- Warby Parker has changed the eyeglasses game.
Who would have ever thought that you could buy amazing glasses without ever leaving your house?
The geniuses behind this innovative way to shop have created a user-friendly, visually appealing, website. It allows you to enjoy your personal online shopping experience and feel good about it.
More about that later!
Warby Parker’s founders thought that buying glasses posed a huge problem for many people around the world.
-Lack of access
-Cost
-Making and keeping appointments
All of these played a role in keeping us from seeing as well as possible. A change was needed.
2010 was probably the best time for them to have launched this campaign. Social Media was skyrocketing in popularity, availability, and ease of use.
Warby Parker decided to create dissonance, (that’s one of my favorite words) in the market by coming at it from a completely different direction. No stores, no salespeople, just good glasses.
The new, upstart company wanted to leverage the connectedness of satisfied customers, through social media.
By asking you to reach out to friends, and family, and post pictures of yourself wearing your new and awesome Warby Parker products, they could reach millions of potential customers and not use middlemen.
It didn’t happen overnight but soon the word started to spread, through Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. You could order eyeglasses online and both save money and love your look.
In this same vein, Warby Parker promotes transactional communication in several ways.
By placing value not just on their own message but the messages that you provide in return. Warby Parker is constantly asking you for your thoughts and concerns and asking for your help.
The company constantly provides new information about products and eye health on YouTube and other platforms, and it also asks customers to do the same.
Additionally, Warby Parker has created a platform to assist with social good. The Buy a Pair, Give a Pair | Warby Parker program provides glasses free of cost to people around the world who are in need.
The latest information on their website states that over ten million pairs of glasses have been distributed through this program!
Now I don’t know about you, but if I must buy glasses anyway (which I do), I love the thought of knowing that my purchase is going to help provide glasses for someone else. Win-Win!
By providing a quality product at a great price and allowing us, the customers to talk directly to the company, sharing both their successes and opportunities for improvement. Warby Parker broke the mold of what shopping for eyeglasses should look like.
Testimonials from real people, trying on glasses at home, helping to find and schedule optometrists, and in general just doing what they told you they’d do has led to success.
And now, as technology rolls ahead, you lucky iPhone owners can even try glasses on virtually, with the Warby Parker app found here, Warby Parker on the App Store.
So, in conclusion, Warby Parker, a simple seller of eyeglasses, has really managed to become an international icon in the social media marketing world. And this is how they do it.
– They solve problems.
o Access
o Price
o Scheduling
– They listen to you the customer.
o What are their successes
o What are their opportunities for improvement
o They love your testimonials
– Social good.
o Provide eyeglasses to needy people worldwide
It’s simple really. Utilize the worldwide reach of social media. Leverage the fact that you know someone else and love to share good news. Provide a quality product at a great price. Outstanding customer-centric service. Do good.
Any business that follows this model will be set up for success.
Hello! I loved reading your blog! It was very well written and spaced nicely for an easy read. My one qualm, however, is the grey font on a grey background, it is a little hard for me to read but I have bad eyes. I also loved your use of images at the very top of the blog, it made me have to scroll through it. Also, I would maybe recommend solid bullet points because the open ones kind of look like zeros/o’s. Great read!!
Hi Eric
First, I love the image that you chose at the top, it was a unique way to start the blog and it drew me right in. You may want to include links or references to those images as I think that was part of the requirement.
You did a great job of treating this like a discussion which has really been a huge theme of our last two weeks work. You gave it a personal voice, some of your own opinion and analysis, and seemed to have fun (but in a good, organized fashion).
I look forward to reading more of your work!
Aimee
Hi!
I want to start by saying that I really liked how you came across as a brand ambassador or influencer for the company. Your interpersonal style of writing definitely reads more as a friendly conversation. This is definitely a selling point, however it could possibly be made a little bit more academic in terms of the formatting. I like how you wrote about how the company solved problems that consumers faced, while touching on the point that the company is transparent and gives back to the community.
Good post!
Taylor
Hey Eric,
I enjoyed reading your blog post. The imaged you used definitely caught my eye immediately and made me want to continue to read on. You led off with an interesting hook that kept me engaged, and it was arranged in a format that was easy to follow and read. The writing was conversational and it read more like someone was talking to you rather than you reading something out of a book. The information you provided was interesting, and you presented it in an easy to understand way.