Eyes are the windows to the soul.
— William Shakespeare
Overview
Park Optical is a well established business that has been serving their community for 55 years. They pride themselves on having a great selection of frames, offering detailed eye exams, and meeting the personalized eye care needs of the community.
How do we appeal to the next generation of customers?
Park Optical’s service and experience needs to be translated to reach customers on digital platforms. Park Optical has observed other eye glass companies disrupting their industry and they want to stay desirable to a younger audience without alienating their current clients.
Challenge
One of the challenges is that Park Optical will need to change in order to address the buying habits of younger customers. Not all customers want to go to a physical store. There is a large segment of customers that are not as discerning about their eye care choices.
Looking at a competitive analysis, there are other brands like Warby Parker with a large following in the younger demographic. How does Park Optical appeal to that demographic? How do they communicate with the next generation of customers? How do they show their value?
Process
We interviewed a number of people about their eye care choices. Our goal was to identify what behavior helped them decide on an eye doctor, a frame purchase, or a pair of sunglasses.
After our interviews, we tested a sample group of people to see what was working and what wasn’t working in Park Optical’s current communications. We then prototyped, tested, and made changes to their content in order to identify what language and context was most effective.
Our focus was on brand, content strategy, information architecture, and messaging. Park Optical offers many services including eye exams, frames, prescriptions, personalized fitting, sunglasses, specialty items, and repair.
We needed to help them communicate their value through web, video, advertising, and social feeds as well as provide them with the foundation for online retail sales.
Using content audits, user journeys, user flows, and prototype testing, we mapped out a plan to simplify the process of finding information for customers.
Insights
They wanted to find information on key people, how the company gives back to the community, and how active Park Optical is on social media.
Our testing revealed that most customers wanted the ability to make an appointment, find Park Optical’s location, and download any paperwork they needed to fill out. They also wanted to find information on key people, how the company gives back to the community, and how active Park Optical is on social media.
We created a number of touch points that were well branded and provided the right information at the right time. Making an appointment and store location were featured higher in the structure of the site.
Since Park Optical has received such great feedback from their customers, we were able to highlight customer reviews on the landing page. We also addressed customers’ most frequently asked questions on the site, which reduced unnecessary phone conversations and allowed for more personalized service both on the phone and in the store.
Since Park Optical offers medical services like eye exams and treatments, we created a digital option for people to download patient forms before coming in for their visits.
Facebook has been Park Optical’s primary social media outlet. We were able to further utilize FaceBook’s platform to create a custom feed which highlighted Park Optical’s latest information and industry news.
The project’s key business objectives are performing better than expected. Park Optical’s presence is being felt in the community and we are working on more open initiatives to further their reach.
