The JA Report: News, Tips & Trends from Jewelers of America

JA On The Air: Discussing Diamonds and Consumer Confidence

Jewelers of America Chief Operating Officer Robert Headley represented the association last week on "Midmorning," a Minnesota Public Radio program that was covering conflict diamonds and consumer confidence surrounding the international diamond supply chain. The program, hosted by Kerri Miller, also featured Tom Zoellner, author of The Heartless Stone and Corinna Gilfillan of the non-governmental organization (NGO) Global Witness. Headley entered the conversation in the second half hour, representing the views of Jewelers of America retailers in the U.S., who are the closest connection to consumers. The discussion covered the Charles Taylor War Crimes Tribunal, recent decisions regarding diamonds from Zimbabwe's Marange region and what the industry is doing to ensure consumers are buying diamonds that are not from conflict.

Click here for the link to the audio program at JA's In The Media Page.

Mr. Headley Goes To Washington

Jewelers of America is taking a stand for jewelers’ issues in Washington, D.C! On July 29, JA’s Chief Operating Officer Robert Headley attended a press conference on Capitol Hill, held by Representative William Delahunt, of Massachusetts, to announce his introduction of The Main Street Fairness Act, which would help level the playing field between online and brick-and-mortar retailers.

Pop-Up Jewelry Stores: The Wave of the Future?

By Helena Krodel, Director of Media and Special Events

From Boston to California, New York to San Francisco, pop-up stores are a new phenomenon taking retail by storm. A pop-up shop, that is — a temporary retail space or experience which involves “popping-up” one day, and disappearing the next – has become the second most clever way (after social media of course) to create a unique environment that engages customers and generates a feeling of relevance and interactivity. As far as publicity goes, this concept is high on the list of buzz-worthy activities. 

Address Customer Concerns About De Beers Settlement Delay

A recent decision by the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has delayed the $295 million De Beers Class Action settlement. Since consumers were among those who filed claims, retail jewelers should be prepared for questions from customers. Handle them well and reaffirm your position as your customers' resource for trustworthy jewelry information and product.

Jewelers of America provides these tips to proactively ease customer concerns about the delay in the class action process:

Ingredients for Internet Marketing, Part 2: Understanding Traffic

By Vedran Tomic is an Internet marketing consultant, who specializes in local search and is a contributor to SmallBizTrends.com, a small business news site

In Part One of “Ingredients for Internet Marketing for Jewelers,” Internet Marketing Consultant Vedran Tomic explained the importance of web design, social media and local search to your Internet marketing campaign. Now, he explains how organic and paid search helps build your web traffic and increase your customer base.

To have a decent return of investment (ROI) on your Internet marketing efforts, you will need to get traffic to your website. More specifically, you will need targeted, qualified traffic. In the case of local brick-and-mortar jewelers, this means web traffic from people in your area interested in jewelry.

Web traffic can be acquired in many ways. In this guide, I will concentrate on traffic from search, because search is arguably the most important channel of traffic acquisition. There are two types of search traffic: organic search traffic and paid search traffic. No search marketing strategy is complete without both of these models at work. However, it’s important to understand each method’s advantages.