Ed Dikes’ high-end store welcomes one and all
Being hailed as a retail role model by Richemont, the luxury group behind Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels, and other illustrious brands, is just another day for Ed Dikes, owner of Weston Jewelers in Weston, Fla. One look at his proactive marketing strategy explains why. Dikes’ high-end, brand-driven store is a magnet for luxury customers thanks to its rarefied inventory of jewelry and watches; but his affordable, fashion-forward jewels attract younger shoppers, too. Dikes is buying Google AdWords using a variety of brand names as well as multilingual industry-related words to improve his search engine rankings. More important, he and his staff rely on Google Analytics to monitor the ad words’ effectiveness. But all this focus on technology hasn’t dulled Dikes’ personal relationships, which he helps fine-tune with clever and creative in-store events that do wonders for store traffic—and keep his customers guessing.
What have you done with social media and Google AdWords to garner accolades from Cartier?
In addition to using the Cartier name, we’re using other key words such as collection names. These help us capture search results on Google. We’re seeking to pinpoint Weston as the luxury destination by coupling the Cartier name with our location. We’re also tying in other luxury brands such as exotic cars, including Bentley and Ferrari. People purchasing these cars are part of the demographic for buying high-end watches and jewelry from Cartier. Given the area’s large Latin American populations, we’re using key Spanish language words in Google Ad Words to attract the South American buyer.
How do you make Google AdWords work for Weston?
A big mistake a lot of retailers make is simply buying the words and waiting for the results. We track ad words very closely and carefully through Google Analytics to see which key words are driving the most Web traffic and from what online sources. Constantly changing and tweaking these key words is what’s helping achieve better search result rankings. Google Analytics also gives us a view into what the competition is doing.
Weston puts the “social” in social media. How do you do it?
We have more than 1,300 fans on Facebook. We try to target specific groups of people to be part of a promotion. But one thing we do that’s unique is…every Monday we individually post happy birthday wishes on the profile walls of all of our Facebook friends and fans celebrating birthdays that week. About 75 percent of people write back to say thanks or “like” the posting. From these weekly birthday groups, we produce a call list for our associates to check in with the celebrant’s significant others to see if a jewel or watch would make an appropriate gift.
And you also do Facebook ads.
Facebook ads can be geared to a specific target audience. I choose the brands carefully and then advertise them on Facebook pages targeted to the right demographics. I’ve used Facebook ads to drive people to our website, where I can capture their information for future campaigns.
Describe some of your innovative store events.
Our pre-Christmas Treasure Chest event was a huge success. It involved two vendors: A. Link and TW Steel. About 2,000 keys were sent out to new and existing customers in our database. For two days, there was a constant parade of people coming through the store to see if their key opened the treasure chests for a chance to win the diamond studs or the watch. The buildup produced great content for Facebook. Another successful event was Taste of Weston. We set up a table out front on our sidewalk and had people complete a contact form there. Then, they were instructed to take the completed slip to a fishbowl in the back of the store. It generated a continuous flow of traffic and introduced Weston Jewelers to people who had never come in before. And recently we held a Roberto Coin Buyer for a Day event, where customers did the actual buying for the store. Some of our top Roberto Coin customers were honored and empowered by the event, while we received invaluable feedback on how to better purchase jewelry from a valued vendor partner.