(PRESS RELEASE) Punchmark, one of the leading providers of ecommerce websites for the jewelry industry, has spent the summer working on answers to the biggest problems on retail jewelers’ minds when it comes to showing and selling jewelry online.
With over 50 combined years of experience in jewelry among its partners, Punchmark understands the pain points retailers feel when trying to create an omnichannel experience: being required to write thousands of product descriptions, poor customer experience due to slow website page speeds, and fear of online fraud and threats from ADA Compliance lawsuits to name a few. Punchmark has taken retailers’ difficult issues head-on since 2011 when they launched a pioneering integration with the EDGE software.
Here are some of the exciting outcomes from this summer’s work:
Supercharging Page Speeds
Jewelry websites are all about the bling, and that means high-resolution imagery and captivating videos to grab shoppers’ attention. But this same content, as stunning as it is, can weigh down websites and drag speeds down to a crawl.
Slower page speeds have a negative effect on SEO and can cripple user experience. Since January, Punchmark has been working overtime to turbocharge their entire fleet of web-servers to deliver lightning-fast speeds. With this latest release in July, they are seeing some initial tests with Google Page Speed scores coming back in the 70s-80s and manywell into the 90s!
To put that into perspective, that’s about 60 points above industry average.
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Punchmark websites are going from relatively mediocre speeds to becoming the fastest websites out there. This speed boost is a game-changer for retailers big and small who are fighting for position in Google search results. Google has generally made the world aware that they will boost SEO rankings for sites that have faster mobile page speeds, and penalize slower ones. A faster website also means lower bounce rates, a higher number of pages visited per session, and ultimately more ecommerce sales and in-store sales that came from the website.
Rewriting Web Product Descriptions Using AI
To sell items on the web, product details need to be rich with titles and descriptions that lure the visitor to click. The problem is that most retailers enter their product descriptions into their POS software for inventory purposes, and not in a language that a website visitor would find appealing or compelling. Enter A.I.
Punchmark has developed artificial intelligence that can take data from inventory systems, and produce well written item titles and descriptions 1000s at a time. The tool, called “The Jewelry Data Wizard”, crunches item data and spits out finessed language in a variety of styles from
“factual” to “flowery”.
Jewelry retailers often have tens of thousands of products in their inventory management systems, and the process of dressing them all with marketable information can be extremely nerve wracking – preventing many retailers from being successful on the web. As an example, products titled “Earring” were transformed to become “14K White Gold London Blue Topaz Earrings” and similar, with the click of a button. This feature may be the most exciting advancement yet.
Ecommerce Fraud Protection
As jewelry websites began to see success online, the sheer amount of ecommerce fraud was unimaginable. There has always been an abundance of fear among jewelry retailers preventing them from selling online – which, unfortunately, means they’re leaving money on the table. Punchmark worked for a year to find the right partner, ClearSale, and was the first to introduce real ecommerce fraud protection back in 2018. This service identifies chargebacks before they occur – before the retailer has shipped the item – and gives the retailer peace of mind that they’re covered if the credit card is later reported stolen or unauthorized. When a purchase is made on your Punchmark site, your “manage orders” page will show an “approved” or “fraud” flag, usually within 24 hours of a sale.
“Our clients used to call our support team with situations like, ‘I just sold a $5,000 ring to someone all the way in New Jersey, and I’m scared to ship it. Please help!’,” recalls Bryan Cockerham, CTO of Punchmark. “Retailers who have signed up for a Punchmark website since then have never known this fear. It’s been amazing and extremely gratifying.” This summer, Punchmark has doubled down on their relationship with ClearSale to offer an even better white-glove level of service to their clients – granting quicker approval times and faster response times to inquiries and support.
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ADA Compliance
Adhering to the standards of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is not something that retail jewelers should need to think about as they manage their websites. As Punchmark learned of the widespread lawsuits affecting small retailers across the nation, they began to research the complicated criteria needed to be compliant, and how to protect clients from litigation. Within months, Punchmark was the most out-of-the-box ADA Compliant website platform in the jewelry industry – no plugins required. Punchmark took this matter seriously, for both the retailers and the disabled visitors who want to shop, and came up with a set of solutions that has kept their clients safe. “It is actually risky to say that your site is ADA Compliant these days, because you open yourself up to be targeted, but there are several different grades you can achieve, and we have made it so that they are easily within reach,” says Cockerham, “We help take care of it all.”
This summer, Punchmark has also become a direct partner of, AccessiBe, a leader in ADA compliance. AccessiBe provides website add-ons that can measure, suggest changes and make your site more ADA compliant. Working with AccessiBe has been a game-changer for clients who have been directly threatened by legal scams, offering advice on how to thwart expensive settlements as just one of their benefits.
AI Content Generation
Retail Jewelry stores don’t usually have the staff to perform simple marketing tasks like consistently writing blog articles or generating fresh web content. Once again, enter AI. Punchmark has built their page engines so that you can enter a topic, and AI can generate a title and a full article making a half-day process take less than a minute.
“We are really excited about what has come out of this latest surge of new features,” says Cockerham, “we’ve got more coming soon but these have been fun to talk about since their inception.” As a small team, Punchmark has been able to move quickly to keep up with the times, always taking advantage of the latest technologies. From being Podium’s first industry partner in 2016 to being ClearSale’s first jewelry website partner in 2018, and now developing industry solutions with AI, Punchmark has been the first to bring game-changing solutions to jewelers. Cockerham concludes saying that Punchmark’s founding mission was to help bridge the gap between jewelry and more-advanced industries when it comes to technology and marketing.
“With close to 500 jewelry websites on an ecommerce platform that improves every day, we feel like we’re making a difference.”
About Punchmark
Punchmark is the industry-leading jewelry website platform, offering its specialized SiteManager platform to jewelry retailers. With its deep industry knowledge and innovative solutions, Punchmark empowers jewelers to create exceptional online experiences and drive their businesses forward.
