What kinds of marketing and outreach are you doing to attract new residents and increase move-ins?
Find creative solutions
By Joseph Jasmon
CEO
American Healthcare Management Group
We adjusted our business relationship visits and offered a helping hand to those businesses reopening with COVID-related assistance. We continue to provide virtual tours and have started a video program to introduce ourselves to the community.
We recently began to offer in-home assistance, advice and a person to call for prospects who are nervous about moving. Enhancing our online presence and working our family networks is the key.
Now more than ever we have to be creative in building and fostering our relationships with our potential families. It is our goal to be a valuable resource to the community.
Video is an essential tool
By Dan Williams
Principal, COO
Seasons Living
The pandemic has challenged our industry to think outside the box and find creative new ways to attract customers. At Seasons Living we have put a big emphasis on virtual tours showcasing our communities. Video has become an essential tool in getting the amenities we offer in front of prospects.
Much of our marketing message has changed to emphasize how we can keep our residents safe. We have created an animated video highlighting infection control to educate consumers.
We’ve had fun utilizing the community buses as mobile sales offices, going out to referral sources and offering curbside snacks. This has been a big hit.
A slow return to normal
By Douglas Schiffer
President, COO
Allegro Senior Living
We’re working to make visiting the community more acceptable. Whether it’s reassuring prospects that we’re working hard to maintain the highest levels of cleanliness or setting up outside ‘living rooms’ so families can visit, it’s important to demonstrate our ability to be welcoming in this new normal.
For prospects to become residents they have to know that they’ll be safe and engaged without being cut off from their family and friends. We continue to take it a day at a time. In-person tours, rather than virtual, are beginning at our active adult and independent living communities, and it’s making all the difference as we slowly return to normal.
Safety and service meet
By Ted Doyle
Vice President of Marketing & Communications
LCB Senior Living
We took a ground-up approach to post-COVID marketing feeling that, all things being equal, people who need our services are going to go where they feel most safe.
A messaging strategy was created wrapping all of the traditional benefits within the concept of safety. “Where Safety Meets Service” was launched as an integrated campaign across all channels.
At the same time, we conducted family surveys to gauge our work and received very positive feedback that we’ve been able to share. We’re also creating robust virtual tours and have restored a real sense of life and activity within the communities.
Market the positives
By Jill Harlow
Agency Director
Watermark Retirement Communities
At Watermark Retirement Communities, we’re providing residents and families with peace of mind by sharing our laser focus on safety in every area of our communities and our 30 years of experience in delivering exceptional service and care.
Watermark’s marketing message reflects our longstanding approach to transformative aging — incorporating high-quality care with integrative wellness in an environment that supports daily living with an abundance of choices. Watermark communities offer a retirement lifestyle that embraces renewal and engagement with amenities and programs that enrich mind, body and spirit.
Our commitment is to lift the weight for families concerned about providing a safe and healthy lifestyle for their loved one.
Manage marketing budgets
By Rick Westermann
Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Rental
Life Care Services
In March, Life Care Services immediately reduced marketing spend across all channels hoping to redeploy it later at a higher return on investment. In June, we began to increase our pay-per-click monthly spend by closely following our digital marketing key performance indicators in each local market to maximize spend and performance.
Like many providers, we quickly adjusted our sales approach in March and April with prospective residents and referral partners to digital using Zoom, FaceTime, Google Duo, pre-recorded videos, text and targeted email campaigns. Coaching our teams and practicing mock virtual tours have been paramount to the success we have seen converting these prospects to move-ins.
Residents offer testimonials
By Heather Frahm
Chief Marketing Officer, Senior Vice President
Benchmark Senior Living
As a company built on human connections, Benchmark values honest and ongoing communication with residents and families. Since COVID-19, this dialogue has been more important than ever. That is why we asked our communities to participate in a June survey.
An impressive 87 percent of respondents indicated their impression of Benchmark stayed the same or improved since COVID-19. Meanwhile, 43 percent indicated their impression of Benchmark has improved since the pandemic, while 24 percent indicated they have a favorable impression of the the entire seniors housing industry.
The results offered insights on how we can improve and provided a treasure trove of testimonials for brochures, digital promotions and prospect letters. What carries more weight than the opinions of people who already call Benchmark home?
Create hybrid strategies
By Sarabeth Hanson
President, CEO
Harbor Retirement Associates
Our focus in our sales and marketing efforts is, of course, to maximize every effort to encourage new business and grow our census while acting responsibly to ensure that we’re not putting our residents or associates at risk.
We focus on well-choreographed, high-quality virtual tours, and these will continue to be a large part of our process. Our intention is to take the lessons we’ve learned about the opportunities we have with the technology at hand and to incorporate them into our traditional sales process. This creates a new enhanced hybrid sales process and cadence, where the virtual tour is an enticement to come visit in person.
Above all, we are going to continue our focus on the individuals that we serve and will serve by developing deep, meaningful relationships with our prospects that will allow us to connect with them on a deeper level.