Selling a Better Quality of Life With Hearing Aids

Today's hearing aids are virtually invisible...or not.

If your eyes start to go, you get them checked, you get a pair of glasses and life goes on. Not so with hearing loss. Oh, brother. Studies have been conducted that indicate that people who wear hearing aids are viewed as old, feeble and (I love this) broken!

People with hearing loss are no more “broken” than people who wear glasses or other adaptive devices – an artificial limb, for example. And as a hearing aid technologist I take umbrage at my clients being called broken. They aren’t broken, the just don’t hear as well as they used to.

Industry Trends The ReSound Dot. HOT!
For those of us who have been fitting and selling hearing aids for three or four decades, we’ve had the opportunity to see a fundamental change in, not only hearing aid tech, but also in the way hearing aid wearers perceive themselves. For decades, hearing aids were big, clunky things that gramps complained about. They spewed out feedback like a Jimi Hendrix guitar solo and they were beige and blah.

Hello new millennium. Now, hearing aids are almost all digital meaning that manufacturers can fit more and more features into smaller and smaller casings. The result?

Hearing aids that:

provide comfortable, natural sound.

are lightweight yet loaded with features and plenty of juice to boost your hearing.

comfortable to wear either completely in the canal (CIC), in the canal (ITC) or behind the ear (BTE) configurations – something to please all of your clients.

are totally, 100% automated so your clients don’t have to sweat the small stuff.

are available in a discrete profile or in kandy-apple red if you want to make a statement to the world.

are available with higher standards of quality, longer battery wear and – get this – a lower price. The unit that cost $3,000 just a few years ago now costs half that as the R & D expenses are recouped. Works that way with all electronics. Remember when laptops were $2,000 minimum? Today, you can buy a good one for less than $500. Same with hearing aids.

You Aren’t Selling Hearing Aids, You’re Selling Quality of Life
This one fact may make the difference between the success of your store or practice and the “crash and burn” effect. If you view your job as selling ear gear, you’re only telling half the story.
The ability to hear is a quality of life issue. If a client can’t hear, you may discover a sense of isolation. Even anger. That’s why I always tell my clients, “You aren’t buying a couple of hearing aids. You’re buying a higher standard of living.”

Imagine hearing the grandkids giggle or the wind rustling the leaves after a decade of almost total silence. Can you put a price on that?

Further, individuals who compensate for hearing loss are more productive in the workplace, they can work longer (if they want to) and they can become part of the community and family once again. You don’t sell hardware, even if it is top-of-the-line. You market a better quality of life for all of your clients and those who live and work and play with these men, women and children.

Explain the Benefits
Ear Bling. Make YOUR Statement

Chances are the client that just walked into your shop doesn’t want to be there but has finally recognized that it can’t be put off any longer. I can usually recognize these folks by their scowls and the spouse dragging the client through my front door.

Before I conduct a hearing evaluation, before I discuss options, prices and guarantees, the very first thing I do is explain how much better life will be when the client can hear again and get back in the game. Just a few minutes of going over benefits rather than tech specs seems to do the trick.

In short, sure promote the product but more importantly, promote the improvement in quality of life. The money spent on a pair of hearing aids will only sting a little and for a short time.

The ability to enjoy the sounds long-absent in the client’s life is something that will be enjoyed every minute of everyday.

Once clients understand that (1) they aren’t old, feeble and broken, (2) today’s hearing aids are cool or discrete and (3) there’s been a huge leap forward from the unit gramps wore in his shirt pocket, the client becomes your ally in improving hearing and improving life.

And you’ve made a new client and a new friend.