – In today’s world most people are bombarded with messages (especially email) each and every day, so ask each customer about their contact preferences. Do they want to receive email? Regular mail? A telephone call? And how often are they comfortable hearing from you – once a month? Every three months? Every six months? Once you know each customer’s contact preferences you can set up your outreach program to match each person’s preferences and comfort level.
These outreach efforts may not seem very important, but nothing could be further from the truth. What sets you apart as a small to medium size business is your ability to provide personalised attention to each customer, so when you use this characteristic to your advantage you are in a much better position to be successful.
What are you doing to maintain regular contact with your customers?
Please leave your comment below or read other peoples’.
Guillaume Soubiraa and Philippe Brunot returning from the deep of the Aqua mine ruby mining trench using the mine crane. Video courtesy: www.fieldgemology.org
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JigBhqvtXJA
A outback tour to the mining spot where the new world record rubies from Winza (Dodoma)Tanzania are found (GRS Gemresearch Swisslab news)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyeA97mr-3k
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