👋 Read Jabra Enhance Select hearing aid customer reviews here.
Lively launched in 2019 with an impressive team and big ambitions. Forbes called them the Warby Parker of hearing aids, and the hearing health community embraced their innovative and patient-first care model.
The idea was simple. Give patients everything they would expect at a local hearing clinic but do it online.
Lively pulled their plan off by staffing a team of hearing professionals who gathered hearing tests online, programmed hearing aids remotely, and shipped those customized hearing aids to patients' homes.
The founding team at Lively had no idea what was coming their way.
2020 led to a surge in Telehealth innovation and helped Lively become one of the category's most popular and well-respected hearing health brands.
In late 2021 GN Hearing announced that they would purchase Lively for around $100M. Not a bad outcome for a 4-year-old brand.
I had a chance to interview the CEO of Lively and the CEO of GN Hearing, about the acquisition. You can read that interview here. Nearly a year later, Lively is back with some more news.
Now the Lively brand will take a new name: Jabra Enhance.
Jabra is a trusted name in audio and is also owned by GN. Think of this as a consolidation of branding power.
I had a chance to chat with Lively about the change and what it means for customers. Here is what I learned:
What's staying the same? Mostly everything.
Starting on November 6, 2022, the new name Jabra Enhance will show up on customer emails, marketing materials, and packaging, but the fundamentals of the brand are staying virtually identical.
Product:
Lively currently carries three levels of product. The same products will continue with new names:
Lively Lite -> becomes Enhance Select 50
Lively Plus -> becomes Enhance Select 100
Lively Pro -> becomes Enhance Select 200
At least for now, these are the same products. Same chargers, same technology, etc. Just a new name.
Leadership and customer care team:
The CEO and leadership of Lively will become the CEO and leadership of Jabra Enhance. No changes.
All Lively hearing aids historically came with three years of unlimited follow-up care. If you are in the middle of your care term, nothing should change about your assigned contacts.
Your 100-day risk-free trial and three-year warranty will also be honored under the new brand name.
All new customers will get the same benefits:
- 100-day trial
- Three years of care
- Three year warranty
What the Lively/Jabra team shared with me is that this "big news" is actually pretty uneventful.
What is changing?
The Website
The existing website will change from ListenLively.com to JabraEnhance.com. The features and functionality should remain roughly the same, including the popular Lively hearing test.
The Lively Mobile App Will Change
There's one big change that current customers need to know.
The Lively Connect app will be updated to Jabra Enhance. If you have automatic updates on your phone, this should happen in the background. If not, you can search the app store for "Jabra Enhance Select" after 11/8.
Note that Jabra also has a totally separate hearing aid product called Jabra Enhance Plus. The two products have different apps so make sure you download the "select" version.
Once updated, the app and icon will change to "Jabra Enhance Select". The overall functionality of the app will stay the same.
Is this a good or bad change?
I'm a big fan of the Lively care model. It isn't for everyone (mostly people who want in-person care), but it offers one of the best values in hearing health.
The move to Jabra Enhance is immaterial. Jabra is a trusted brand, and GN will be highly motivated to make the product successful in the long run.
After a few months of transition, Lively will be a memory, and we'll be talking about the quality devices Jabra Enhance carries at lower than the average industry price.
The change might indicate new products on the horizon. Lively (now Jabra Enhance) uses ReSound's underlying technology and has yet to make a move to the latest ReSound OMNIA design released in August.
I wouldn't be surprised if we hear an announcement that Lively will support that new technology level in the coming months.
Until then, I'll continue to recommend Jabra Enhance Select as one of the best overall value offers on the market.
