The Beading Gem

Some of you may have wondered if you could sell directly on Facebook.  Now you can with the Vendor Shop Social app.  The concept of selling from a social media site is not new but it is the first app I have come across that is really attractive to handmade craft artisans in many ways.

Like it or not, social media is increasingly influencing many parts of our lives.... including jewelry. Just as you declare your relationship status on Facebook,  Buump band bracelets now let you signal your availability or unavailability for everyone to see.

I was rather late getting started with a Facebook Page. To be honest, I didn't really like the clunky and occasionally buggy software. But Facebook is huge -  it recently surpassed Google as the most visited site in the US. So if you are interested in promoting your jewelry store, it can't be ignored.

Do you make jewelry to sell?  If so, you probably know promotion is the key. It's no point having an online store and expect traffic to come without doing any promotion. The internet doesn't work like that.

Many artisans chose to write a blog and are active in a few social media communities. Indeed blogging,Twitter, Facebook and Flickr are cited by artisans as the key places to interact. But many people lack the time to participate, and are overwhelmed by it all.

Many of us like to go clothes shopping with close friends and family simply for that fitting room consultation before buying. But much as we love them, not everyone we know is a talented fashion maven who can make good suggestions or offer tips on how to put together a certain look or style. Thanks to modern technology, you can now get that help without even leaving home!

Facebook Fun
Part 2 of 2
Calling all Facebook fans! If you like to give virtual presents to your friends and family,and are tired of the usual birthday cakes and cutsey gifts, try out this latest app from the locket manufacturer, Heartsmith. It was launched on Facebook last month.

Facebook fun
Part 1 of 2
I finally caved and set up The Beading Gem's Facebook page! It's really difficult to dabble with too much social media as there is only so much time. However, Facebook is wildly popular and I wanted to join in the fun.

I came across Tweet Volume and found it an interesting free service whose software uses data from Twitter and Google. It's a way of comparing anything you choose and find out how popular the topic is based on how much it is being twittered. Being very curious, I tried it out.

The first experiment was to compare the relative twitterings or how often the search term comes up for 5 craft/jewelry selling sites - Etsy, Arfire, Dwanda, Ruby Lane and 1000markets.

I checked out the sites on weekend evening as well as on a weekday evening (shown above). The results were the same - Etsy artisans and their fans were by a huge margin the most active. This doesn't necessarily mean Etsy is bigger than the others but that the artisans there are very tech savy indeed or Twitter addicts! You may wish to read this blog's post "How Etsy uses Twitter". As one commenter there said, "Business is all about communication - and Twitter is a great communication tool."

Twitter though, as I pointed out before, has to be used well as most tweets fall into the pointless babble category. About 40% of tweets were found to be of the "I am eating my lunch" category.

Moving on to experiment two, I used Tweet Volume to check out which type of jewelry piece was twittered most amongst necklaces, earrings, bracelet, anklet and brooch (pin was not specific enough and neither is ring). As you can see below, necklaces, earrings and bracelets are twittered most which indicates their relative popularity. Food for thought.



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The Beading Gem's Journal

There are many social networking sites you could be on - Facebook, Myspace, various blogging communities and so on. But Twitter is the one that's HOT right now. You can follow me at twitter.com/beadinggem.

The rapid growth of Twitter is easy to understand - it fits right in with a time-pressed society already attuned to instant messaging media like chats and texting. Twitter also appeals to those who prefer frequent micro-blogging in under 140 characters rather than writing infrequent longer blog posts. The influence of Twitter could well be profound - check out Time.com's How Twitter Will Change Our Lives.

On the other hand, many users try and soon abandon it. The Nielsen (ratings group) posted some retention data which shows that 60% of Twitter users failed to return after a month. I can well understand their confusion. Twitter does appear rather like a site for narcissists. Newbies may also think Twitter can magically deliver customers, followers whatever. But like blogging or any other social network, the returns depend on the amount of effort the user is willing to put in and the patience to see it through. It pays to also use any service intelligently otherwise that effort is just going to go down the drain.

Hundreds of companies are now jumping on the bandwagon. They are hoping to follow the cohort of "early adopters" or users shifting from older sites like Myspace. There are 6 good reasons why jewelry artisans should try out Twitter :

1. Whole new community of potential customers (but don't spam them! see below)
2. A totally new way to engage and communicate with your customers and fans
3. Easier than blogging, perhaps instead of blogging
4. Find new suppliers or unique products
5. Check out the competition
6. Spot trends

TWITTER TIPS

Getting Started
For a short sharp video introduction, check out the Howcast.com's How to Use Twitter. (n.b. it might take a while to get going).

You can tweet as often as you want. If you mouse over other people's tweets on your page, you will see a back arrow. Clicking on that will show the @username which means you are replying to that individual publicly. Direct message a person if the tweet is only for him or her. Twitter Search allows you to see what's happening for anything you care about.

Managing Twitter
If you enjoy tweeting and are frustrated with the limitations of the homepage, then a really good way to manage and organise your twitter account and see what's happening in your twittersphere is to use Hootsuite or Tweetdeck. It's a free download that I often use and have come to like. I have been able to tweet more and monitor twitterdom via columns. You can add columns of your own like Search: jewelry and move them around.

Sites like Hootsuite includes a very useful tool - there is the box where you can put any URL and shorten it into a tinyurl for your tweet. With only 140 characters, you really need it!

Making sense of Twitter
Twitter is rapidly evolving in how it is used by the community. RT is a codeword for retweets - you could copy somebody's tweet with proper source credit to YOUR group of followers. Another phenomenon is the hashtag, a way of grouping certain types of tweets. Some hashtags are now clickable. Tagdef.com has the (searchable) full list if you need a hashtag dictionary. But don't overuse this feature as it can generate confusion and frustrate your followers.

This article covers the 7 Common Mistakes Almost Everyone Makes.

Customising your Twitter page
First you had to design your webpage, then your blog, now you get to custom your twitter page! It's actually a static background - only the central message field moves. So you have to come up with a large "banner" which the viewer can only see either side! You can check my Twitter page and scroll up and down and you'll see what I mean.

Don't let it take over your life
Once you get started, Twitter can be quite addictive so make sure it doesn't rule your life and you still have time to design and make jewelry! Technology is cool but only you have the control to say no. Why follow every single person who follows you? Follow those who you WANT to follow. I am definitely not a fan of campaigns to gain huge numbers of followers.

Don't Spam
Also if you are promoting your jewelry, don't over do it. Try to do something creative with your tweets and not just announce a new shop arrival, one after another. Twitter is not a commercial channel.

If you check the comments following this Huffington Post article, there are a couple of telling remarks about jewelry artisans overusing Twitter. I quote "It's a nice service if you stay away from the name-collectors and spammers (and whatever you do, avoid the Etsy sellers - they spam like crazy!!). Also check the corresponding Etsy forum thread "You should probably lay off the Twitter spam!" about what jewelry artisans had to say. I think the problem is the overuse of Twitterfeed which automatically sends every new listing to Twitter.

So are you game? One of my friends, who shall remain nameless, says there is no way on earth she could possibly say what she wanted in just 140 characters!
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Original Post by THE BEADING GEM
Jewelry Making Tips - Jewelry Business Tips 

It's insane, this Twitter mania. A growth rate of over 700% in just a short year and millions of users including me @beadinggem. (Beginner Twitter tutorial post coming up in a few weeks). It's THE place to be these days for many individuals and businesses, including jewelry artisans.

Twitter is turning into something more than just another social medium. It is currently playing a pivotal role, along with other web tools, in Iran where access and dissemination of information is severely limited(see Iranians find ways to bypass Net censors and Twitter responds on Iranian role).

Celebrities have also been hopping on the band wagon - Ashton Kutsch was the first person to pass the one million follower mark. On April 17, a noticeable jump in numbers - some 1.2 million new users - was due to Oprah Winfrey tweeting for the first time on her show.

It's thus inevitable Twitter spoofs would emerge. Here is the first - Twouble with Twitter, an animated spoof from Super News about a guy who just doesn't get it about Twitter.

The video also incorporates the infamous Twitter whale icon which is displayed whenever the Twitter site is down.



Flutter is a delightful mockumentary which introduces nano-blogging - an even smaller version of Twitter. Users "flap" like humming birds in just 26 characters! Vowels go missing in action! This clever dig at Twitter is by the highly creative people at Slate Video .



Via and Via

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The Beading Gem's Journal

Cut Out and Keep is a wonderful site I stumbled upon. It is an online community which boasts over 15,000 uber creative members who "make and share step by step craft tutorials". Nicknamed CO+K, the site started as a blog back in 2001 where Cat Morlet would post her photos and craft tutorials. She started doing podcasts and by 2007, she and her partner morphed the blog into the current interactive website.

The site continues to grow with members posting pictures of their craft projects. Who knew you could decorate alligator clips, that jellyfish earrings (above) were so pretty and toothbrushes could be made into bangles? Don't know what conversation rings are? Then click here. The safety pin earrings were also fun.

Many generous members have uploaded how-tos.There are hundreds of projects to browse through. I enjoyed going through quite a range of free jewelry making tutorials. Glass Primitif on Etsy has a clever one where you encase a razor blade between two glass sheets for the coolest pendant. Knittin' Kitten shows you how to make some custom framed earrings using bottlecaps.



Below are some outstanding free beaded jewelry projects. They were submitted by Beads Unlimited (UK).

Waste Not Want Not Bracelet
At a loss what to do with all those left over, mismatched seed beads? This great even count peyote stitch project takes care of that and you get a one of a kind bracelet!



Spring Charm Bracelet
This charming bracelet with lots of dangles on a chain is a great way of putting together all your left over beads. The beaded wire flower makes for a lovely touch.


Autumn Leaves Necklace
Right angle weave and fringe your way to this lovely necklace!


Pearly Pink Jewelry Set
The hoop earrings are a cinch to do if you use the bead-a-hoop type of findings. The necklace dangles or tassels are added with needle and thread - a simple and effective technique.


Spring Necklace
This really pretty beaded multi-stranded necklace is also easy to do. The instructions explain how to use a calotte or clamshell finding to hide the knots.



St Petersburg Necklace
This lovely beaded necklace reminds me of the flat spiral stitch but it is actually done in the St Petersburg stitch.



For more tutorials check out my Jewelry Making Tips

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[UPDATE : Plaincraft is no longer available.] 
Have you ever wondered, deep down, if your jewelry designs were really, really good? Your friends and family may gush over your creations but perhaps the one way to know for sure if your jewelry has broadbased appeal is if you got a whole bunch of total strangers to judge your jewelry purely on its merits. A fabulous design doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be wildly popular.

Plaincraft is a new website where you can get crowdsourced ratings on handmade creations. Just upload your design (with your online shop link) and viewers can rate it on a scale of 1-20. Everyday, the top 10 are displayed on their front page. Below are my favourites from yesterday's top 10.

As they said on Plaincraft's Twitter - "No frills, no fees, it's free!" It's an easy way to get exposure for your work. Yep, free advertising. You got to like that.

Exotic Paisley Necklace by JoslinJewels
Sheridan Joslin is a fantastic wire work artisan from Bainbridge Island, WA. I didn't know until after I stumbled on Plaincraft that she reads my blog too!

The Vision Chain Maille Earrings by IkowDesigns
Chris from North Carolina is a passionate jewelry artisan who fell in love with chain maille and it shows.

Nouveau Blue by JoslinJewels



via
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The Beading Gem's Journal

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Blogging is a great way to make your website dynamic. Indeed many artisans write blogs to highlight new products and to engage fans of their work. But blogging is like a hungry animal at times. It requires frequent updates if it is to stay alive. For many busy artisans, blogging might be too difficult or making jewelry is far more enjoyable than writing. There is an alternative called Twitter. It's a wildly popular micro-blogging platform. All you have to do is "tweet" - write a sentence or two in just 140 characters. You tweet to your friends and family via the computer or your mobile phone and share what you are doing at that moment. Here is a video explaining what Twitter is in Plain English :

Woo hoo!! I just got a post comment from BlogNet Awards telling me they have accepted Diana Norman's nomination of my blog for the Best Hobby Blog category. Thanks, Diana for doing this!



You can read what Diana wrote about the Beading Gem's Journal as well as the review by the BlogNet Awards team here. They apparently check every nominated blog manually before it is accepted on the site "to make sure that only good quality blogs are entered into the BlogNet Awards." Double woo-hoo!

BlogNet Awards holds monthly and yearly contests in different categories as well as the best overall one. They accept nominations until the 15th of the month but voting and comments are accepted until the end of the month. Blogs that don't win, get automatically entered to the next month's competition.

You can see, comment and vote for my blog if you click here. You do have to be registered to vote and comment on any of the blogs.

Remember, if you are a blog owner yourself, commenting there earns you link love. Not only that, commenters can potentially win prizes for commenting! Winners are picked from monthly random draws and can win either cash ($50-150 CAD) or Entrecard credits. What are you waiting for?
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Tutorials are a great way to learn a new technique. It is vital that we continue to learn for how else would our creativity and skills improve?

Many artisans are now putting out tutorials. Here are two virtual places where you can browse for and get growing numbers of member submitted tutorials. Both sites are newish so expect site upgrades and features yet to come.

1. Jewelrygeeks.com (formerly metalchasers.com), a social media site for jewelry artisans is one of my favourite places to hang out - their gallery section is a veritable parade of jewelry pieces to gawk at. They recently added a tutorial hub (under sections) where members can submit tutorials - text, photos or even videos. They are to be complete and free but of course if you produce tutorials for sale, your link will be there! One of the early submissions is from SilverRiverJewelry (link no longer available) - a basic tutorial on how to make your own headpins (above left). Tutorials can also be rated. Jewelrygeeks uses Ruby Points for site participation which will soon go towards the purchase of "quality, tangible items" when their Club Feature launches.

2. Eni Oken (link no longer available) is a well known wire artisan who offers fantastic tutorials

Below is Eni's fabulous woven bead cuff tutorial for $7. The site takes a cut after you make your first sale. Your students i.e. people who made jewelry using your tutorials are also encouraged to post pictures of their work. Members can also share informative articles on all aspects of jewelry making - writing articles earns points which then goes towards purchasing free tutorials, featured space and more gallery space.

Book Review
Making beautiful jewelry is one thing but selling it is quite another. Promotion is key. Most jewelry artisans do not possess large marketing budgets so social networking is a vital form of cost-effective advertising.

Getting new contacts via your own local social network is a good start. Last week, I blogged about a social networking event we took part in where a group of different local businesses pooled their individual customer bases and created opportunities to meet potential new clients.

Social networking online however, requires new approaches. You'd think with the internet, a vast ocean of customers would be stumbling over a jewelry website or blog, but the reality is, they won't because they don't know it exists.

If you're new at this game and wondering how and where you should get started, wonder no more! A new book just published by Rena Klingenberg of Home Jewelry Business Success Tips (link no longer available)  addresses those issues specifically for jewelry artisans. Rena contacted me recently and asked me to review it : Social Networking : Sell Your Jewelry Online the New Way(link no longer available) .

The book does cover a lot of ground - from niche marketing, to social sites, linking (social bookmarks), forums, blogs as an important social marketing tool and even satellite sites like Squidoo. Rena pretty well covers the major sites to target. She also includes invaluable tips and the dos and don'ts when social marketing. A couple of bonus sections are also part of the book - Guide to Setting Up Your Successful Online Jewelry Business and a Social Marketing checklist. Bear in mind, doing social networking online does require a certain comfort level with using computers and being on the internet.

This 190 page book is a culmination of a lot of time spent not just writing it (3 months) but doing the research which took her a few years. It took me over a year of online research and social networking to figure out on my own how to promote my blog. Yet, Rena still had tips I didn't know about. And I am pretty sure I don't have the circulation Rena has for her website!

So I do recommend it and you will see my positive verdict on the book's promotional page. It is very useful for anyone who hasn't a clue what to do or is still very new at it and can't afford the time to research it all. The book is available either electronically or in printed form (plus shipping) and has been priced at $39. This is a lot more than most pdf books I have seen. But that has to be balanced against the time you are willing to spare learning how to do online social networking on your own. Would you rather make jewelry instead of spending hours and hours on the computer?

That said, online social marketing is in itself time-consuming. Rena's book is a comprehensive guide but remember, it is not possible to do everything because it can be overwhelming. My advice is to concentrate on the most effective social marketing techniques for you and the ones you enjoy doing most. Also remember that even with the best social marketing efforts, unless the website is attractive and inviting with good photos of gorgeous jewelry, the visitors will not stay to buy.

Note : Although I got to read her book, I did not receive payment for doing the review nor will I benefit from any book sales.
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The Beading Gem's Journal

Bettejo (A Bead a Day) recently left a comment wondering how on earth I had "the time to research and come up with all the facts and pieces of information I post"? Well, I do enjoy reading a lot so it is not a chore. I also like collecting cool facts. Books are my best resources. The internet is also pretty good. However just as there are good books and books best composted, the internet has to be cherry-picked for reliable information.

The amount of information available on the web today is nothing short of explosive and is growing everyday. The Netcraft Web Server Survey started estimating numbers of websites in 1995 (18,000). The 100 million mark was crossed in 2006. And yet, it is a conservative figure as many websites were probably missed. Each website could also have many pages. This website attempted to estimate the total number of web pages based on Netcraft's website numbers and Yahoo's webpage indexing figures, arriving at a staggering 29.7 billion webpages on the World Wide Web as of February of 2007.

So with an ocean of information available, how can we possibly fish for the information we want? Using search engines like Google is a good way but bear in mind these internet "bots" only fetch you what you ask. If you don't use the right keywords or don't even know where to start, then finding great websites will be akin to finding a needle in a haystack. But if you pool the resources of millions of discerning surfers who not only fetch for you but review these sites as well, then you get StumbleUpon! It is one of the most enjoyable ways I use to find websites of interest, including jewelry sites.


First join this free service and download their toolbar. You also should set your preferences ie list the topics you are most interested in. There isn't a category for jewelry, so I chose crafts. I also added a whole bunch of other favourite topics like history and books.

Now comes the fun part. You can do three main things on StumbleUpon :

"Stumble" Click on the word on the toolbar and a random website previously discovered by another member will appear. You can give it a thumbs up or down. Click on the speech bubble if you were moved enough to write a review. The more positive responses, the more times that website will be recommended to other stumblers. Keep clicking "Stumble" for more websites. I didn't think one could exhaust a category but my friend Diana Norman confessed to stumbling right through the entire humour category one day!! One of my favourite stumbles is the website which makes bookcases and shelves from books - here is their funniest bookshelves section.

Recommend new sites. I quickly learnt I wanted to be the first to discover new sites. Not very mature, I know. When I do find a new website or webpage, I get slightly giddy with delight because I've beaten more than 4 million StumbleUpon members to it! I quickly hit the thumbs up sign and review it. After I stumbled Marika's blog post on her jump ring making I received a message from a fellow stumbler who was delighted with my discovery.

Social Network. Make friends and check out their StumbleUpon pages if you are socially inclined. I also provide a link to my personal StumbleUpon page (also on the right sidebar) for my blog readers to check out. Many of the links there have made it to my blog.

I initially joined StumbleUpon in order to share my best pages. Many stumblers enjoyed my post "A Jewelry Box of Quotations". But I've grown to like just stumbling. My very first stumble brought me to Subversive Jewelry, the clever website of New York artisan, Justin Giunta. His website (shown in the picture above) shows an old metal cabinet with drawers that open when you click on them. Many Stumblers loved that site! Dragon Mama showcased the amazing fantasy beadwork by Born of Beads. Crafista's list of 10 reasons why one should buy artisan jewelry was a hit with me.

So go ahead and stumble today!
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The Beading Gem's Journal

After a long gestation and labor, I have finally produced my first website. But it is not just any website - it is a Squidoo lens.

Squidoo for those of you new to the concept, is a modular based website builder to get out lots of information in a unique and fun way.

My idea for my first lens came from my own name. My parents must have thought me beautiful (one can hope) and valuable to have named me Pearl which explains the Beading Gem bit. You could say I was born to bead. There are also women and girls named Rubies, Jades and even Emeralds out there. So what about places? Evidently, discovers and founders often do get their naming inspiration from gorgeous gemstones.

Researching took many, many hours. But very early on, I realised there were just far too many gemstone lakes, rivers, bays, mountains and other geographical features to be easily digestible so I chose to limit the selection to just settlements. Like hand made jewelry, these gemstone place names were crafted by people not nature, with the hopes that each creation will turn out beautifully.

I found to my surprise, many places, small and big which were named after gemstones, sometimes several in a single country. Did you know that settlements called Diamond can be found all over the world in countries as diverse as Canada, Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago and the USA (13 states)? And Sapphire in Australia, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea and the US? I don't claim the list to be exclusive for I am sure I have missed more than a few. So I am hoping people will add to the list via feedback.

So go travel the world on Gemstone Place Names, and travel through time with some fascinating past blog stories on gemstones and jewelry.

If you are a fellow lensmaster, be sure to drop by and say hello.
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The Beading Gem's Journal
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We can learn to make jewelry in many different ways - from books, website tutorials or in classes. But if the written word doesn't do it for you or if you cannot find a local instructor, then free video tutorials are the next best thing.

The best known video site is You Tube which has all kinds of videos besides the instructional ones. Being able to find the one jewelry making video you want though will depend on how good you are with keywords, a little luck and your patience and time going through a number of possibilities.

5min.com has some practical videos but the jewelry section is sorely lacking - the site only has a few and doesn't even have a Hobbies category. Expert Village is better with a crafts section and but it is not subdivided so searching via keywords is necessary. Su Tree is yet another instructional video aggregator but unlike the others, has a well subdivided arts and crafts category allowing you to zoom in quickly on the growing beading and jewelry making section.

Like the other sites, videos can be uploaded by anyone - great advertising for your business or website if you do. Su Tree as well as Expert Village also lets you suggest videos from other sites such as You Tube which means you'll see a larger collection. But Su Tree does something else unique - it allows users to create "courses" linking appropriate videos together with notes. Anyone can view the videos but registration (free) is required to take any courses.

I first found out about Su Tree when they invited me to be their field expert on jewelry making given my teaching and blogging experience. As a field expert, the Su Tree widget is displayed on my blog where you can spot the changing set of jewelry videos. I have also so far contributed two free basic "courses" on Su Tree - how to make a bracelet (necklace, anklet) and how to make earrings for beginners.

You can learn about a great variety of things in mere minutes on Su Tree. These include "How to make a water bracelet" for a kid's party, "How to make a light saber" for your budding space warrior or even "How to make a lava lamp" for your retro fan. Those are from the section on crafts for kids! So check Su Tree out and have some fun.