Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Capturing the Essence of Your Residents to Market Lifestyle

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • The lackluster quality of most stock photos depicting seniors
  • What it is like to work with 80+-year-old models, including those with cognitive disabilities
  • Why Tom incorporates stories into his photos
  • How senior living facilities can improve their marketing by showcasing quality photos
  • Justifying the cost of quality photoshoots for marketing purposes
  • Rebuilding trust in senior living communities post-COVID 19 through photography

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Tom Sanders, a professor of photography at Savannah College of Art and Design and the founder of Senior Living Photography and Senior Stock Photos. He is the author of the coffee table books The Last Good War: The Faces and Voices of WWII (2010) and Vietnam War Portraits: The Faces and Voices (2020).

Debbie considers Tom to be the best in the senior photography niche which, she laments, is severely lacking. She notes the oftentimes routine, inaccurate, and sometimes even silly representations of seniors in traditional stock photographs. One reason for this, addresses Tom, is that many senior living companies are unwilling to invest in high-quality photoshoots.

Debbie also criticizes run of the mill photos as idealized images of prospects that lack relatability (i.e. models are often a decade or two younger than the usual senior living demographic). Tom, on the other hand, is unafraid to literally get up close and personal with the people he is trying to represent. Debbie points out that many of Tom’s photos clearly display the wrinkles of his 80+-year-old models. They are posed simply, their humanity, personalities, and vulnerabilities all laid bare.

Tom encourages more photography companies to take advantage of the stories that seniors have to share, so as to bring out the individuality of every single model. It is this level of care and openness that helped The Last Good War to earn the title of “Non-Fiction Book of the Year, Editor’s Choice” by the Forewords Review Magazine.

Companies should be willing to invest in better quality photos of their seniors the same way they are already used to spending on photos of their facility. After all, a marketer’s job is to sell lifestyle, not real estate.


Check out Tom’s portfolio at https://seniorstockphotos.com/ and https://www.seniorlivingvisuals.com/

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Reimagining the Prospect Journey

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • Key impacts of COVID-19 on the senior living industry in China
  • The importance of building relationships with prospects amid COVID-19
  • Useful technologies and other strategies to engage with prospects during quarantine
  • How to “check the temperature” of your lead base during these turbulent times
  • Training salespeople that can effectively navigate the current climate

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Jeff Gronemyer, Director of International Census Development with Meridian Senior Living. He gives a global perspective on the impact of COVID-19 on the industry. Overseeing sales efforts for Meridian in China, Jeff is essentially a couple of months ahead in terms of best practices for interacting with prospects during the pandemic.

In China, Meridian has completely shut down their buildings. The question prospects lead with is no longer, “When can we move in?” but, “What can you do to keep my mom and dad safe?” Meridian has shifted its marketing and sales to cover common concerns brought about by the new normal. This includes helping seniors gain easier access to produce and other basic necessities. There have also been a number of changes to protocols for moving in particularly with regard to making sure that health and sanitation take precedence over all else, while of course keeping the process comfortable and fear-free for seniors.

During a time when communication is more important than ever for closing prospects in the senior living industry, Jeff says that there is now more focus put into the relationship aspect of things. Building a relationship with the prospect while leading them through the sales process has always been a tricky balance. The difference today is that prospects will not be moving into facilities until further notice, and so the pressure to close in advance is no longer there. This simply means taking the time to have meaningful conversations with prospects. One way that Meridian encourages its sales staff to adopt this focus is through sending information on relevant topics to chat about with seniors, such as historical events ranging from 1960 to 1976.

This is a time to experiment and innovate with different technologies and other strategies to engage with prospects. It is also important to discover the changing attitudes, mindsets, and goals of your client base. Reach out—whether through surveys or focus groups—and soak in the different hopes, worries, and fears that prospects are currently experiencing. This is especially important since senior living communities are being dubbed as dangerous “petri-dishes” by certain media institutions. In order to respond to these messages, there is no better strategy than to communicate on a more intimate level with those you are looking to serve.

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: The Secret Sauce for Successful Live Chat

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • SiteStaff Chat’s edge over other conversion services
  • The two types of prospects that chat support representatives typically engage with
  • How SiteStaff’s engagement specialists conduct conversations with prospects
  • The importance of earning the right to ask for a prospect’s personal information
  • Why Bill is passionate about empathy and culture

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with SiteStaff Chat Founder Bill Jennings on how prospects for senior living facilities engage with Chat’s online support staff. Bill founded his company as a response to the many other support services that have the unfortunate tendency to offer generic, information-laden responses to website visitors. Instead, SiteStaff Chat’s approach is that of “an emotional selling process; making people feel comfortable.” This approach turned out to be the perfect fit for the senior living industry, of which the emotional component is naturally higher among prospects.

SiteStaff Chat typically sees two types of customers. The first type are family members looking for a place for their aging parents, but have little to no idea what to expect from or how to go about the process of moving them into a senior living facility. The second type are those looking to move themselves into a facility simply because they are looking for community and, of course, assistance. In both of these cases, support staff need to be both empathetic and understanding as they work to dispel prospects’ common fears while guiding them towards a decision.

Chat’s engagement specialists are looking to provide real answers to prospect queries, as opposed to canned ones. Bill laments the “copy-paste” tactics of traditional services, where answers are scripted and superficial. Chat aims to qualify the prospect, not by attempting to methodically close them, but by “humanizing the experience”, first by establishing whether there’s even a fit for them in the first place, followed by diving into specifics around the prospect’s particular circumstances and goals.

Today, Chat’s representatives spend an average of eight and a half minutes chatting with prospects. These eight and a half minutes are not spent giving an elevator pitch, but on having real, human-to-human conversations that aim to earn the right to ask the prospect if they are ready for the next step of the transaction.

When much of the modern marketing world focuses on vanity metrics such as views, impressions, clicks, or website traffic, it is crucial for a company (and refreshing for prospects) to create personal experiences that give visitors real value. After all, senior living communities deal with high-intent prospects. By empowering these prospects to make informed decisions through meaningful conversations, any business can achieve more of the metric that truly matters: conversions.

Try SiteStaff Chat for 30 Days Free of Charge by visiting https://www.sitestaffchat.com/ or give Bill a call at (303) 349-4282

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Creating an Effective Sales Culture in Senior Living during Covid-19

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • The importance of creating an effective sales culture
  • How to develop a sales training process
  • Practical advice on empathetic selling to maximize your existing database when COVID-19 has slowed down the flow of new leads
  • Lessons learned by Mike after having done over 150,000 mystery shops

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Mike Miller, President and CEO of Primo Solutions, LLC, and the author of Selling at Combat Speed (2008) and Stop Selling & Start Caring (2011). They discuss the core message of Mike’s newest book which, while always relevant, is many times more so today amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The inspiration behind Stop Selling & Start Caring came when a colleague discussed the uncomfortable experience of looking for a senior living community for his mother. After visiting several communities, his colleague found that none of them even bothered to ask him how he, as the adult child, was feeling about the process. Instead, it seemed like all these communities cared about was making the transaction.

Many institutions lack a clearly-defined sales training process which, by extension, results in a lack of a cohesive sales culture. Debbie and Mike agree that it is key to have a great sales trainer that regularly conducts sessions to help instill and maintain this culture. But more importantly, the company has to have leadership in place that, once training is done, can efficiently and effectively delegate in order to ensure the healthy growth of its culture.

“You can have a great strategy,” says Mike. “But if you do not have the culture in place and the buy-in where people really believe in the process and what they are doing, then it is not going to work.”

COVID-19 has forced many businesses to focus on their existing database as the pandemic has led to fewer new leads coming in. Mike believes that senior living communities tend to spend too much money on incoming leads, and that many can actually fill their communities by investing in their current database. Additionally, the problem with a constant stream of leads is that communities will eventually have a difficult time to work with and nurture those leads already in the CRM.

With regards to the current situation, Mike says that we have no choice but to “make a difference on the phone.” Even today, it is possible to increase your conversion rate via deliberate, creative, and empathetic selling. It starts with reducing your marketing spend and putting more focus on training your staff to work with existing leads.

Ask Mike for a free PDF of Stop Selling & Start Caring at [email protected]

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Best Practices around Marketing and Communication Strategy Used by Various Industries Amid the Covid-19 Pandemic

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • What direction should marketing and communications take amid COVID-19?
  • The power of “sharing, not selling” as a long-term approach to business development
  • Why your organization should shift from crisis communication to resource communication
  • How to get people comfortable about potentially moving into a senior living community during a pandemic
  • What can we learn from this situation, marketing and communications-wise, to become better prepared should another crisis hit?

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Dan Hutson, Marketing and Communications consultant. The pair discuss best practices around marketing and communication strategy used by various industries amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and how these practices can be implemented by the senior housing industry.

Today, organizations have to choose between quietly waiting out the crisis, and looking for opportunities to innovate. Much of the senior living world has chosen the former strategy. Worse than that, some even chose to do “tone-deaf” marketing that completely ignores the new normal. Consumers and clients are more forgiving towards vulnerability and more “raw” messaging, as long as the company can assure them, with a level head, that they are willing and able to consistently follow through in spite of current challenges.

“This situation has freed up your time from doing a lot of the business-as-usual marketing work,” says Dan. “Take this time to really think about interesting ways of connecting with your audience—communicating and creating ongoing conversations with them.” If more organizations adopt this paradigm, there may endure, long after the end of this crisis, a “sharing, not selling” approach to business.

It helps greatly to put yourself in the shoes of those you’re trying to serve. Imagine what a typical member of your target audience is thinking, feeling, and doing at this very moment. One thing’s for sure: there’s so much uncertainty in the world today that people in general are just looking for leaders to help make their struggles more bearable. This, says Dan, becomes the perfect opportunity to serve as your customer’s go-between—to position your company as an incredible resource which provides useful services outside the usual scope of your business.

At a time when social distancing is the norm, ask yourself how you’re adopting technology to support your sales and marketing effort. If you want more people to become comfortable with the idea of potentially moving into a senior living community, particularly during this pandemic, digital and inbound marketing should be your priorities. Many people are uninformed about the different types of available communities, not to mention their concerns about sanitation in these spaces.

If relevance is what you’re after, there’s no better time than this moment to put out regular content that tells your customers exactly what services they should be expecting from your organization. This content should illustrate the reality of your senior living space as a “living, breathing community of people who are engaged in interesting, purposeful lives.”

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Widespread Effects of COVID-19 on the Senior Living Industry

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • Lead generation amid COVID-19
  • Why warmer leads have been converting better than cold leads in the past few months
  • What prospects want to talk about during the pandemic
  • The power of creative follow-up
  • Shifting your messaging from crisis communication to reopening
  • Creating a sales and marketing playbook for the new normal

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Julie Podewitz, Chief Sales Officer at Vitality Senior Living, on the widespread effects of COVID-19 on the senior living industry and best practices for how communities can navigate the new normal.

Asked about lead generation amid COVID-19, Julie notes that while leads have been down (more than 50% in some markets), sales conversations continue to remain strong—and in certain cases are actually higher than pre-COVID-19 numbers. A big factor is sense of urgency which, according to Julie, has been “moved forward in a massive direction”. Empathetic sales has become the norm. The pandemic has “forced us to be doing what we really should be doing, which is asking questions” as well as demonstrated the importance of building rapport using every available channel. While leads have lessened, phone calls have been longer and more meaningful. During these challenging times, busyness has morphed into productivity.

Even if prospects may not be able to move into a community anytime soon, there is no better time to connect with them than right now. Potential residents are looking not only for a resource, but for an ear as well. While leads across the board have been down, referral leads have been on the rise, which says more than anything else that prospects are looking for people that they can entrust their future to. By connecting with and creatively following-up with these prospects, getting sales is a given.

No matter the current climate, what needs to remain consistent in your brand’s messaging is honesty and transparency. Of course, this is especially true amid the pandemic, during which fear is the biggest shared hurdle that senior living communities must overcome in the minds of their prospects and current residents. By being upfront with your intentions in your communications, you will assure and inspire confidence in both your employees and customers.

Senior Living Marketing Perspectives: Painting a Picture of the Future of Senior Living

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Topics Discussed and Key Points:

  • How the employees and residents of Belmont Village have weathered COVID-19
  • What has changed and what continues to work in the industry?
  • Building trust with a captive audience
  • The senior living industry should begin to tailor their messaging around reopening
  • Dealing with misleading and negative media coverage
  • Adapting your messaging and value proposition during a period filled with uncertainty
  • Becoming more prepared in the case of a second wave

Episode Summary:

In today’s episode, Debbie speaks with Carlene Motto, Chief Marketing Officer at Belmont Village Senior Living. The two discuss how COVID-19 has completely shaken the industry and drastically affected the lives of residents and the employees who care for them. After reflecting on lessons learned throughout this ongoing ordeal, Debbie and Carlene paint a picture of the future of senior living.

One of the biggest changes in the industry was making the switch from face-to-face to virtual with regard to connecting with potential residents. Prior to COVID-19, marketing “had to be creative” since most prospects and their families did not normally pick up the phone. Sales teams had to make use of texting, email, and other forms of written communication. Now, the tables have turned and people look forward to speaking with others. Aside from the phone, technologies such as Facetime and Zoom have become incredibly important for connecting and building trust and rapport with prospects and their families.
Belmont Village believes that “our opportunity is to tell our story through our website.” Due to the pandemic, efforts have been put into repositioning the brand to demonstrate real concern for their people. Out of respect for families who may be struggling financially at this time, focus has been put on connecting live with the families, providing meals to the community, and doubling down on blogging and other website-related strategies.

At a time when the media tends to conflate senior living with nursing homes and at times highlight negative stories regarding the industry, communities need to optimize their messaging on their website and do whatever they can to build relationships with residents, prospects, and their families. “I absolutely believe that senior living even during these dark times is the right place to be—where you can still have interaction, good nutrition and healthcare, and access to PPE.” Sales and marketing teams should continue to keep in mind that building trust in these turbulent times requires “timely, frequent, and transparent communication” with customers.

Both employees and customers want and expect regular and reliable communication during times of uncertainty. In the case of a second wave of the virus, one of the best things that a company can do to prepare is to learn to be alert and responsive at a moment’s notice. As Carlene says, “There’s no such thing as overcommunicating during a time like this. […] In real estate, it is location, location, location. In senior living, it is people, people, people.”