New York, NY — the national trade association for businesses serving the fine jewelry retail marketplace, now features Verichannel — the jewelry industry search engine — on its homepage at www.jewelers.org. Verichannel's search function complements JA's "Find a Supplier" online directory — which allows JA Retailers to search for products and services from JA Suppliers (www.jewelers.org/retail/find-supplier/).

Verichannel is the first-ever, jewelry-industry-specific search platform powered by Google. As the web grows ever larger and search results ever more crowded, the Verichannel search engine uses back-end Google technology to search the Web for jewelry-industry-only websites. For example, when using Verichannel, a search of "diamond" will produce hits that are 100% jewelry-industry related, as opposed to site results about playing cards or baseball diamonds. It also enables jewelry businesses to list their websites for greater market visibility, and thus showcases the businesses' products directly to the jewelry professionals they wish to reach.

Visitors to Verichannel.com will also find industry resources like a comprehensive diamond search, trading news and industry blogs — including JA's "The JA Report" (http://tips.jewelers.org). Visit gemfling.com for details.

Verichannel is the creation of industry online pioneers Jacques Voorhees (founder of Polygon) and Louis Valentine (co-founder of GemFind), together with William Boyajian, former CEO of the Gemological Institute of America.

Explains Voorhees, "The need for a jewelry-industry-specific search engine became obvious to me when I did a keyword search for 'diamond' plus my zip code and the first page of results had nothing to do with the jewelry industry. I was seeing Diamond Lumber Company, Black Diamond Video, and so forth. When I enter the same search into Verichannel, I see only jewelry-industry results."

Jewelers of America (JA) is the national trade association for businesses serving the fine jewelry retail marketplace, with the primary purpose of improving consumer confidence in the jewelry industry. JA's consumer education arm, Jewelry Information Center (JIC), provides public relations and marketing services on behalf of the fine jewelry and watch industry. JIC's website, www.JIC.org, is the online source for fine jewelry and watch information, trends and shopping tips. Visit www.jewelers.org and www.JIC.org for more information.