Sharon Zimmerman
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Why shouldn’t you buy cheap gold jewelry?
Can you buy cheap gold jewelry? Short answer – yes Longer answer – but why would you want to? Why can’t I get gold jewelry for cheap? Because gold prices are tied to the commodities market and right now (October, 2024) it’s the highest it’s ever been. Why else shouldn’t I buy cheap gold jewelry?…
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How to build your expertise as a small business owner – from a seasoned business coach
Don’t skip past the unfun parts of running your business – it’s where you build your expertise! It’s the time you spend in your business when you get to literally fuck around and find out. I didn’t take a super-traditional path into metalsmithing. It started with beads (doesn’t it always?), moved onto assembling, and then…
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Can you wear your 14 karat white gold jewelry in a chlorinated pool?
Should you wear your 14 karat white gold jewelry in a pool? No. Why can’t I wear my 14 karat white gold jewelry in a pool? Chlorine is corrosive to nickel, so it will eat holes and weaken your jewelry faster than if you didn’t, so don’t wear it in a pool. But what if…
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Make a sales goal for your next trade or craft show before you build that booth!
Start off your next jewelry show on your best foot – have a budget, state your goals My early jewelry shows felt like a rush of nervousness, and a complete lack of understanding about what I was supposed to be getting out of each show. Some were amazing, others seemed meh, and I wasn’t tracking…
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Develop a pricing strategy for your jewelry business
What does pricing have to do with paying yourself? Everything. If you’ve taken my pricing course, then you know I focus deeply on the math side of pricing, and the labor and time side of pricing. Because the math is important to understanding the base or the floor of your pricing model – the formula…
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How to use Pinterest for your jewelry business
Well hello! This blog post contains an affiliate code, if you make a purchase using my code, I may make money from that. Thanks! How can you use a Pinterest Strategy in your jewelry business? Is your business here for a good time not a long time? Or here for a good time AND a…
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Make your jewelry business an assembly line
Your jewelry production needs systems Is it weird to think of ourselves as mini-assembly lines? Not at all! Remember how I like talking about creating systems for your jewelry business? You probably already have some systems in your jewelry-making skill set. Putting in the time to learn jewelry production I spent almost 5 years working…
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Web accessibility helps everyone use your site
An accessible website is a beautiful website As designers, you likely spent a lot of time thinking about the visual nature of your website – how does it look? Does it reflect your brand? Do the images stand out? Does your brand blend together seamlessly? Do people “get” what you do? Accessibility was likely an…
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What parts of your business need to have a plan and strategy? Hint – it’s all of them
Getting support to create a business plan At the starting point of owning my jewelry business, I and 9 other makers started meeting monthly for focused* discussions. We shared tips, sources, strategies, and dinners. Through this group, I started thinking differently about how I ran my business. Or maybe I should say, this group helped…
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Creating systems for your jewelry business
How making systems for your jewelry business is so freakin’ cool! At almost every point that I have decided to take the time to organize something in my business, I get this itchy feeling that I am NOT DOING ANYTHING. Later, I am always thrilled that I took the time to organize it. I’ll marvel…