Live from Vegas - Day 3 - Seminar Day

Live from Vegas – Day 3 – Seminar Day

This year JCK has gotten back to having a seminar day ahead of the main show.  Today began with free breakfast courtesy of the Luxury show, followed by numerous seminars with a bit of AGTA gem shopping in between.  At breakfast, I met a jeweller from Houston, TX who has been advertising and buying diamonds for a few years now, and has turned it into a major source of revenue.  I’m going to follow-up with him and learn more, but the three-and-a-half-part blog I wrote on buying diamonds off the street covered a lot of what he’s done.

The first seminar I attended was on sales referrals by Brennan Scanlon.  His take on in-person networking was refreshing.  We’ve all been to the chamber mixers and seen those who shake a lot of hands and give-out a lot of cards.  He focused on “the givers gain” which was his way of saying give, give, give before expecting others to show loyalty to you. 

Encouraging statistics:

1/20^th of prospects will buy from you

1/6^th of referred customers will buy from you

Referred clients stay with you 4 times longer

Referred clients buy 4 times as much

Referred clients are 2.5 times more likely to refer new customers

Doug Hucker from the AGTA had me marching straight for Steve and Debbie (manager of Steve’s retail store) to insist that they become members.  The materials and staff training that they offer for your $350 membership outweighs that value by a huge margin.  If it helps you sell another $3,000 orange sapphire ring, or a $1Million Paraiba tourmaline, it’s more than paid for!  Join today!!!

Shane Decker talked about romancing jewellery.  Before getting into his discussion, he pointed out that a greasy fingerprint on a ring is a sign of rejection and would encourage all to keep their rings spiffy!  The three ways in which he encouraged his audience to romance jewellery were by A) using “value-added” statements, B) romancing the beauty of the design and C) romancing the reason or occasion.

Those weren’t the only sessions I attended and much was learned by listening to gem dealers promoting their wears.  I look forward to the main show today.  Yesterday I had a few “scans” on my Toddwaz Report T-shirt, so I have a bit of a start on my social media experiment.