INSIGHTS How Do You Explain It? By Marge Axelrad Monday, November 12, 2018 12:30 AM How many times a day do you reach for your phone to “show” someone something? To illustrate an idea? To illustrate a look, a technique, a store, a game-day play, a powerful image? I’m betting it’s several, let’s say, more than five times a day. And, why is that? Because the easy access or reach of a mobile device, phone or tablet, helped by a great photographic angle, or increasingly, by a short compelling video, is something that helps propel an explanation. Pictures have the power to tell a story, to drive home a point, to attract, persuade and, yes, sell. They can also educate, inform, help people “realize” something, convey a message fast. That’s what “Dynamic Demos” is about, our Cover Story in this issue, which examines the new ways people in the spectacle lens arena are amping up the way they are using images, often with the help of digital tools, to advance information about what clearer vision, or glare reduction, or photochromics, or a new lens design, can mean to patients that are searching for explanations and answers. Our vision business has long been hampered by patients who just can’t “see” the difference between value and premium, between standard and elevated. As our story points out, “That’s the eternal problem of selling eyeglass lenses: you can tell patients that digital designs will work better than the standard designs they are wearing today, that a premium AR coating will help them see better and look better, and that every day, they’ll enjoy a fuller, more satisfying visual experience. But how do you make them see the difference?” The time is now for all dispensers and eyecare practitioners to embrace dynamic digital tools to convey the value and the power of seeing clearly, with the help of the right prescription products and features. You can activate your authority and create new “aha” moments for patients—and put into a modern context some of the great new technology-enhanced vision correction options for your patients. Show and tell. It works most of the time. maxelrad@jobson.com