Revolutionising Digital Diamond Buying

In a world that has completely become digital, Nilesh Chhabria, Chief Operating Officer, Finestar Diamonds talks about how it is using technology to stay ahead of the game.

The global diamond industry is currently facing many challenges in terms of keeping up with technology. Finestar Diamonds’ biggest strength is how digitally equipped they are. “The major concern for the industry at this point is the shrinking margins and the optimal way to maintain profitability is by reducing operational cost. Therefore, bringing in a major part of your business through the company’s website is the way ahead,” says Nilesh Chhabria, Chief Operating Officer, Finestar Diamonds

The challenges that ‘digital’ brings with it
Selling diamonds online of course comes with its share of problems and owing to security concerns not many companies have embraced the idea of selling their products online. “Our industry, especially in India, is at a very nascent stage of utilizing digital platforms for the sale of diamonds and is facing resistance and a slow adoption rate making it a challenge to even get a potential client to access the website. Once we overcome that, there is the issue of lack of actual physical interaction with the diamond. Many of our clients hesitate to buy diamonds online as an image or video cannot match up to the real experience of seeing a diamond with one’s naked eye. It is important to understand that user interactivity and experience is the most essential part of online business,” adds Nilesh.

The seeing, touching and feeling factors in buying jewellery is ingrained in the Indian psyche and with diamonds it is even more so, because of the possibility of inclusions as well as their high value. “The Asian market is heavily dependent on GIA, the comments and the key to symbols to buy diamonds but there is no way a client could define where these symbols are on the stone by just looking at the image. From personal experience, I can say that I have purchased stones from multiple websites in the past and have been disappointed when the stones received were unsatisfactory. There is an absolute need to integrate the details given on the diamond grading certificate with the visual experience on the website as this is the biggest dilemma for the buyer,” Nilesh added.

Finestar Diamonds – a pioneer in technology driven sales polished sales are through digital. How has the company achieved this given the current trepidation in terms of online diamond buying? “It is our vision at Finestar, to develop world-class, bespoke AI technology that facilitates the trade of diamonds. We are persistently focused on discovering, developing and delivering innovative solutions that connect us to our clients through the advanced use of technology. We provide our online clientele a personalized experience by analyzing digital footprints and user behavior. What sets us apart is that with the help of AI, we think like the client and deliver what he might require even before he can ask for it. The visual experience should be trustworthy and transparent as whatever the buyer sees is what he or she should get. We believe that reducing prices should not be the alluring point of sale and it should be beyond these discounts. It should be about the experience or information that can be given beyond what any diamondgrading certificate can give,” quips Nilesh

“Finestar X-ray is our solution to the major concerns any buyer faces when making an online purchase decision. As the name suggests, it is literally an X-ray of a diamond that shows the internal framework of the given diamond. Technically speaking, it is the digital image overlapping the GIA plotting image to accurately show where exactly the inclusions are in the image. With one simple click and drag on the website, the viewer gets to see the exact positioning of the inclusions and can also reduce the opacity level of the image for precision. In addition to this, there are buttons below the image to provide detailed information on what kind of inclusion it is. Clicking on these buttons states whether it is a white or black inclusion and the degree of the inclusion is clearly stated as minor or major. For all stones be it a 1 ct or a 5 ct, the image size is the same so differentiating an inclusion as major or minor is precise.

All the ‘Key to Symbols’ given in the GIA certificate are also displayed as buttons and clicking on them defines the location on the GIA plotting. Apart from the above, if any additional hidden information is available we will be displaying that as well on the ‘X-Ray’.”