Smart home technology is often considered an expensive and complex luxury that only tech-savvy homeowners can afford. Wyze is breaking down those barriers to entry with affordable smart home products that are easy to learn and set up.
To learn more about the industry and the future of smart home technology, I emailed Scott Wilson, the senior director of product marketing at Wyze Labs. We discussed what they’ve been up to and how they’ve been managing customer concerns.
(Note: This interview was edited for grammar and style).
What do you find most challenging in the smart home tech industry?
From a customer’s perspective, we’ve found three major pain points for customers in the smart home industry. The first is price. No. 2 is ease of use, and No. 3 is the existence of a full smart home solution and ecosystem.
Wyze has set out to solve each of these issues by pricing our products as low and accessibly as possible, constantly updating and improving our user interfaces and operability, and developing new products all designed to work together (like, locks, scales, cameras, watches, light bulbs, etc.)
From a business perspective: educating the market that smart home exists, and that it’s a solution to many everyday problems. The smart home market is still relatively small, but it’s growing fast.
For example, many homeowners don’t realize they can have their lights turn on at exactly the right time at exactly the right brightness or why they’d even want that. But when homeowners are able to experience automation, they fall in love with it and begin outfitting their entire home.
What are most popular products for homeowners?
We see voice assistant speakers like Amazon’s Echo, smart plugs and smart lights as the popular smart home products for people entering the space. For those already in the space, we see cameras as a top-owned product.
What are common concerns people have before purchasing smart home tech?
Many people are intimidated by the initial setup process. For example, light bulbs now have firmware! It takes a little time getting used to the idea that you can update your light bulb, but we do our best to make the setup process and everyday interactions as easy as possible.
What are some obstacles that prevent people from adopting smart home tech?
The No. 1 barrier in my opinion is (was) price. Before Wyze entered the market, smart home technology was very expensive to own. A main part of Wyze’s mission has been to challenge the status quo in the market and create high-quality products at the lowest prices possible for customers.
Brandon Doyle is a Realtor at Doyle Real Estate Team — RE/MAX Results in Minneapolis and co-author of Mindset, Methods & Metrics – Winning as a Modern Real Estate Agent. You can follow him on Twitter.