Tutorial: Rock crystal set - beginner level

Text and photos: Sandra Kemppainen

Tools needed:

- wire cutters

- flat nose pliers 

- round nose pliers

Materials:

- about 14-15” of 22 gauge soft wire (I used sterling silver wire)

- three round rock crystal high quality beads

- three small Swarovski crystals

- sterling silver ear wires, small pins and one pendant bail.

1. Using your round nosed pliers make a wrapped loop at one end of your sterling silver wire. Wrap the wire 2 times around the neck of the loop. Snip off the end and tuck it in to create a smooth finished wrap.

Here I attached the sterling silver bail before closing the loop, to create the pendant. For the earrings you do not need to attach anything.

2. Thread the rock crystal bead (I attached the larger bead) onto the wire so that it rests against the wrap of the loop you have just made.

3. Holding the end of the wire as close to the bead as you can, bend the wire to 90degrees. Then hold the wire with the round nose pliers as shown below to create a perfect round loop.

4. Close the loop and wrap in a spiral shape, while holding the round loop with your pliers.

5. Do the same for all three rock crystal beads (or whatever beads you are using).

6. Next attach the three small crystals to the pins and put them on the bottom of your beads.

7.  You are almost done! Attach the two earring beads to the earring wires. 

And now you are done! Just hand the pendant on a delicate sterling silver necklace and you have a beautiful little gift for a good friend or a non-expensive new product for your online shop! 

You can use almost any combinations of beads you wish. These decorative spirals look best on round beads.

If you would like to learn a very easy way to taking good product photos, please refer to DJAM Issue 2/2013, where we have presented a beginner level product photography tutorial!

Marketing tips: Getting started with Google AdWords

So you have your own shop and pretty pictures and a Facebook page, twitter account, Pinterest, Tumblr, Wanelo profile and what-not. But still you would like to draw more traffic to your page.

If you have your own domain (which I strongly recommend), it’s easy to make a simple page with a little text and a few pictures to just link to your shop, if you do not wish to complicate things by creating a web shop on your own. 

If you have your own domain and register your small company on google, you will at some point receive a small letter from them in your mail with a coupon code giving you quite a nice amount of money to use with Google Adwords.

Let’s take a look at how you can create a new ad and do some fine tuning to the settings of the ad.

Start with creating a new Campaign. The most important here is to be very specific and concise when you choose the Title of your ad and the Description. 

My first advice would be to create the ad using your brand name in the title and the most important keyword that describes your business.

You will see that I used most settings as default. It is a good way to get started. You can later change what you decide needs more tuning.

The next thing I did was making the ad available for the largest range of potential clients.

What I did next was fine tune the geographical locations where the ad will show. After having my shop online for about a year, I can safely say that most of my clients come from the U.S.A. So I picked the locations where possible clients can come from.

I let AdWords handle the CPC (cost per click) automatic bidding, because I feel comfortable with that, for now. But you can adjust the daily budget, to an amount you feel comfortable with. (see above)

Keywords! Keywords are how your clients will find you. It is important to pick the exact right keywords for your business. Also, remember to use combinations of keywords! They may result in more useful traffic on your site and usually they are much cheaper than the single keywords.

Be sure to read the rules and guidelines about creating an ad and its title, description. You do not want to risk getting your ad rejected and having to start over.

After you have added your keywords, you can check if there are some kewyord suggestions (usually there are tens of them). Pick carefully only the ones you think are most relevant to your site. You do not want to pay for irrelevant visits.

Now your ad should be finished. It will take from a few hours to a few days for it to go through Google’s review process.

After it is ready and published, you should check the Adwords home page for statistics at least once a day, to see how your ad is doing. Check the number of times the ad has shown (impressions), the number of clicks it has received, the cost of each of those clicks and the keyowrds that have brought the clicks. By constantly monitoring these numbers, you can add or remove keywords, adjust the locations, to get better results.

Another small tip is to maybe not have the ad running constantly. Let it run for a few days, then pause it for a few days, if you want your balance to last longer. Huge companies spend thousands per month for Adwords, but since I am refering to smaller businesses now, your budget might be quite a lot smaller than that.

Good luck and please remember if you have any questions or if there is something specific about internet marketing you would like to read about in our magazine, drop us a line at info (at) designjewelryaccessories.com.

Sandra Kemppainen.

Tutorial: Easy Product Photography - No Photoshop skills needed!

text and photos: Sandra Rugina

Tutorial: by delilah - Feather Earrings

Material List:

- 4 feathers (most likely, in pairs of two)

- chain

- ear wires

- 12 pieces of seed beads

- about 20 cm of 0.3 mm silver plated wire

Tool List:

- wire scissors (you can adjust feathers, too, with them)

- round nose pliers (to open ear wires bail - or chain jump rings)

- something round to spin wire around it (diameter 3 mm or less, if you have)

Alternative materials:

- you can use feathers of any kind, at hand, any colors. I have these ones from my parrots, picked them up from their cages.

- beads also can be replaced with any other small beads, any colors. 

INTRODUCTION

I will teach you in this tutorial how to create a funny pair of earrings, with feathers and few additional

materials. Working on them requires not so many skills; anyone can make them, if there’s a wish. Simple to

create, beautiful when worn, this pair of earrings will make you shine and smile.

Now we start working with the 0.3 mm wire. Note that you can work with the entire wire (20 cm) from the very beginning, but, if you do have wire (wasted) from other projects, now it’s time to use it. Pieces of 5 cm will be more than enough for one feather to work it out.

In the 2nd picture you can see the wire with a bead inserted on. In the 3rd picture, you get the wire’s end and insert it once again through the bead hole, in order to secure it. 

Once the first bead is added to the wire, we go on and add the feather, simply inserting it through the bead’s hole, making sure the wire we are working with remains at the top part of the feather. Wrap the 0.3mm wire three times on the feather and prepare to add the second bead.

Now we must add the second bead, and the last one, as the operations are the same. Note that the bead must be inserted on the feather, not on the 0.3 mm wire. Add the bead, wrap/coil the wire three times more, and finally add the third bead and another three coils.

Now I will show you how to create a bail for this feather, to be able to attach it on the chain. Just grab something with a small diameter (2-3 mm) and twist the wire twice around it.

We continue with twisting the wire under the bail, around both wrapped wire and feather. Twist it 4-5 times, as much as you consider it is tightly secured. At the same time, you can notice how this feather should look like with bail finished and secured.

The second feather requires the same operations, the same steps to follow. And the other two feathers for the other earring, as well.

Now, all you have to do is to hang these feathers two by two, symmetrical or not, (and that depends on

you) on the chain.

What is there to say ... Pick up the chain you are going to use (make sure there’s a chain with small jump rings, because the feathers are pretty light, and only the chain will keep them “hanging down”).

Take measurements in order to have two equal chains (count their jump rings, to be sure). Ok, one piece of chain … decide where you will attach it on the ear wire, open the ear wire’s bail and insert the chain’s jump ring. Do the same operation for both of the earrings, in order not to forget the counting and make them symmetrical.

Once you’ve attached the chain to the ear wire, close the loop and prepare to add feathers.

To add feathers, you must open every final jump ring on the chains, and they are 4 (2 for an earring,

another 2 for the other). Open the jump rings and insert the feather’s bail, one by one, at each end.

And that should do!

Here’s an earring ready! 

Text and photos: delilah

www.delilah.ro

Tutorial: by delilah - Two Spheres Ring

This is an easy to do ring, I think anyone who has ever held a wire in his/her hands can make it out. No

need for many materials and it can apply to any spheres at hand, any color, any sizes, if you like. The silver

plated also, can be replaced, with copper or sterling silver one.

All we have to deal with in this tutorial is a bit of wrapping and... that’s all.

10 cm of 1 mm silver plated wire, and no more than 1 m of 0.315 mm wire.

Of course, don’t forget about the spheres.

Let’s start now!

Material List:
-10 cm of 1 mm silver plated wire,
-about 1 m of 0.315 mm silver plated wire,
-2 spheres/agate/beads

Tool List:

-flat nose pliers,

-round nose pliers,

-wire scissors,

-wire cutter,

-a mandrel or something round

Take about 1 m of 0.315 mm silver plated wire and start wrap it around the 1mm wire, patiently, leaving about 1 cm unwrapped at each end of the 10 cm long wire, for the spheres.

When almost 40 cm of that 0.315 mm wire is wrapped and we reach its end, we add the first sphere and

then bend the 1 mm wire close enough to make a very small loop as in the 2nd picture. Just when the loop is done, we bend it close to the sphere, as in the 3rd image, in a right angle to the main wire.

All these being done, we continue wrapping , straight to the other end of the 1 mm wire, close enough, but keeping in mind we must add another sphere there.

Once the sphere is attached, we do the same operation as we did before: create the small loop, bending it close to the sphere.

In the 9th picture we continue wrapping the wire till we entirely cover the 1 mm wire.

All done so far, we have in front of us an entirely coiled wire with two spheres at its ends, waiting to be bended on a mandrel, or why not, on the finger!

Turn the wire into a ring

In the last step, we have two pictures of the final ring, already bended, and ready to be worn.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this lesson and I can hardly wait to see your variations of this ring.

If there are any questions about it, please, feel free to ask me, I’ll be glad to answer to all of them. The

most important thing to me, is to make sure you understand all the directions/steps.

Sincerely,

delilah

Visit Delilah's shop.

Jewelry Tutorial: by Bobbi Maw Adding a Safety Chain

Have you ever lost a bracelet because it came unfastened and you didn’t know it? I have - you just about want to cry, don’t you? Do you have a favorite bracelet you don’t wear because you’re afraid to lose it? I’ve had one like that. How about a bracelet with a magnetic clasp that stuck to a grocery cart handle, and you didn’t know it? I’ve had that happen too. Well, no more - this short tutorial is for a very simple solution to those problems; written for beginners, but just as useful for non-beginners.


Materials suggested:
- One finished bracelet - can be wire wrapped; strung and finished with crimped ends, or even commercial made.
- About 1 ½ inches (3.8cm) chain
- 2 x 4-6mm jump rings

Tools needed:
- 2 pairs of pliers, either chain nose or flat nose.

For this tutorial, I’m using the crystal bracelet from one of my newest tutorials - Back to the Beginning - Beginner Crystal Bracelet - though this technique will work for any number of finished bracelet styles including most commercially made bracelets.

Start with two 4 to 6mm jump rings and about 1 ½ inches of delicate chain. You can use a longer piece of chain if you need to, just don’t get carried away.

Use two pairs of pliers, one in each hand; with the seam of the jump ring facing up, grasp the ring with a pair of pliers on either side of the ring.

Open the ring by turning the right side of the ring away from you, and the left side of the ring towards you. I’ve see some refer to it as twisting one side away, and one side towards you.

It doesn’t need to be completely “opened” - just enough room for the chain link, and where you are attaching it to your bracelet.

Put the left pliers down, but continue holding the ring with the right pliers. Slip the last link of one end of the chain onto the jump ring.

Then slip the ring into one of the openings on one end of the bracelet.

If the bracelet you’re attaching chain to has a clasp, there is probably a loop or ring of some sort on either side of the clasp you can use.

Let the bracelet hang on the jump ring while you pick up the second pair of pliers. Close the ring by reversing how you opened it. In my case, I turned the left side of the ring away from me, and the right side towards me. Jumplock makers tell you to wiggle the rings back and forth a bit, while you slightly push the two sides together. They actually click when they are together correctly. Before I let go of the ring, I still run my finger over the seam just to make sure.

 Now open the other jump ring, and thread it through the last link on the other end of the chain.

Attach the jump ring into the opening on the same side but opposite end of the bracelet. You want the chain to attach on the same sides of the bracelet, just at either ends. Don’t fasten the chain on the opposite side of the bracelet - the chain would always be under the hook and keep getting caught.

Close this second jump ring too. Really good jump rings have nearly invisible seams when closed properly.

Doesn’t that look sharp? And if it comes undone by accident, you’re less likely to lose it. You can if you want to, add a tiny lobster style clasp to one end of the chain, but fastening the clasp and/or lobster could be a bit of a pain. 

I personally don’t think it needs it. Open the bracelet, and just slip it over your hand and fasten it. Voila!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this tutorial. For any comments or questions, or if you need any help at all, don’t hesitate to contact me at bobbiwired [at] gmail [dot] com

Bobbi Maw.

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