In a bid to help independent jewellers compete in the rapidly changing online world, The Leading Edge Group has created a web, social media, direct marketing and e-commerce platform for its 159 member stores.
Speaking after the jewellery buying group’s recent conference in Sydney where social media and e-commerce were the main focus of discussions, general manager Joshua Zarb said Leading Edge had “identified long ago that the independent jeweller did not have the means to be competitive in digital media on a single store level”.
Therefore at the conference, the group presented each of its 91 members in attendance with a website, “completely customisable and administrated to suit their own individual store requirements and needs”.
Developed in-house by the Leading Edge Head Office support network, the website was designed and constructed specifically for the jewellery marketplace.
“We are so pleased to say that take-up was almost 100 percent and we are now in the process of setting up the sites for members,” said Zarb.
“It is so important to first and foremost represent the most important brand in the marketplace which is ‘your own store’ whether you are branded Leading Edge Jewellers or John Smiths Jewellers so the look and feel of the websites will reflect each stores very own personality.”
He said the costs of setting up the digital package would be split across the 13 other divisions within the Leading Edge Group so jewellery store members would receive “all the benefits without the associated expense of doing it alone”.
Zarb said the most exciting phase of the group’s launch into the online world is still to come:
- Leading Edge will incorporate a direct marketing facility to feed into the website so members can communicate directly with their own individual customer base
- Leading Edge will soon be to run offers/promotions and specials from their preferred suppliers directly to the consumer
- Leading Edge is currently developing a complete e-commerce platform that will be fed into the individual websites.