By Yana Kiselyova

DiamondPriceGuru.com is a web service that was created to make it as easy as possible for future grooms to buy a diamond ring for their loved ones. In this Step by Step User Guide we will describe how easy it is to use this service by following 4 simple steps.

DiamondPriceGuru.com is a web service that helps future grooms (well, actually anyone who is shopping for a diamond) save money by selecting a loose diamond from 400,000 stones carried by 11 online retailers. Why not buy a diamond ring right away, you ask? You can save a boat load of money if you buy a loose diamond separately from a ring setting and then have a retailer you selected mount the diamond on a ring for you—all retailers provide this service for free if you buy both the stone and the ring setting from them.

So, Step 0, I am imagining myself a groom-to-be who is passionately in love and has just stumbled upon DiamondPriceGuru.com web service. I am ready to start looking for a diamond that will be mounted on an engagement ring for my loved one. My budget is $2,000 and I want to find a round-shape diamond with the best parameters (cut, color, and clarity) for the price I can afford. Of course, you may have a different budget or a different objective altogether. This manual will help you use DiamondPriceGuru.com to the fullest extent.

Step 1: Select Diamond Parameters

To find a diamond for my brilliant girlfriend I need to pick its shape, set the limit on the price I am ready to pay, and select color and clarity of the stone from the Search page of DiamondPriceGuru.com.

 

Diamond shape

You can select the shape of the diamond by checking the boxes at the very top of the Search page. You can select one (if you know exactly what diamond shape your loved one would prefer), or you can select as many as you want or even all of them. See the picture below.

 

Emerald shape is “selected” and the cursor (little hand) is pointing to Round shape

 

If you think your beloved would prefer a round shape (also called round brilliant) you can select it and click on Emerald one more time to de-select from your search.

 

Round shape is now selected

 

By the way, you also do not have to try to point exactly to the “check box” to select the shape, you can click on any part of the shape box area.

 

Diamond price

I have $2,000 that I can afford to spend on a diamond (remember, though, there will be some expense on the ring setting as well, though typically not as high as the diamond stone itself). So, on the right-hand side (little box) of the Price slider I go ahead and type the number 2000. This automatically sets the slider to the number I typed in. Or I can simply drag the slider to the right until it points to 2000. This sets the maximum price for diamonds in my search results.

I leave the left-hand side of the slider at $200 (minimum price) to cast the net as broadly as possible, at least at the beginning.

 

Price is set in the range of $200 to $2000

 

Carat weight (or size) of diamond

I would like to see all sizes of diamonds priced at 2000 or lower. Therefore, I do not change anything on the Carat slider and leave it as is, which means search results will include all diamonds in the range of 0.1 carat to 6 carat.

Numbers in the “boxes” on the right and left of the slider are inserted there automatically.

 

The Carat weight (size) of the round brilliant is not limited

 

As demonstrated, prices and carat size of diamonds can be set either by moving the sliders or by putting the exact numbers into the boxes on the right and left of the sliders, whatever is more convenient for you.

However, diamond Cut, Color, and Clarity can only be selected by moving the sliders. Let’s do it.

 

Diamond cut

Typically, most people would not notice any difference between diamonds whose cut quality is certified as Ideal, Very Good, or even Good. Therefore for my search I select diamonds in the range of Ideal to Very Good. To learn more about the cut and what different grades of cut mean, click here.

 

The Cut is set for Ideal and Very Good

Thus, our search results will be limited to diamonds with the cut quality rated by GIA (Gemological Institute of America) or AGS (American Gemological Society) certification agencies as Ideal or Very Good.

 

Diamond color

I thought that all diamonds were colorless. It turns out that diamonds can have different colors—yellow, blue, green, pink, orange, and the rarest red. Web-service DiamondPriceGuru.com searches only for colorless (also known as white) or slightly yellowish diamonds in the range of color grades from D (colorless) to Z (yellowish).

By the way, I learned all this by clicking on a learn more link, which leads to the educational material about each of the four key parameters determining the diamond’s price: carat weight, cut, color, and clarity.

Back to the color, though. Let’s say, I am planning to mount the diamond on a platinum (or white gold) ring setting. A yellowish color diamond will look even more yellow on a white-metal ring. Therefore, I decided to set my search parameters on a Color slider to D and E, colors, that are perfectly white (typically it is impossible to distinguish yellow hue if a diamond is H color grade or above, but I decided to narrow down my search a bit more from the beginning).

 

Color is set in the range of E to D

 

Diamond clarity

Diamond clarity can be FL (Flawless), when stone has no blemishes, inclusions, chips, fractures, etc. Or the clarity can be rated as low as I3 (Imperfect), when a lot of blemishes, inclusions and other imperfections can be seen with a naked eye. And there is nine more grades in between as you can see on a Clarity slider below.

To make sure my happiness is not dependent on some spots and fractures in a stone I select the highest grades of clarity—from IF (internally flawless) to FL (flawless).

 

Clarity grade is set in the range of IF (internally flawless) to FL (flawless)

 

Ok, so we have decided on the parameters now.

Every time I changed one of the parameters, the number of diamonds matching my criteria was narrowed down and displayed in the box on the right side of the page. This function allows users to see how many diamonds will be included in the search results without having to go to the search results first. So, if you want to save time, deciding on a more narrow set of parameters will do the trick—you do not want to browse through 10s of thousands of diamonds before picking a stone to buy, do you?

DiamondPriceGuru.com tells me that it found 522 diamonds matching the selected criteria and priced at or under $2,000.

 

Found 522 diamonds

 

Step 2: Looking through search results

Now we are ready to do the search. Click on green “Go to search results” arrow to go to the page listing 522 diamonds that match your selected criteria.

 

Page with the first 50 found diamonds

 

To find the largest diamond in these results I need to jump straight to the last page of the search results (by clicking to pages at the bottom of the page). There is an easier way to do that, though—by sorting the results. All you need to do is click on the title box at the top of the table. If you want to sort the results by Carat weight, click on the word Carat—now all diamonds are sorted from largest by Carat weight to smallest.

Search results sorted by Carat weight in the descending order

If you click on the word Carat again, the table will get re-sorted in the opposite direction—from smallest stone to the largest.

In addition to Carat weight, you can also sort by Cut, Color, Clarity, as well as Price.

Step 3: Selecting diamonds (starred diamonds)

Ok, now I would like to pick 7 largest diamonds from my search results list for further comparison (remember, I have 522 diamonds in my results now, which makes it a bit overwhelming to pick from such a large number). DiamondPriceGuru.com offers a function that allows to select diamonds for the “Comparison Box” by clicking on stars next to the stones you want to compare side by side. So, I click on stars next to 7 diamonds that I am interested in and they automatically get included in my Comparison Box.

 

3 diamonds have already been selected (“starred”), and 1 more is in the process…

 

When a diamond is in the process of being selected—its star is “blinking” (or “hypnotically” whirl-winding). No worries, there is no hypnosis effect—just trying to attract attention.

So, out of 522 diamonds, matching my quality and price parameters, I have down-selected 7 stones for further comparison.

 

7 down-selected (“starred”) diamonds

 

By the way, you can de-star any of the starred diamonds by clicking on the purple color star one more time.

 

Step 4: Comparing selected diamonds

By clicking on the button “Go to starred diamonds” in the left-hand-side box, I get to the page showing only those 7 diamonds that I have starred.

 

Page with the 7 starred diamonds

 

Now I can export the data in the Microsoft Excel—.xls, or in the .csv format for easier comparison. I can send this file to my friends and family to get an opinion or simply print it out and take it with me to the jewelry store (if I decided I’d like to check it out how much more expensive those diamonds are in the brick-and-mortar place nearby).

 

Saving the starred diamonds data in the .xls format

 

I can also print the results out to show to a friend of mine to get his advice.

 

Page for printing

 

Let’s say, by looking at my list of 7 diamonds, I decided that I would like to narrow down my choice even more by eliminating any D-color diamonds (since they are more expensive), and also all Very Good cut diamonds—hey, my loved one deserves the best!

 

4 diamonds that will be eliminated from the Comparison Box (see the checked off boxes)

By clicking Remove I remove the selected 3 diamonds from my consideration. Now I have 4 diamonds in the Box.

 

4 diamonds remain in the Comparison Box

 

The remaining diamonds are identical in terms of color, clarity, cut, and certification. The only different is carat weight and price. I know, I am ready to spend up to $2,000, so I could pick the largest one—0.47 carats. But I am thinking the white gold ring setting will cost me some money too, so, might as well save some on a stone. So, I pick a 0.44 carat diamond for $1,791 from Adiamor.com.

I click on the name of this online retailer I am re-directed to the last page of the DiamondPriceGuru.com.

 

After that I am re-directed straight to the page showing the diamond I have selected. My credit card is ready, all I need is go ahead and make the purchase.

 

Adiamor.com page with the selected diamond

 

I have selected the diamond for less than $2,000, now I need to pick a ring setting from Adiamor, wait a few days and start thinking about how to make the moment of my proposal as unforgettable as I can. Amazingly, DiamondPriceGuru.com can help here too—click on our Proposals page to read how others have done it.