Archive for the ‘Nursing Home Marketing’ Category
Thursday, August 11th, 2011 by Angela Stringfellow
Chris Rodde, CEO and co-founder of SeniorHomes.com, will be hosting a webinar in conjunction with Mature Market Sales Source, “Top Seven Ways to Get the Most Out of Internet Inquiries.” The webinar will take place on Tuesday, August 16, 2011, at 10:00am PST. Join Chris and Deena Neste, Principal and co-founder of Mature Market Sales Source, as they walk you through incorporating internet leads as part of your sales strategy, maximizing your website for lead generation, and more. 
“Top Seven Ways to Get the Most Out of Internet Inquiries” is free for participants. Register today to learn from Chris’ many years of expertise in internet lead generation. Topics to be covered include:
- Incorporating internet leads in your marketing strategy
- Designing systems, strategies and protocols for effective engagement
- Maximizing your website for lead generation
- Selecting the best internet lead vendors
- Using tools and strategies for maximizing engagement
- Most effective methods for thorough follow-up
- Benchmarking and comparing results
- Optimizing your sales and marketing budgets
Register today and join Deena Neste and Chris Rodde for this complimentary webinar for maximizing your internet lead generation strategies. Click here to register for “Top Seven Ways to Get the Most Out of Internet Inquiries.”
Tags: Chris Rodde, Mature Market Sales Source, webinar
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Buying Internet Leads, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, Senior Living News | No Comments »
Wednesday, April 20th, 2011 by Angela Stringfellow
We read an interesting white paper today from DNA13, “Listening 101: Tips to Integrate Social Media into Your Day-to-Day Media Monitoring,” that got our wheels turning about the value of social media. You’re probably familiar with the story of how Comcast used social media to transform customer service. (If you’re not, read about it now on MojoSocial.) There are dozens of other customer service success stories just like it. 
You’ve also heard much about how social media is impacting search, with an increasing importance placed on Facebook shares and Twitter retweets. (You’re not? Check out this post from SEOmoz on the topic.) What you don’t hear much about, however, is the value of social media as a market research tool. In assisted living, nursing homes and other residential care settings, there’s a lot of competition and a lot of emphasis on meeting customer needs. But we’re often so focused on the value of building followers, providing value and engaging conversation, we might forget to listen.
Listen to uncover hidden opportunities
If you’re new to social media, you should start by listening in on the conversation that’s already underway. Google your company name; it’s likely that people are already talking about your assisted living community, somewhere across the web. Don’t you want to know what they’re saying? You might learn that most of your residents’ caregivers are members of the sandwich generation. What activities or events can you plan that would appeal to the whole family? Maybe they’re baby boomers with no plans to retire in the near future. How can you make their role easier? You might find out that there’s something members of your community are wishing for–why not give it to them, if it’s within your means?
Don’t just investigate yourself, though. Check out your competitors, too. Even if your organization focuses solely on assisted living care, there’s much to be learned from investigating skilled nursing facilities and independent living communities in your area, too. Find out what’s missing and fill in the void. Learn what they’re doing and do it better. Uncover problems and offer solutions. This is where the engagement comes in. Once you’ve identified topics of interest (by listening!) you can seamlessly join the conversation. Because you already know their hot buttons, what information they’re seeking, and their common problems, you’re prepared to deliver exactly what they wanted to hear–at exactly the right time.
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Tags: Assisted Living Marketing, competitive analysis, social media strategy
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, Senior Living News | 4 Comments »
Wednesday, February 16th, 2011 by Angela Stringfellow
Mature Market Sales Source is offering an “Open Discussion of Benchmarks & Best Practices for Senior Living Sales & Marketing” this Thursday, February 17th from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. PST. The live chat format of this session allows participants to connect and interact with other top performing senior living leaders and sales executives. 
The chat will take place monthly, and participants can attend via phone or internet conference. This is an opportunity for industry leaders to share their knowledge and best practices as well as learn from other senior living professionals. Through the open chat, participants can get their questions answered and seek advice on the biggest challenges they face as a senior living sales or management professional. Whether your question relates to sales and marketing or business practices in general, other attendees are likely to be experiencing the same struggles–or, they may have found an innovative way to overcome a common obstacle that you can learn from.
Don’t have a specific question in mind? You’ll still benefit from the sharing of ideas and resources. Typically, The Open Source monthly chats are limited to members only, but this month Mature Market Sales Source has opened up the lines to all industry leaders with an interest. Space is extremely limited; only 20 open lines are available on each call, but an additional 100 “listen-only” spots are available. Listen-only participants still have the opportunity to ask and answer questions via text chat.
Don’t miss this rare opportunity to connect with like-minded senior living sales and marketing leaders! Reserve your seat here.
Tags: Assisted Living Marketing, Mature Market Sales Source, Nursing Home Marketing
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, Senior Living News | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, January 4th, 2011 by Chris Rodde
We are pleased to present an exclusive offer to SeniorHomes.com customers. We have partnered with Bild & Company to offer a FREE webinar to help you get the most out of your leads. The webinar is normally $49 but through a special arrangement with Traci Bild, a limited number of SeniorHomes.com customers can attend for free.
Reserve your FREE spot in the webinar today by emailing webinar@seniorhomes.com
Traci Bild
Here is more information about the webinar…
100% Occupancy Is Not a Pipe Dream: Discover Two Proven Sales Tactics You Are Not Utilizing That Will Have an Immediate Impact on Occupancy, Revenue and Investor Return for Your SNF, Independent or Assisted Living Community.
In the last six months, Bild & Company moved 25 senior living communities to 100% occupancy and zero lost revenue days. Another 16 communities entered their Double Digit Club; moving in 10 or more residents in one month. Each and every one of these communities started out challenged. Learn the top two tactics for moving communities to 100% occupancy, zero lost revenue days and experience it for yourself!
This webinar is a must attend event for those sales and admission directors looking to grow their visit to move in conversion in AL to 50%+, IL to 35%+ and SNF to 90%+. Traci will show you, step-by-step, how to book one appointment for every second follow up contact made, what you must do to eliminate the impact of your competitors and how to cut the sales cycle in half; literally! This webinar is not for the light-hearted, but for those looking for concrete ideas that will make a permanent difference in the way sales are handled at the community level. Strong focus will be put on follow up and closing skills.
If you manage one or more sales directors, this event will bring clarity to the big questions you have about occupancy and why it’s not growing. More importantly, you will learn exactly what you can do to turn things around for positive occupancy growth.
Presenter: Traci Bild, Sales Expert to the Senior Housing Industry
Co-Presenter: Chris Rodde, CEO, SeniorHomes.com
Date: Thursday, January 20, 2011 at 1:00 pm EST / 10:00 am PST (1 Hour Webinar, Streaming Live or Dial
In- Your Preference)
Reserve your free spot in the webinar by emailing webinar@seniorhomes.com!
Tags: Assisted Living Marketing
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing | 2 Comments »
Monday, January 3rd, 2011 by Angela Stringfellow
It’s back to the daily routine for most of the world today, after the busy holiday season has come to an end. But many adults have a new item on their list this week: Searching for care for an aging parent. 
The post-holiday season is a great time for assisted living marketers to improve occupancy rates. Many families who live across the miles will gather together during the holidays, giving adult children and other loved ones a perfect opportunity to monitor the status of a loved one’s independence. Many issues that may go unnoticed by children who live out of town become obvious when several days are spent together under one roof, such as medication compliance, mobility concerns, and memory loss.
Assisted living marketers can begin making a push by publishing a useful checklist for loved ones to utilize to gauge an aging relative’s safety and independence at home on the company’s website. Post it on your company Facebook page and Twitter feed. Often, the need for assisted living or other long-term care doesn’t cross a family’s mind until it becomes blatantly obvious that a loved one is no longer safe to remain in his or her home alone, and some of the more subtle signs of a loss of independence don’t come to mind until they’re pointed out. Think medication non-compliance, expired foods in the refrigerator, and clutter in the home.
So what do adult children do when they come home from a holiday visit with suspicions that an aging parent isn’t safe to live alone any longer? Most of the time, they turn to the internet to search for information to confirm their suspicions. Make sure your checklist and accompanying advice are visible in the search engines by using keyword optimization, social media, a blog post, and even a press release to get the word out.
The next step most consumers take is to search for potential facilities — near where they live or near their family member’s current home. If there are many miles between those locations, the search can be more difficult but is simplified by online directories like SeniorHomes.com, which list senior housing communities in cities across the country. A simple search by city and state brings up dozens of listings, whether you’re searching for assisted living, independent living, or nursing homes.
If you’ve followed the first few steps by offering relevant and timely information and making it visible through online media, but your facility lacks a presence on senior housing directories where many families begin their in-depth search for assisted living, many of those post-holiday leads might land with your competitors.
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Tags: aging parents, lead generation, senior housing
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing | No Comments »
Sunday, January 2nd, 2011 by Angela Stringfellow
The New York Times reported on December 26, 2010 that while the 18 to 33 age demographic is still predominant among internet usage, older age demographics are rapidly catching up. Adults 45 and over more than doubled their social networking use in the period between December 2008 and May 2010, but the most surprising gain came from adults 74 years and older — this group quadrupled its social networking participation, with 16 percent of adults in this group now actively using social networking. 
A similar report issued in November by AdvertisingAge points out another interesting piece of data: Baby Boomers who are caring for their aging parents are heavier internet users (among social networking sites like Facebook) than their non-caregiving counterparts. Laurel Kennedy, author of “The Daughter Trap” and president of Chicago-based consulting firm Age Lessons, estimates that approximately 15.5 million baby boomers are serving as caregivers out of the 78 million-strong boomer population.
The gender gap is nearly evenly split, with a slight edge towards women (60%, versus 40% men). This group spends an average of 150 minutes each month on social media and visits 70% more pages than the typical internet user. ComScore, which conducted research on behalf of Age Lessons, breaks down the top ten sites among Boomer Caregivers. It’s not surprising that Facebook leads the pack, with a 91 percent reach. Among some online retailer sites (Amazon.com, Target, WalMart), LinkedIn has a 37% reach and Twitter a 21% reach.
One interesting discovery from comScore’s research is that the online review site Yelp has a 30% reach among Boomer Caregivers, beating out Twitter. In our previous posts reporting on assisted living marketing and social networking use, Yelp never entered the conversation as a most-used site for either internet users or marketers. Could this be an untapped resource for senior housing marketers? Possibly, if boomers are using Yelp to read reviews of health and medical providers and not merely to decide what restaurant to visit that evening. Only more in-depth research could tell for sure, but it’s probably worth your time to monitor your presence on Yelp.
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Tags: baby boomers, social media, Yelp
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, baby boomers | No Comments »
Friday, October 29th, 2010 by Angela Stringfellow
CareNetworks is conducting a Social Media Success Series, a collection of interviews from senior care providers who have achieved positive results from using social media. The first in the series is an interview with Emeritus Senior Living, one of the largest senior living providers in the country with more than 460 assisted living communities serving 43 states. 
As all demographics, even baby boomers and seniors, are embracing social media, it makes sense for senior living providers to research ways for incorporating social media into their overall marketing mix. CareNetwork’s interview with Emeritus’ eMarketing Specialist, Chris Kim, is evidence that social media marketing is effort well spent.
According to Kim, Emeritus first began using social media in June 2009. In the grand scheme of things, they’re still new to the scene, yet they’ve still achieved some impressive results. Rather than use social media to generate leads, they use it to engage their customers. They started by thinking about what information their typical customer is searching for, and leveraged social media as a tool for brand reputation management, an online presence, and to establish the company as an industry authority. As a plus, Kim reports that social media enabled Emeritus to connect with field employees and third-party service providers.
Currently, Emeritus utilizes the following social media initiatives:
- Facebook
- Twitter
- A corporate blog
- LinkedIn
- YouTube
Note in our previous post, Benefits of Social Media Marketing (which reported on findings from the 2010 Social Media Marketing Industry Report), that Emeritus has focused the majority of their social media efforts on the top five venues indicated by this study. The company continues to build out a robust resource of health and caregiving glossaries, guides, and tutorials (even video tutorials are in the works) on its corporate website for residents, potential customers, their families, and providers. The company’s resources also provided useful content that was used to engage customers on social media profiles.
Here are a few tips Kim offers senior living executives for ramping up social media efforts:
- Keep your content current and updates timely — keep your customers abreast of what’s happening in your facility
- Don’t just post content; instead, ask for feedback and opinions
- Add some flavor. Run a contest, link to other relevant — and fun — resources, like quizzes, and ask fans to post their scores
Read the full interview on the CareNetworks blog
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Tags: Emeritus Senior Living, social media marketing
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing | No Comments »
Friday, October 29th, 2010 by Stuart Grinnell
In 1994, family caregivers were first recognized during National Family Caregivers Week. President Clinton was the first to honor caregivers as a month-long celebration, signing the first proclamation declaring November National Family Caregivers Month. Every year since, the American President in office has declared November a month to recognize the challenges, struggles, and tremendous sacrifice millions of family caregivers provide every day. 
The National Family Caregivers Association (NFCA) coordinates National Family Caregivers month each year. More than 65 million Americans serve as family caregivers, making them part of a large group of caring and compassionate individuals who strive to meet the needs of aging parents or disabled loved ones every day, yet many members of this population continue to feel isolated and alone.
To help caregivers cope with the daily challenges and emotional toll that caregiving can take, NFCA has created a community comprised of caregivers and volunteers to offer education and support as well as a sense of community among this remarkable group. National Family Caregivers Month serves to both recognize caregivers and to promote education and support resources available to caregivers. Membership in NFCA is free to all family caregivers and provides access to the association’s resource library, which includes helpful information including:
- A home healthcare primer
- Care management tips and techniques
- Advice on improving doctor/caregiver communications
- Medication management
- Tips on choosing assisted living facilities or nursing homes, or other senior housing
- Stress reduction
- Action checklists
- And much more
National Family Caregivers Month is celebrated community-wide, with healthcare providers and community organizations taking an active role in the promotion of the event and recognizing caregivers. Those wanting to get involved can participate in a number of ways, including displaying National Family Caregivers Month posters in their places of business, offering support groups for family caregivers in the community, hosting a caregivers workshop with resources and information, or simply by telling caregivers they know about the benefits of joining NFCA.
Visit the NFCA website to learn more about National Family Caregivers Month and ways you can get involved.
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Tags: National Family Caregivers Association, National Family Caregivers Month
Posted in Aging, Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, Senior Living News | No Comments »
Wednesday, October 27th, 2010 by Jacqui Tom
On October 26, 2010, 125 executives from senior living companies and related organizations convened in Alexandria, Virginia, to discuss the future of senior living in America. Rick Grimes, President and CEO of ALFA, says of the event, “There is a lot of interest by senior living executives to find ways to better serve seniors and their families and collaborate with their staff to promote excellence at their companies.” 
Participants were given the opportunity to share knowledge with fellow leaders, participate in discussions and roundtables, and attend presentations. Discussions and roundtables focused on solutions to the following challenges:
- Staff recruitment and retention
- Economic impacts and how government involvement will affect the industry
- Challenges of longer lifespans and needs for diverse types of assistance
- Forming collaborative relationships with adjuct industries, such as hospice providers, pharmacies, and rehab centers
- Changes to employee benefits as a result of health care reform
Tom Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, spoke to participants at a luncheon on how a changed political landscape would have eventual impacts on the senior living industry. In addition, the President’s Council, comprised of a representatives from companies serving the senior living industry, gathered for an industry update and discussed possibilities for aiding ALFA in its mission to advance the future of senior living.
Read the ALFA press release.
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Tags: ALFA, senior living
Posted in Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing, Senior Living News | 2 Comments »
Monday, October 11th, 2010 by Angela Stringfellow
MetLife’s “The MetLife Report on Early Boomers: How America’s Leading Edge Baby Boomers Will Transform Aging, Work & Retirement” suggests that the oldest Boomers will forego the traditional leisure-filled retirement in order to continue working — possibly indefinitely. Many Boomers are struggling under debt from putting children through college, others have suffered financial setbacks through the economic crisis, some have purchased second homes, and due to a longer life expectancy, many fear they’ll outlive their nest eggs. 
Many older Boomers face a favorable employment outlook because they have many years of experience, and they’re attractive to employers who realize that they won’t have to provide health insurance coverage to Medicare-eligible workers, according to Sandra Timmerman, Ed.D., director of the MetLife Mature Market Institute.
This transition to a new model of retirement will mean significant changes in the long-term care industry. Unless they become sick enough to require round-the-clock care, many boomers will opt for long-term living options that allow them to remain independent and continue working. Aging in place may become more popular as seniors opt for services that can provide care in the home.
Nursing homes are already becoming a place for the seriously ill and disabled, because assisted living communities tend to offer more flexibility to residents. Even assisted living facilities may need to change their marketing objectives to more broadly appeal to independent seniors. A focus on the ability for residents to set their own schedule, leave as they please, and participate in a variety of activities both inside and outside of the facility will be key to any long-term care facility’s success.
The up-and-coming senior population commands choices, and a life of continued work will ensure that seniors remain active, which will improve long-term health. Facilities that can accomodate the varied and changing needs of seniors will remain the most successful as we experience a long-term living revolution.
Read the Business Wire press release.
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Tags: baby boomers, long-term living, retirement
Posted in Aging, Assisted Living Marketing, Home Care Marketing, Nursing Home Marketing, Senior Housing Marketing | No Comments »
