By Mauricio Minotta

Gem and jewerly business owners can't afford not to invest a percentage of their profits in strategic marketing plans to stay ahead of their competition in the highly competitive industry, business owners can’t afford not to invest a percentage of their profits in strategic marketing plans to stay ahead of their competition, said David McKinney, Ph.D., instructor for GIA’s School of Business.

“The most important aspect of your business is strategizing,” he said during a 45-minute presentation titled “Invest in Marketing” at Conclave 2003. "Unfortunately, most small business owners are too busy to put a marketing plan together. But it’s a must if you want to stay in business.”

Speaking to a group of jewelry business owners, McKinney stressed the importance of familiarity with their target audience to create promotional and marketing campaigns that cater to their needs and preferences.

He peppered his lecture with statistics, saying that Generation X and Y (ages 18-34) consumers purchased 53 percent of jewelry sold in 2000. The same group also bought 40 percent of the fine jewelry sold that year.

He also encouraged audience members to perform a regular SWOT analysis to gauge the viability of their businesses. SWOT is the acronym for the various points to analyze:  Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats.

“You have to analyze your threats in this business,” McKinney said. “Then you need to constantly differentiate yourself from the (competition). If not, you’ll get in a rut and become complacent about your business.”

Ultimately, McKinney said, the goal behind each marketing strategy is to create more traffic in a store and hopefully more sales. He also described marketing as a continual process and a chain of events, however, that doesn’t necessarily end with a sale. Offering free repair service, for example, will keep loyal customers coming back into stores for potentially more sales.

“Marketing never stops,” McKinney said. “Keep it up after the sale, as well. Get you customers’ birthday information and keep marketing to them. But most importantly, take time from the day-to-day work to develop your plan.”