Helloee Everyone :)

[Petal]

Hi Jayne and to our friendly forum.

There's a real mix of people and skills here and you may find the forum as addictive as some of us already have! OOOh yes, more marketing tips would be very useful, but we all share our tips and hints here, that's what makes this forum so informative.

Looking forward to hearing more from you.

Jules x

[Petal]

Hi Jayne

I see the softees have gone to bed now! Welcome to the forum.

OMG, Di, do you never sleep....? Or are you an afternoon catnap lady instead?

Jules x

[Di Sandland]

Sleep and me seem to have parted company lately

[agent_44]

Hi Jayne and welcome to the forum!

[Ominicci]

Hello Jayne and to the forum!

[lorraineflee]

Hi Jayne and welcome from Bedfordshire!

Lorraine

[Solunar Silver Studio]

LOL - its a bit like sitting on the middle step. I used to do that as a child on the basis that halfway up and halfway down is, in fact, nowhere.

Yes, I was a strange child.

And who said I even needed beauty sleep?

Why is it that the Kermit the Frog version of that song is going round in my head now....or was it his nephew Robin...

Look what I have just found on youtube!! (There is a sort of random 15 second intro to sit through first...)

YouTube - Halfway Down the Stairs

And that doesn't look a bit like Di now does it??? Might do though if she doesn't get a bit of SLEEP! once in a while!!!

Sorry about the diversion Jayne...but this is what we are like!!!!

[Di Sandland]

Aw, Bee, you've brought tears to my eyes now (nostalgic ones). So now my eyes are double red!

[Solunar Silver Studio]

It's good to cry - if they are the right sort of tears. Have a wallow...it might do you good.

I'll just surround you with hugs and kisses to make you feel better/worse....(delete as appropriate!!)

U

[Jayne]

Wow! Thanks for such a warm welcome everyone
Di - 3.17am?? That is seriously hardcore! I can see that I will have to 'up' my game to keep up with you lot
Su' - yes, we are quite close; only about 30 miles away from each other I think. You'll have to pop in for a cuppa sometime
Barbara & Jules - I am a complete newbie and in no position to offer advice to you guys. (I haven't even built a website yet, so technically I would be a pre-newbie). I feel like a bit of a philistine to be honest as you guys are all so passionate about your craft, whereas I am in a place where I am putting commercial/marketing considerations first. I used to be incredibly enthusiastic about learning new techniques but found it fraustrating as I couldn't find good quality training that was local to me - having a young family meant that going to the big smoke to complete a 'proper' course was out of the question. I persevered with adult ed classes for several years but it was all pretty stagnant and difficult to learn new techniques because you had to lobby so hard.
So.......I decided to approach it from a different angle and learn to do the simple things really well. I really think that it is possible to produce good quality, desirable jewellery using simple techniques, so my plan is to start a website on that basis and learn new skills in a slower, more 'organic' way. I've spent the last 2-3 years studying other people's websites - mainly top end jewellers - and trying to suss out what works, what doesn't and what's possible.
I did make contact with a friend of a friend a few months ago who has been selling jewellery on the net for quite a while to ask for advice and this is what she said:
* count the clicks that it takes to actually buy a piece of your jewellery and try to reduce them to a minimum,
* make the site as simple as possible (leave out the fancy animations & gizmos) as it will operate faster and not everyone has the pc capability to support a fancypants site
* introduce a really expensive item to your range and market it alongside low and mid-priced items. You may not sell many of them, but it is meant to improve sales of the mid-priced item.
So, that was her advice, some of which I thought relevant & some not.
I am so in awe of you guys and have so much to learn. If I do manage to launch a site and it does ok, then maybe I will be worthy to talk marketing, but until then......I am the pre-newbie....
(and a bit of a waffler as you have no doubt noticed)

J x