Outlining the advantages of 4 social media sites

increase the reach of posts or creating a targeted ad campaign to reach certain customers in specific locales.

Twitter
Twitter’s fastest-growing age demographic right now is 55 to 64 year olds, which means more customers that can afford to buy the bigger-ticket items now are reachable on the social media platform, Chislett said. 

Additionally, and more obviously, the younger Millennial crowd is very active on Twitter and gets a lot of their news from the network. They also use the platform as a place to interact with brands and hear their voice.

To really understand Twitter and how it works, Chislett recommends creating a personal Twitter account first. This will help not only to see best practices for businesses to reach their customers but also to understand how consumers are using it as well.

It’s also necessary to understand how hashtags work. In addition to informing about what things are trending with consumers, hashtags can also be used as a search function, making it possible to find customers in the local area that may not have been reachable otherwise.

When including hashtags in a post, it’s a good idea to include one of the store’s city, according to Chislett, increasing the chances it will be seen by the right customers.

Pinterest
Pinterest can be a great tool for jewelers because it allows brands to see what kinds of products, stones, colors, and more that their customers are looking for, and shows trends in local markets.

To set the business apart from the competition, be sure to give Pinterest boards creative names, Chislett said, and find interesting ways to organize them so they stand out in followers’ feeds. For example, organizing by color will create a flood of pins in one color in a follower’s homepage, which is sure to catch their eye and make them notice who’s pinning them.

Additionally, make sure that when posting pins, they are originating from the company’s website, so that click-throughs take them straight to a product page with the potential for sales.

Instagram
Photo-sharing site Instagram is the perfect social media network for jewelers because it allows them to take advantage of one of their strongest assets--their visually appealing merchandise—and, unlike Facebook, all followers get to see every one of the posts.

Hashtags can also be used on Instagram to make a user more searchable as well as keep track of what’s trending in the consumer market.

While the returns on investing time and manpower behind social media are almost totally immeasurable, there’s no denying it has its benefits and is a space jewelers should be in, Chislett said. In addition to being a way to attract new customers and keep in touch with existing clients, it can also be a great way to get old merchandise that hasn’t sold back in front of customers in a fresh light.

In addition to outlining the advantages of these four social media platforms, Chislett spoke of the benefits of having a completely separate mobile website -- not just a responsive site that adjusts to mobile devices -- built with a design and function created to make it easier for the shoppers on the go.  

The mobile site should be cohesive with the regular site in style and design to streamline the brand’s look.

She also noted that for Underwood Jewelers, they believe that the investment they put in for a brand-new mobile site was worth it. The store had a number of instances last year where people used the mobile site to call the store or email an inquiry, eventually leading to a sale.