How to Start a Jewelry Business: Step-By-Step Guide

Jewelry making has become one of the trends that are helping hundreds of people to earn from it.

Also, different platforms are offering amazing opportunities, encouraging more people to showcase their skills and talent by selling jewelry online.

But the market is competitive too, there are big brands dominating with more followers and brand establishment.

For someone who is planning to start a business in jewelry making, it can be hard to keep up.

But according to online Jewelry Sales, the growth will be increased by 11% in 2021.

So if you are considering starting your own online jewelry business, this guide can help you.

What Are The Niches In Jewelry Business?

To stand out in the market, choosing the niche is an important step.

Even when the competition is tough, identifying your niche can help you to offer something that nobody else is doing.

You can choose different ways to stand out. And for that you are going to need:

  • The audience for your business
  • What you are designing and for what purpose?
  • Which is your type in the jewelry business?

These are the common and basic yet the most important points to remember.

Choosing your audience is crucial so you know who you are making designs, is this for young girls? Or office-going women? Can men also use it etc?

The next comes the design and purpose. Do your jewelry designs are minimalistic ? or you have something unique to touch?

For what purpose the buyers can consider purchasing jewelry for you? Are you making the jewelry for weddings ? or for themed or prom nights?

When you get the answers to these, you will have the overall outlook of your business.  

However, the next one is choosing the type for your jewelry business. And this one is divided into :

types in jewelry for online store

Fine Jewelry

Image Source:The Glass Magazine

Fine jewelry is made using metals and gemstones like gold, diamond, platinum, silver, and rubies.

These meals and gemstones are precious and that’s why they symbolize the luxury lifestyle.

Fine jewelry focuses on high quality along with stylish and worn mostly for important or special occasions.

The price range can be started from $100 to $3000, or it can exceed which depends on the materials used, sourcing, reputation of brand, and size.

Handmade Jewelry

Image Source:Pinterest

This type of jewelry has its own popularity and marketplace like Etsy.

Also, the platform is an example that handmade jewelry can be sold and people will purchase it.

However, you can’t do mass production but if you are planning to start a business and want to sell something unique, this one is a good option to consider.

You can also consider Etsy for selling your handmade jewelry and building your audience.

Costume Jewelry

Image Source:Franchise India

Well, it’s also called Fashion jewelry. These types are designed for everyday use.

This one is different from fine jewelry as the price of costume jewelry is lower and uses the imitation materials like wood, synthetic diamonds, copper, plastic, brass, etc.

However the jewels require to be affordable, it can start from $1 to $100.

But you can expand your business once you establish the brand. Before you start with this type, make sure you have a good product pricing strategy. It will help you not miss your potential customers.

Steps To Take For Starting Your Own Jewelry Business

You can be a hobbyist or professional, for both starting their business is not that hard.

If you are well prepared and know what you are doing, it won’t take much hassle either.

For that here is a step by step guide for you :

Step 1: Choose Your Niche

As mentioned earlier, choosing a niche is an important step. No matter what business you are doing, if you have a niche, you can target a much better audience, and chances of earning profit increase too.

The same goes for the jewelry business, knowing what you are selling, who you are selling, and from where they can purchase will help in deciding much easier.

For example, if you are selling handmade jewelry and targeted young people. You can use social media like Facebook and Instagram. 

Since you are targeting the young generation, you can keep the tone fun and light.

Another example you can consider is selling engagement rings. It will require much professional take and a website to showcase your work.

As you noticed, choosing the niche helps you in deciding what you can do next along with defining your audience, branding as well as marketing.

Step 2: Decide The Platform Sell Online

For someone who is starting their business online, the internet can be overwhelming as it’s too big to pick one platform.

There are three basic ways to pick and i.e. :

  • Social Media
  • Online Marketplace
  • Own Store

To understand this more, here is a brief on how and what you can choose :

Social Media

Social media like Instagram, Facebook, etc have their pros and cons, to choose you to need to know :

  • It offers you a huge audience and a bigger reach.
  • Social media is low cost.
  • You can start much faster and easier.
  • Branding can be an issue as it’s limited to the profile page.
  • It can get time-consuming later

Pro tip: Instead of relying on social media, use this for engaging more audience and building the audience.

Online Marketplace

The platforms you get here are eBay, Amazon, Etsy, etc. Before you choose, consider this first :

  • It allows you to save time and effort.
  • It doesn’t require you to work hard
  • Less expensive, mostly the fees for listing or transaction fees.
  • Less chance of getting loyal or repeat customers.
  • More competitions

Pro Tip: Considering if you are starting the business and you are not planning to invest a lot, an online marketplace can be helpful. Also, it comes with other services which save your time.

Owning Online Store

You can start the business by owning the store online. Here are points for you to consider :

  • It’s a most professional way to start a business.
  • It gives you overall control over branding and designing.
  • Display all of your designs in one place.
  • You can create a consistent brand and professional journey.
  • However, it can take a much longer time and effort to successfully start.

Pro tip: Unlike other options you get, owning your store online is similar to owning a store. It gives you all benefits and advantages 

if you are serious about the work and you want to start it professionally. Then you should consider this.

What To Pick Then?

The best thing is don’t have to pick one, you can choose whatever fits your requirements.

If you have limited or fewer items to start with, you can choose online platforms like Etsy.

Later on, you can maximize the profit after combining different platforms.

Step 3: Setting Up The Store

After you choose the platform, now you need your store where you can sell your jewelry online.

Depending on the platform, you can need to do the setting of your shop.

Social Media

Setting up your social media can be a little tricky as it varies on the platform you choose.

Social Media platforms like Facebook and Instagram have their own ways of starting a shop. Make sure you know how to do it.

Facebook has 2.6 billion active users on a global level. The platforms allow you to create your shop and sell along with building your audience.

howto setup jewelry store on facebook

Instagram is one of the recommended platforms as not just you get a much easier way to interact with customers. 

But with 1 billion active users on a daily basis, you get better opportunities too.

howto setup jewelry shop on instagram

Online Marketplaces

Starting with an online marketplace and setting up your marketplace is much easier.

You just need to create an account, upload what you are selling and you are done.

However, depending on the marketplace such as Amazon, you will need to choose the selling plan

Owning Online Store

You need to choose the eCommerce builder which can help you in starting your jewelry business. 

Also, you are going to need a domain name, selecting the theme, adding products, changing the setting, and publishing it.

Step 4: Show Your Products

Focus on how you can make your product look appealing and good. The more amazing it will look, the better response you will get.

If you are owning the brick and mortar, you can get attention by using lightning and placements.

Also, it’s important to remember that your customer can’t touch or examine the jewelry, so you need to focus on how you can build more trust and make your product shine.

Here are few ways that you can consider :

Add More Customization To The Store

Jewelry stores should look something that can hold the attention, your store should have beautiful appearance, color combinations, etc that can appeal to the eyes.

When you are building your store, you get most of the control over what you want your store to look like. You can design the storefront and make it more toward the branding purpose.

Pro Tip: Set your tone and create the brand’s voice with customization.

Use High-Quality Pictures

Your audience will need the images to know what they are buying. You can use this for creating a beautiful experience for them.

Use models if you can or you can make DIY backgrounds to highlight your jewelers.

Make sure your images are high in quality and appealing to the eyes.

Pro Tip: Use multi-angles so you can highlight all the best features of your jewelry.

Write Appealing Description

Tell about your jewelry, talk about the design, stones, and how you manufactured it.

Give details and help the buyers to know what they will get. Mention about when they can wear the jewelry, which occasions will fit, or how they can keep it clean.

The point is to make your description informative and reasonable so the buyers can decide to purchase it.

Step 5: Price Your Designs And Jewelers

Pricing is important as if you get this right, you can find a lot of potential customers.

Pricing your jewelers are also crucial to show why it’s valuable. 

For example, if you are using precious stones, your jewelry should be reasonably expensive.

However it also includes other factors like:

  • How much time did you invest in making that piece?
  • How do other expenses like labor, packaging, and manufacturing, etc cost?

Well, it can be difficult to understand what cost should be right. If it gets too expensive, then there will hardly be anyone who might purchase it.

If your pricing is too low, then it will not be profitable for you either.

Here are some points that can help in deciding the ideal cost :

Cover All The Costs

The basics should start with covering all manufacturing costs, including your time and skills.

Make sure you are not selling at loss.

Search Your Market

The best way to know what price you should start is to do the research.

No matter what type you choose in jewelry, there will be a standard price set in the market.

You can consider the price range according to that.

Pro tip: try using the formula

The total cost of your product + Markup% = Find the price of your product.

Step 6: Set Up The Payment Process

Regardless of what you are choosing, getting the money online is simple.

Here you need to connect the store with the account to get the payments. It will be easier for a customer to send the payment directly to your account.

Different online Marketplaces have their own payment system.

 For example, if you are an Amazon seller then you have to wait for 14 days because Amazon transferred payment after that.

 Or if you are using Etsy then it’s a payment that will be delivered to your account. Well, Etsy has its own payment method. 

 However, both platforms have different payment gateways and you can choose according to your convenience 

To Choose payment gateways, it depends on your location as well as currency and your banking preferences.

 It will need your t setup and it will also include your customer demographics.

There are some main payment options that you can consider for your online store such as

  •    PayPal
  •  Square
  •  Apple pay
  •  Amazon pay
  •  Stripe

 if not then you have an option to choose manual payments too such as you can do a wire transfer.

  Step 7: Setting Up The Shipping 

For online business, shipping plays an important role and there are few things that you need to understand before you set up the shipping options.

The Origin Address

 The first thing you need to understand is where the ship is from. Their shipping address will help in understanding the taxes and other charges that will apply to your services.

The Shipping Types 

 you can handle your shipping rates depending on what type of shipping you are offering.

 Here is an overall view of shipping types that you can consider.

  •  free shipping
  •  exam shipping cost
  •  flat rate shipping
  • Calculated shipping rates
  •  price based or weight-based rate
tips for shipping of your jewelry

 Destination of Your Shipping

For your store and to understand the overall cost for shipping, you need to fix the shipping zones.

 it means there will be certain areas all specific places where you are offering your shipping services. it also means that only those customers who are either from that shipping zone can order your product.

 This is when you need to understand how large or small you can afford to go.

Step 8: Do Marketing And Promotions 

Once you are set to go, now you need to find potential customers for your first set.

 Here comes the marketing strategy that will target your demographics and find those potential customers who would like to purchase from you.

 you are going to need a multi-level Channel Marketing strategy and you can add different channels such as:

Email Marketing

 Growing your email list is considered one of the best ways To connect your brand with your customer in the long run.

 you can do promotions by sending emails about recent designs that you are added, personalized options, special offers, etc.

Social Media

You can use Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube for promoting your brand. you can connect with your audience by sharing behind the scenes how you make Jewelry, process and what inspired you, etc.

 Social media is a good platform where you can make your brand more popular and connect with your audience.

 you can showcase your designs and highlight what makes your jewelry store different from others

 Paid Advertisement On Social Media

 There are different eCommerce businesses who made their brand popular by doing campaigns on social media channels like Facebook, Instagram etc. 

 bi paid advertisement can target your customers more precisely and it will give you a much more clear idea about where your traffic is coming from.

 Also, by buying paid advertisements you can show your jewelry and designs to those who are looking for a product like yours.

How Can You Get More Profit In The Jewelry Business?

  There is no doubt that the jewelry business is a profitable market. That’s why there are so many business owners running their jewelry shops successfully.

 The point is as a seller you need to offer something different and unique. jewelry is based on preferences and taste.

Need to find what makes your design special to stand out from others.

The more creative and unique perspective you have, the more customers will like to visit your store and purchase the jewelry from you.

Here are some points that can help you : 

Jewelers are always in trend, it doesn’t matter what time is going on. 

You just need to focus on what is popular among your audience. It’s good for your marketing and the more research you do the better understanding of preferences you will get.

Look for the types of designs going famous, what kind of stones or type in jewelry are getting more demand. 

Instead of relying on-trend completely, get something to add in it which can be your own. 

Increase Your Reach

Getting the attention of your customers will help in improving sales. And for that, you need the reach.

Social media like Instagram is an ideal platform to use for that. You can use other mediums to get access to communicate more with others.

Use Online Marketing 

Instead of using outdated ideas like banners and posters, switch to online marketing,

Make your brand and store welcoming, so more people can connect with you. 

Use creative ways, choose special days like mother’s day, valentine’s day, or any other celebration events 

Market your brand more on platforms so you can get better reach.

Use Celebrity Or Influencer Marketing 

When it comes to jewelry, you can use celebrity and influencer marketing. Popular faces can help in establishing your brand with more effort. 

Also, It will help in building trust and eliminate the cautions for those who are not familiar. 

The good news with influencer marketing, you don’t need too much investment. 

Target the audience and choose an influencer who can connect well with them. 

Frequently Asked Questions ( FAQs)

 Is the jewelry business still profitable?

The jewelry industry has profit margins that can start from 25 to 75%. However, it depends on the business and the value of jewelry, but yes it’s a profitable industry. 

Do I need a license for starting a jewelry business?

You will need a business license for a seller permit. Also, you might need a trade license application from the local government. 

What are the best online places to sell jewelry?

There are different ones, based on what you prefer. However, the top 5 are Etsy, eBay,  Zibbet, Bonanza, and Artfire. 

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