Traffic Trends for US Jewelry and Accessories Stores
Declining Traffic Momentum Across the Segment
US jewelry and accessories e-commerce stores entered 2026 under visible traffic pressure. Average monthly store traffic in January 2026 stood at 6,697.9 visits, representing a steep drop from the segment's peak of 14,918.2 in November 2024. That peak was part of a sustained Q3–Q4 2024 surge that saw traffic climb from 8,551.1 in May 2024 all the way through the holiday season before falling sharply in early 2025. January 2025 registered 7,446.3 average visits, and traffic has broadly continued to contract since, with monthly averages largely ranging between 6,500 and 6,900 throughout the remainder of 2025. The year-over-year comparison for January is telling: the segment moved from 7,901.9 in January 2024 to 6,697.9 in January 2026, a decline of roughly -15.2% over two years. The trajectory suggests structural softening rather than a seasonal blip.
Organic Search Dominates but Is Losing Ground
The traffic channel mix as of January 2026 reveals a segment heavily dependent on organic search, which accounts for 89.9% of total traffic (8,044,132 of 8,948,404 total visits across tracked stores). Paid search contributes just 0.6% (49,327 visits), while organic social delivers 8.6% (769,609 visits) and paid social a modest 1.0% (85,336 visits). The low investment in paid channels reflects a category that has historically leaned on SEO-driven discovery—consumers searching for specific styles, occasions, or materials—rather than performance marketing.
However, the organic search engine dependency is becoming a liability. Organic search traffic is down -13.5% year over year, a significant contraction that is difficult to offset given how little volume is being generated through paid or social channels. With paid search at just 0.6% of traffic, there is limited buffering capacity when SEO performance weakens. Stores in this segment may be experiencing the compounding effects of algorithm updates, increased SERP competition, and the growing role of AI-powered search interfaces that reduce click-through to category pages.
Revenue Compression Mirrors Traffic Declines
Revenue trends closely track the traffic deterioration. Average store revenue peaked at $761,402.62 in November 2024, riding the same Q4 2024 wave that drove traffic highs. By contrast, January 2026 average revenue came in at $284,512.42—a decline of -62.7% from that November peak and roughly -7.5% below January 2024's $307,545.98. The compression has been consistent across 2025, with most months falling between $254,000 and $395,000 after the post-holiday correction. September through November 2025 were particularly weak, with averages of $282,834.26, $284,063.42, and $254,506.84 respectively—notably failing to replicate the Q3–Q4 2024 lift. December 2025 offered a modest seasonal bump to $285,073.96, but January 2026 immediately retreated to $284,512.42, offering little indication of renewed momentum. The consistent alignment between falling organic traffic and falling revenue reinforces that this segment's revenue engine is tightly coupled to search visibility—and that improving channel diversification will be critical to stabilizing performance heading into the remainder of 2026.
SEO Performance for US Jewelry and Accessories Stores
Organic Traffic Trends Reveal Sustained Pressure
US jewelry and accessories e-commerce stores recorded an average SEO traffic of 6,021 sessions in January 2026, reflecting a year-over-year decline of -13.5% compared to the same month in 2025. This contraction is part of a broader downward trajectory that began after the segment's peak in November 2024, when average organic traffic reached 14,368 sessions per store. The slide into 2025 was steep and persistent—by March 2025, average SEO traffic had fallen to 6,265 sessions, and the segment has largely plateaued in the 5,900–6,300 range through the remainder of 2025 and into January 2026.
Organic SERP visibility has also softened, with a -2.0% decline in organic search rankings over the same period. While less severe than the traffic drop, this signals that fewer keyword positions are being held or gained, compounding the difficulty of reversing traffic losses through on-page optimization alone. The seasonal surge seen in Q4 2024—where September through November saw average SEO traffic climb from 13,188 to 14,368—did not repeat with comparable strength in Q4 2025, with November 2025 reaching only 5,725 sessions, a sharp contrast that underscores structural rather than purely seasonal weakness.
Domain Authority Erosion Compounds Visibility Challenges
Average PageRank for the segment stands at 2.39 in January 2026, representing a year-over-year decline of -14.9%. This is a meaningful deterioration from the peak of 3.49 recorded in October and November 2024. The decline accelerated in early 2025, with PageRank dropping from 3.48 at end-2024 to 2.83 in January 2025, then recovering modestly to 3.40 by September 2025 before sliding again to 2.39 by January 2026. This volatility suggests that the segment's authority profile is unstable, likely driven by inconsistent link-building activity and potential loss of high-authority referring sources.
The overwhelming majority of stores in this segment operate at low traffic volumes—1,324 stores fall under the 50k traffic threshold, while only 3 stores reach the 100k–250k range, and none exceed 250k. This concentration at the low end of the distribution indicates that SEO scale remains a significant competitive gap for most jewelry and accessories merchants, with the top performers still far from achieving mass organic reach.
Backlink Profiles Show Volatility and Gradual Decline
Referring domain counts and backlink volumes have been inconsistent across the tracked period, signaling an unstable link acquisition environment. Average backlinks peaked sharply at 182,885 in November 2024—likely influenced by holiday-season content placements and gift guide coverage—before collapsing to 18,857 by January 2025. By January 2026, average backlinks stood at 9,903, down from 18,857 in January 2025, a decline of roughly -47.5% year-over-year. Referring domains followed a more gradual path, averaging 620 in January 2026 compared to 394 in January 2025—a recovery of +57.3%, though this improvement has not translated into stronger PageRank or traffic recovery.
The divergence between a rising referring domain count and falling PageRank and traffic suggests that the quality of newly acquired links may be declining. Stores in this segment appear to be accumulating links from a wider but less authoritative set of sources, which limits the SEO impact of those gains. To reverse the -13.5% organic traffic trend, jewelry and accessories stores will likely need to prioritize high-authority editorial placements and structured content strategies rather than relying on volume-based link acquisition.
Paid Media Trends for US Jewelry and Accessories Stores
Paid Search Spend Collapses Heading Into Early 2026
US jewelry and accessories stores saw average paid search spend peak at $937.33 in May 2025 before entering a prolonged contraction. By December 2025, average monthly spend had fallen to $281.87, and January 2026 recorded just $252.05—a -77.6% year-over-year cost decline relative to the same month in 2025. This sharp retrenchment mirrors the broader pattern of reduced paid search investment that began in Q3 2025, with July and August already softening to the $618–$620 range before the steeper drop in Q4. The January 2026 figure represents the lowest monthly average across the entire observed window, suggesting that jewelry and accessories advertisers are entering the new year with significantly tighter paid media budgets or are actively shifting investment away from search.
Despite the cost compression, the segment still outspends the global benchmark on Google Ads. The January 2026 average of $272.96 sits 12.4% above the global average of $242.95—indicating that even at reduced levels, US jewelry stores maintain a modest premium on paid search relative to peers worldwide.
Paid Search Traffic Erosion Mirrors Spend Decline
The traffic data tells a consistent story. Paid search traffic peaked in the April–May 2024 window, when paid search accounted for 15.1% and 14.2% of total site traffic respectively. By January 2026, paid search traffic had fallen to an average of 201.33 sessions per store, representing just 2.0% of total traffic—a -76.1% year-over-year decline in paid traffic volume. This is a dramatic retreat from the 2024 baseline, when stores were averaging over 1,600 paid search visits per month during peak periods.
Total site traffic has also contracted, dropping from highs above 20,000 average monthly visits in October–November 2024 to approximately 10,168 in January 2026. However, the paid search share of that traffic has fallen disproportionately faster, indicating that organic, direct, and social channels are now carrying a greater share of the diminished traffic load. The convergence of lower spend and lower traffic share points to either a deliberate deprioritization of Google Ads or diminishing return efficiency pushing advertisers out of the channel.
Meta Ads Adoption Remains Niche but Spending Runs Far Above Global Norms
Google Ads adoption within the segment remains limited but stable: 21.9% of stores ran Google Ads at some point in the past year, with 18.3% active in the most recent month. Meta Ads penetration is considerably lower, with only 1.6% of stores active in the last month and 1.6% active across the year—suggesting that social paid media is not a mainstream strategy for this segment.
Where stores do commit to Meta Ads, however, they spend aggressively. The segment's average Meta Ads spend of $3,957.81 is 38.1% above the global average of $2,866.26. Total paid media spend across all channels averages $2,097.34 per store—more than double the global average of $928.11, at 226.0% of the benchmark. This bifurcation—low adoption rates paired with outsized per-store spend—suggests a concentrated group of jewelry and accessories advertisers investing heavily in paid social while the majority of the segment operates with minimal or no paid media presence.
Organic Social for US Jewelry and Accessories Stores
Instagram Remains the Dominant Organic Social Channel
Instagram continues to anchor organic social strategy for US jewelry and accessories e-commerce stores, consistently delivering the largest share of social-referred traffic. In January 2026, average Instagram traffic stood at 632.84 visits per store, representing 8.8% of total traffic—a figure that has held relatively stable since April 2025, when it peaked at 951.48 visits (9.5% of traffic). While absolute visit volume has declined -33.5% from that April peak, the channel's share of total traffic has remained within a narrow 7.8%–9.5% band across the full observation window, suggesting that Instagram's proportional importance is resilient even as overall site traffic has softened.
Posting cadence data reinforces this steady engagement posture. Stores in this segment averaged 3.55 posts per week on Instagram in January 2026, up modestly from 3.42 posts per week the prior month—a +0.13 post-per-week increase. Across the broader segment, the average posting frequency sits at 3.86 posts per week. Follower distribution reveals a heavily fragmented landscape: 448 stores fall under 10k followers, 346 sit in the 10k–50k range, 140 in the 50k–100k tier, 143 in the 100k–250k range, and 75 stores have surpassed 250k followers. This skew toward smaller accounts reflects the independent and boutique nature of many jewelry retailers, where community-level engagement often outpaces raw reach.
TikTok Traffic Share Has Compressed Sharply
TikTok's contribution to referral traffic has undergone a pronounced contraction over the tracked period. In January 2025, average TikTok traffic per store reached 546.21 visits, representing 5.2% of total traffic. By January 2026, that figure had dropped to 194.80 visits—a decline of -64.3% in absolute traffic volume—with TikTok's share of total traffic falling to just 2.0%. The sharpest compression occurred between January and June 2025, when the share fell from 5.2% to 1.5%, before partially recovering to the 2.0%–2.3% range for the remainder of the year.
Upload frequency data points to a contributing factor: stores averaged just 1.36 weekly TikTok uploads in January 2026, down sharply from 2.25 uploads per week the prior month—a -0.89 weekly upload decline. This pullback in content production aligns with the sustained traffic softness on the platform and may reflect ongoing uncertainty around TikTok's regulatory environment in the US market during this period. For a visually driven category like jewelry and accessories, reduced posting frequency carries a direct cost to discovery and referral volume.
Organic Social as a Tracked Channel Surges Through the Year
Perhaps the most striking trend in the data is the dramatic rise of the organic social traffic segment (as a distinct measurement category) beginning in spring 2025. Through Q1 2025, average organic social traffic per store was negligible—just 5.72 visits in January, 8.48 in February, and 15.66 in March. Starting in April 2025, the metric surged to 254.22 visits, then nearly doubled to 491.51 in May 2025. By January 2026, it reached 576.05 visits per store, accounting for 8.6% of total traffic—the highest share recorded in the full dataset.
This trajectory represents a +9,959.4% increase from January 2025 to January 2026 in absolute organic social traffic volume. Even setting aside the likely role of measurement or attribution methodology changes in early 2025, the trend from April 2025 onward shows consistent month-over-month growth, climbing from 3.9% to 8.6% of total traffic. The average engagement rate across the segment sits at 0.02%, which is characteristically low for e-commerce social accounts and underscores that traffic conversion from social content—rather than on-platform interaction—remains the primary value driver for this channel.
Website Performance for US Jewelry and Accessories Stores
Lighthouse Performance and SEO Scores
US Jewelry and Accessories e-commerce stores recorded an average Lighthouse Performance score of 50.8/100 in January 2026, reflecting persistent technical challenges common to visually rich, image-heavy retail categories. Despite this low baseline, the segment showed marginal improvement month-over-month, with the current month Performance score rising to 51.5 from 50.9 in December 2025 (+0.01). While this uptick signals a modest positive trend, scores in the low-50s range indicate that page load speeds, render-blocking resources, and unoptimized media assets remain significant friction points for this segment.
SEO performance tells a more encouraging story. The average Lighthouse SEO score reached 92.9/100 in January 2026, up from 92.1 the prior month (+0.01). This near-ceiling score suggests that stores in this segment maintain strong foundational SEO practices—proper meta configurations, crawlability, and structured markup—even when technical performance lags. Accessibility, however, moved in the opposite direction, declining from 87.0 to 86.4 (-0.01), a trend worth monitoring given increasing regulatory and consumer expectations around inclusive design.
SKU Catalog Distribution
The SKU distribution across US Jewelry and Accessories stores reveals a segment heavily skewed toward smaller catalogs. The largest cohort—454 stores—operates with between 0 and 250 SKUs, representing the most common catalog size in the segment. Store counts decline steadily as catalog size grows: 334 stores carry 251–500 SKUs, 239 carry 501–1,000, and 187 operate in the 1,001–2,500 range. Only 126 stores manage catalogs exceeding 2,500 SKUs, underscoring that the majority of players in this vertical favor curated, boutique-style assortments over broad inventory depth.
This distribution is consistent with the premium and artisan positioning prevalent in jewelry e-commerce, where a focused product range often supports higher average selling prices and stronger brand storytelling rather than volume-driven catalog expansion.
Average Product Pricing Trends
Average product pricing across this segment has fluctuated notably over the past several months. After peaking at $1,945.29 in August 2025, prices declined sharply to $1,659.04 in September 2025—a drop of -14.7%—before stabilizing through the autumn months. October saw a slight recovery to $1,672.16, followed by a more pronounced rebound to $1,787.32 in November 2025, likely reflecting seasonal demand pressures ahead of holiday gifting. December pulled back to $1,688.25, and January 2026 held nearly flat at $1,688.77, signaling price stability entering the new year.
The February 2026 data shows a moderate uptick to $1,720.59, a +1.9% increase from January, which may reflect early Valentine's Day demand driving higher-ticket purchases. Overall, average prices have remained in the $1,650–$1,800 corridor since September 2025, well below the August 2025 peak—suggesting either a normalization of pricing strategy post-summer or a shift in the mix of products being sold. For a segment where average transaction values exceed $1,600, even small pricing fluctuations carry meaningful revenue implications, making ongoing price benchmarking a critical operational practice.