Archive for category: Technology

There’s a saying in senior living SEO that “all search is local search.” It makes sense, right? Most people thinking about senior living probably want to remain in their local community near family, friends, and the organizations they’re active in.

The data supports this theory. Consider the search volume for “senior living near me” phrases. We’re talking thousands of monthly searches.

This is why optimizing your senior living community’s website for local search is a must.

But did you know there are actions you can take outside of your website to help improve your site’s visibility in search results, including local search?

It’s called off-page search engine optimization (SEO), and it’s all about boosting your site’s reputation so that search engines see your community’s site as reputable, trustworthy, and authoritative.

Remember, the more reputable your site seems to Google (and other search engines), the more visibility your site will have in the search results.

Below, we discuss four ways to improve off-page SEO for senior living communities.

1. Become a wiz at managing your community’s online reputation.

People rely on reviews when making purchasing decisions. This is why you must have a plan for soliciting and managing reviews, especially on the all-mighty Google.

The more positive reviews you have (especially on Google), the more reputable and trustworthy your site will seem to search engines, and the more likely your site will be served up, especially on relevant local searches.

Don’t take our word for it, though. Google says, “High-quality, positive reviews from your customers can improve your business visibility and increase the likelihood that a shopper will visit your location.”

So, how can you get more reviews? SLS’s Debbie Howard says the key is being “intentional” about your approach to senior living reputation management.

She recommends doing the following:

• Develop a proactive review strategy. Create opportunities for residents or visitors to leave reviews. For example, in your post-tour follow-ups, include a line like, “Thanks for stopping by for a visit today. We’d love to know about your experience. What did you like best about the tour? Leave a quick review here. It takes only 30 seconds.”
• Try different delivery methods. Most people have smartphones, so they can easily access email and texts. Experiment with both and see which medium converts better.
• Re-post positive reviews across multiple channels, especially social media. Share those glowing four- and five-star reviews on your site, in email campaigns, and across all of your social media channels. Experiment with how you present the review snippets. For example, create a video montage and see what it does for engagement.
• Lather, rinse, repeat. You’re never done asking for reviews because people expect to see recent ones (within the last three months or so) on places like Google.

More helpful reading:

• How to Respond to Reviews
• How to Handle Bad Google Reviews

2. Embrace link building.

Earning high-quality backlinks to your community’s website signals to Google that you have a site worth serving up in search results.

Some links will happen organically. For example, a news site might link to one of your guides about funding senior living. But other links require a strategy. Semrush offers some good (but time-consuming) suggestions for generating backlinks.

Here are some other link-building tactics that might be more accessible and that can help with local search.

• Whenever your community is involved in a sponsorship, request a backlink to your site from the sponsor’s website.
• Pay attention to local businesses’ websites and collaborate with those that are a good fit and have good Domain Authority. Make sure you cross-promote and cross-link.
• Create valuable local content that naturally attracts links. For example, highlight local attractions, like museums and theaters, in blog posts or “fun stuff to do” content.
• Make sure members of your team who appear as guests on podcasts, videos, and blogs get a link back to your site in the show notes or bio blurb.

3. Ensure consistency in local citations and directories.

Building consistent citations across the web helps establish your community’s credibility.

• Make sure your community’s name, address, and phone number (NAP) are consistent across all online directories.
• List your community on relevant local directories and senior living-specific platforms.
• Claim and verify your listings on major sites.

At SLS, we use BrightLocal to clean up our clients’ online business listings. We usually find that 75% are inaccurate or unclaimed.

4. Optimize your Google Business Profile and continue giving it TLC over the long haul.

We feel like we talk about this tip A LOT. And yet, whenever we think we can ease up on this directive, we come across a Google Business Profile that needs a ton of work. (Or that hasn’t even been claimed yet—yikes!)

Google is still king when it comes to search, and there’s a good chance people will come across your community’s GBP before they make it to your website. Treat it like a microsite that you keep updated with current info, real pics (not stock images), and videos. And as we mentioned earlier, pay attention to reviews, too.

Need help? Check out these resources:

• Marketing Tips for Your Google Business Profile
• Google Business Profile Audit

Remember, off-page SEO for senior living is a long game.

SEO is never done, so don’t treat it like a box on a to-do list that you check off once. Instead, include SEO in your ongoing marketing strategy. Need help? Our dedicated SEO team can assist you with all aspects of your senior living search engine optimization.

If you’re not spending time talking to your best residents, you’re missing out on valuable marketing and sales intelligence.

Your community’s happiest residents can:

✔    Serve as a living and breathing example of your ideal prospect

✔    Share thoughts about your competitors

✔    Indicate which messages resonated with them and which ones fell flat

This doesn’t need to be a formal sit-down. Have a casual conversation. Write up your notes afterward. Once you have critical mass (meaning notes from five or more conversations with some of your best residents), revisit your existing personas and refine your messaging and engagement strategies as needed.

Below, we dive deeper into these tasks, starting with buyer persona questions we recommend asking and our reasoning behind asking each question.

Let’s get to it.

Nine buyer persona questions for your best residents

1. What wasyourbiggest concern or fear about our community before you chose it? What helped you overcome these concerns?

Why ask this question? It’s helpful to understand people’s objections about your community and how they overcame them. Was it something your marketing or sales team did to help address their concerns? If yes, you’ll want to know so you can continue doing it.

Or did they somehow convince themselves? In this case, you can focus on having your marketing and sales team better address specific concerns, especially if you note a common theme among the residents you chat with.

Keep in mind that objections can change over time, and they will change from demo to demo. The objections that folks from the Greatest Generation had five years ago likely won’t be the same as the objections boomers have.

Asking this question can also help challenge your own assumptions. For example, one of our clients with an older community worried it would be impossible to compete with the glitzy and glamorous new community down the road.

But once we began talking to the happiest residents, we learned they were turned off by the new place’s glitz and glamour and preferred a more homey and comfortable setting. This intel fueled our marketing and paid ad initiatives so we could attract more people like our happiest residents.

2. What would you tell someone else considering a move toour communityabout your move-in experience?

Why ask this question? Here’s where you can uncover important gaps, especially between the marketing and sales handoff. Do the residents talk about any issues after they made their deposit? Are they neutral about it? Or did they have a seamless experience from first interaction to move-in (and beyond)? If yes to the latter, what was so great about the experience?

Bottom line: You want to do more of what’s working and fix what isn’t.

3. What specific amenities or services made the biggest difference in your decision?

Why ask this question? Marketing and sales teams are often too close to the product they’re selling. What sounds exciting to your team might not matter much to the resident.

But there’s another reason to ask this question: Hearing how real residents discuss various services and amenities can help with messaging.

For example, many communities have an on-site hair salon, but only your community has a stylist named Liz with a penchant for color and pin-curls. You get the idea. Having those conversations with residents will surface compelling words and phrases that you can sprinkle throughout your marketing for added authenticity.

4. How did you first hear aboutourcommunity, and what resources did you use to research us?

Why ask this question? You might think you’re covered if your marketing automation and CRM are integrated properly. Don’t get us wrong: You want your martech platform connected bilaterally to your senior living CRM so you can see when, where, and how a lead first enters your site and their conversion touch points along the way.

But how do you track the conversation that happened at a cookout two summers ago where your now-happy resident first learned about your community from an old friend—and that friend’s testimonial made your resident aware of your senior living brand in the first place?

Asking this question can help you better gauge how much brand awareness residents had before they began their search and how well your brand-building initiatives have and haven’t been working.

5. What was the most frustrating part of the senior living search process?

Why ask this question? Your residents might not point to any frustrations with your community, which is great if that’s the case. But if they make a general across-the-board statement such as “Everywhere we looked did this negative thing” or “No one did this,” pay attention to what “this” is and see if it’s something you need to address.

Note: Some frustrations that bubble up might be out of the marketing and sales teams’ control. Pass on helpful insights to the appropriate department, whether that’s operations, activities, dining, etc.

6. What did other communities do better than us, andwhat ultimately convinced you our community was the right fit?

Why ask this question? Understanding the final “tipping point” for residents can offer invaluable insights into what truly resonates with prospects during their decision-making process.

Whether it’s specific amenities, the level of care, or the community’s atmosphere, identifying these factors can ensure you promote them to like-minded prospects (think look-alike audiences).

Knowing what intrigued people about your competitors is also valuable intel. For example, maybe your best residents mentioned a feature about your competitors that they didn’t realize is also available in your community. That suggests you need to better highlight this feature on your site, social media channels, and during tours.

7. What’s something you wish you knew before moving in that would’ve made the transition easier?

Why ask this question? Too often, marketing thinks their job is done once they hand off a sales-qualified lead (SQL) to the sales team. And too often, the sales team thinks their job is done once an SQL makes a deposit. But what about that precious time between deposit and move-in? And those critical 30 days after move-in?

We’re not trying to make more work for people, but the reality is that there’s a gap that needs closing. If you make a person’s move-in experience seamless and their first month as wonderful as possible, you’re positioning the resident for ultimate success in your community, which can lead to fabulous five-star reviews and excellent referrals.

The good news? This gap doesn’t require a heavy lift. Just as marketing automation helps nurture not-ready-yet leads to sales-qualified status, marketing automation can help guide soon-to-be-new residents through the transition with a friendly welcome letter, helpful resources (such as local movers), and the like.

For example, we’ve created a turnkey program called “Countdown to Move-in Day” that our clients can customize.

8. How has living here impacted your daily routine or quality of life compared to your previous living situation?

Why ask this question? This question gives you a direct window into how your community has improved residents’ lives. Identifying the tangible benefits of living in your community is crucial, such as increased socialization, improved wellness, or a better sense of security.

You can then leverage these real-life benefits to create more compelling, value-driven messaging and stories that align with the prospect’s ultimate goal: enhancing their lifestyle. By focusing on the positive transformations, you’re showing prospects what they have to gain by moving in.

9. How do you define “feeling at home” in a community, and what aspects ofourcommunity helped create that feeling?

Why ask this question? A sense of home is deeply personal and often subjective, but it’s also a powerful driver in senior living decisions. Asking this question helps you pinpoint the specific elements—whether it’s staff interactions, social opportunities, or even the physical environment—that make residents feel truly at home.

These insights allow your marketing team to highlight those emotional and environmental aspects in your campaigns, making your messaging resonate more deeply with prospects searching for a comfortable and welcoming community.

How to use the insights that you gather from these conversations

Once you’ve gathered responses to these questions, revisiting and refining your buyer personas is essential. Use the insights to update key persona traits, such as motivations, pain points, and decision-making triggers. From there, adjust messaging and other engagement strategies accordingly.

For example, if many residents cite specific amenities or a strong sense of community as top reasons for choosing your community, your marketing should emphasize those elements more.

Additionally, note any behavior shifts, such as the increased use of a particular digital channel, and rethink how you’re using that channel. For example, if you’re finding that your happiest residents are big Instagram users, you might want to look into how you can leverage the platform more, whether encouraging user-generated content to promote your brand or experimenting with paid ads.

By updating your personas with honest resident feedback and the messaging you use to engage them, your marketing will align better with your target audience’s evolving preferences and expectations.

Need help perfecting your personas and messaging?

We understand the customer journey in senior living and can help you fine-tune your personas and messaging. Get in touch, and let’s chat.

Since our founding, we’ve partnered with senior living operators all over the U.S., from start-ups to Top 30 providers. Our most successful clients have scaled from two to thirty-plus locations, while others have doubled in size in just a few years.

One of the biggest takeaways from these client engagements is that successfully growing occupancy often involves dismantling faulty mindsets, especially around senior living sales and marketing and how (and if) they align.

Below, we outline those faulty mindsets and how to reset them for good.

Faulty mindset #1: Thinking that marketing serves sales.

A better way to think about it: Marketing and sales teams serve the prospect.

How the marketing team serves the prospect

In the awareness and early consideration stages, marketing guides prospects until they raise their hand and indicate they want to engage with sales. Marketing also creates effective personas based on leads (and their corresponding demographics) who have already advanced to tours, deposits, and move-ins. The marketing team can use these personas to attract prospects with similar wants, needs, and motivations.

By providing a blend of educational and emotional content, marketing positions the brand as a trusted resource. It also empowers prospects to self-qualify through transparent information like pricing and reviews.

Ultimately, marketing attracts the right prospect, meets them where they are in their decision journey, and segments marketing qualified leads (MQLs) from sales-qualified leads (SQLs). The sales team will pursue the high-intent, ready-to-advance SQLs, while the marketing team will continue to nurture the not-ready-yet MQLs.

How the sales team serves the prospect 

First, let’s back up for a moment. What exactly is a “sales-qualified lead” anyway?

It’s when a prospect takes an action that indicates they want to interact with sales, typically by booking a tour or calling the community directly to speak with sales. This can be a first action or a transition from MQL to SQL, where the prospect advances through lead nurturing via marketing automation emails and text message campaigns.

Once the prospect becomes an SQL, the sales team serves the prospect by building rapport, showing empathy, answering questions, and providing personalized guidance.

Sales will also spend time building a relationship, nurturing and advancing the prospect with creative follow-ups, and overcoming objections.

How the prospect fits in

Prospects determine their status, not marketing or sales. The prospect’s intent (evidenced by their actions) drives their designation (MQL vs. SQL).

Keep in mind that being sales-qualified has nothing to do with being financially qualified, health-qualified, or the right fit. The sales team is responsible for performing the final level of qualification during the discovery process.

The best way for marketing and sales teams to ensure that the marketing budget generates the most qualified leads is to use accurate dispositions in closing leads so the team can quickly identify which channels produce the best leads.

Faulty mindset #2: Thinking quick move-ins are the only answer.

Stop the madness! Quick move-ins are often your most urgent cases. And spoiler: They don’t stay as long as prospects who make decisions based on choice rather than crisis.

Don’t believe me? Consider this.

The 2023 Aline Sales and Marketing Benchmark Report for Senior Housing revealed a strong link between sales cycle length and duration of stay in the community. Short sales cycles (under 30 days) led to significantly shorter stays, often due to high-acuity, urgent cases.

Conversely, prospects nurtured over longer sales cycles, especially those lasting a year or more, resulted in much longer stays, nearly doubling from 18 months to 39 months.

This extended stay translates to more revenue per resident, highlighting the financial benefits of nurturing prospects over a longer sales cycle.

This is precisely why the sales team shouldn’t nag the marketing team about generating only urgent, crisis-driven leads. Doing so is expensive, self-defeating, and unsustainable.

Can you imagine being an airline that only advertises to people wanting to fly a few weeks out? Or a hotel chain that only advertises rooms for same-day booking? Of course not. And yet we still hear from sales teams all the time, “Just get us sales-qualified leads. We only want tours and phone calls.”

Shift your mindset! Building a robust pipeline of prospects in every decision-making stage is much more cost-effective overall and will deliver better ROI.

Faulty mindset #3: Thinking more leads automatically equates to more tours and move-ins.

If you’re bringing in more leads, but they’re not sales-qualified or even marketing-qualified, what’s the point? You’ve wasted money attracting people with little to no chance of converting or advancing to a tour, deposit, or move-in.

When you have an effective digital marketing strategy in place, lead volume often goes down, but lead quality and conversions go up. Conversions are what matter most.

Senior living sales tips: How to reset your mindset by focusing on the following

Quality over quantity. Spend time evaluating uncontacted and lost leads to identify the lead sources that are generating quantity but not quality. Most CRMs offer a report that rolls up leads, tours, deposits, and move-ins by lead source. Focus your marketing investment on the sources generating the highest conversions to tours and move-ins.

Conversion KPIs. Look at the gaps between the marketing and sales handoff since this is where many opportunities are lost. Some of the KPIs to dig into include the following:

⮚      Speed to the lead. It’s critical to understand how much time elapses between when the lead hits the CRM and when the salesperson makes the first outreach attempt. Our data shows that 70% of all scheduled tours are booked within the first hour a lead is generated.

⮚      Persistence and cadence. Look at how many attempts are made to contact the new lead. (For context, it typically takes five to eight attempts to make contact.) You should also consider the types of attempts. Aim for a good mix of calls, texts, and emails. We’ve found that making four attempts on day one achieves the highest conversion of lead to tour. Additional attempts should be made on days two through four.

⮚      Dwell time. You should also understand how long a lead lingers in a stage so you can identify when prospects stall in their journey. Have a strategy to re-engage them before they sit too long. This is especially important for post-tour leads that require quick follow-ups to advance prospects to deposits and move-ins. Remember, each stage—pre-tour, post-tour, and waitlist—requires a strategy.

⮚      Call tracking. Without a doubt, the biggest missed opportunities are unanswered and mismanaged calls. Prospects who call the community have the highest intent and best opportunity to convert to a tour. And yet according to WelcomeHome’s Q2 2024 Sales Benchmark Report, less than 30% of prospects’ calls are answered. Ouch! One of the best things you can do is develop a centralized lead management center—either in-house or outsourced (LeadGenie is a great option).

⮚      Lead segmentation. Use marketing automation, such as HubSpot, to triage leads, send SQLs to the sales team, and move MQLs into lead nurturing and advancing campaigns until they are ready to connect with sales. Lead scoring is an additional strategy to identify lead engagement (how often a prospect visits the website, opens an email/ text, downloads content, etc.).

Spend more time developing relationships within the local community. The highest-converting leads are from “word of mouth” sources, such as friend and family referrals, professional referrals, and community sources. Outreach and relationship building should be a top priority.

Don’t forget to work your “bought and paid for” leads. Most communities have hundreds of prospects labeled “cold” or “lost, but not disqualified.” (The reasons can run the gamut for the latter: stayed home, unable to reach, moved in with family.) Yes, new leads always are more exciting. But all of these “cold” or “lost, but not disqualified” prospects were once your coveted new leads. Re-engage them!

Remember, senior living has an exceptionally long sales cycle. Prospects who weren’t ready months ago may be closer to a decision today. Our “Still Thinking?” campaign moved 20% of “stuck” MQLs to SQLs for one client, while our “Stay in Touch” re-engagement campaign delivered 21 move-ins representing $3.7 million in revenue for another client. There is gold in those cold leads.

Shift your mindset and experience the benefits

Operators who put prospects at the center of their marketing strategy, build a system to nurture them through their journey, balance quick move-ins with longer sales cycles, and focus on lead quality instead of quantity will come out winners with consistent and sustainable occupancy growth.

Need a partner who will help get you there? Book a call with us today.

Google began rolling out AI Overviews in May 2024. What are AI Overviews, and how have they affected senior living SEO? Let’s discuss.

What are AI Overviews (AIO)?

When you conduct a search in Google, you’ll sometimes see AI-generated answers and summaries at the top of the search engine results page (SERP). This space has traditionally been reserved for paid ads. When AI Overviews appear, paid ads have less visibility since they’re placed farther down the page. Organic search listings have also been pushed down.

We did a search on “what is senior living.” Below is the screenshot from our desktop.

Many people are concerned about the length, depth, and breadth of AI’s responses. If all the info a person needs appears on the SERP, why would they click into a website?

Here’s the thing: We’ve been here before. Remember when featured snippets started becoming more prevalent? Google is constantly evolving in terms of how it answers people’s queries. For Google, its number one priority is creating an excellent experience for users (so they don’t go trotting off to a different search engine).

AI Overviews are simply part of this evolution. And yes, businesses and content creators will need to adjust accordingly.

But again, that’s not new.

Do AI Overviews show up on all searches?

Nope. When Google began rolling out AI Overviews, the overviews showed up in 65% of queries, according to Search Engine Land.

However, by July 2024, AI Overviews appeared in only 12% of queries and fell to 7% by the end of the month. Specific industries like education, entertainment, and e-commerce saw the biggest drops.

Why the drops?

AI Overviews are far from perfect. Some embarrassing, incorrect, and downright dangerous results happened early on.

And they’re still proving a bit flaky.

One of our writers conducted a search on August 16, 2024, about who won the Patriots game the previous night. (In real life, the Pats lost.) AIO served up a big fail for a seemingly simple query.

Remember, AI is famous for hallucinating, i.e., making stuff up. (However, Google says AIO doesn’t typically hallucinate like ChatGPT.)

In any event, Google initially let up on the gas a bit as it worked on improving AIO’s output.

Where do things stand now with AI Overviews?

Honestly? It’s a moving target, and volatility is the name of the game. Google is doing a lot of experimenting with this feature—and not just in response to its own tests. It’s also responding to competition, most notably from OpenAI’s SearchGPT. (OpenAI is the organization that brought us ChatGPT.)

Google appears to be all in with AIO. Over the summer, it announced it was expanding AI Overviews globally.

Have AI Overviews affected site traffic?

Ah, that’s the million-dollar question. Since the roll-out, so many brands have feared the worst—that SEO best practices as we know them are kaput, that they will see their organic traffic nosedive, and that the paid-ad game will become even harder to win.

Interestingly enough, according to Search Engine Land, two large publishers (Ziff Davis and Dotdash Meredith) reported a “negligible” impact in their Q2-2024 shareholder letters. But again, that was Q2.

The jury is still out as to how much of an impact AI Overviews will have over the long term.

But in the short term, here’s some good news. An analysis of 36,000 keywords by seoClarity found that 99.5% of the time, at least one of the top 10 organic search results was included as a source in Google’s AI Overviews.

The takeaway: Ranking highly in Google remains one of the best ways to get featured in AI Overviews.

What should senior living marketers do?

Our recommendation is the same as it ever was: Remain aware, but don’t panic.

Remember, SEO has never been a static “thing.” And while AI Overviews might be one of the biggest disruptors we’ve seen in recent memory, that doesn’t mean the sky is falling all at once. (HubSpot has a great piece on the evolution of search.)

And here’s even more good news: Local search queries are the least likely to trigger AI Overviews, according to Bright Edge, which has been doing extensive research about AIOs.

For example, people searching for “senior living near me” get served “normal” results based on their location. (The monthly search volume for that phrase is a whopping 49,500, according to Semrush.)

That’s why optimizing for local search, which has always been important, is even more critical now, given AIO. (And this includes making sure you have a fabulous Google Business Profile.)

What about those all-important educational queries during the awareness stage?

Currently, the types of searches most likely to trigger AI Overviews are questions (i.e., what is senior living, how much does senior living cost, etc.).

If you’re worried you can’t compete with sites that already rank well for common questions, try taking a broader view of where and how you share educational content:

Do more videos, full stop. We’re always telling clients to focus more on making videos and sharing them widely. YouTube (which Google owns) also acts as a search engine.

For example, according to Vid IQ (which focuses on YouTube search volume), the phrase “what is senior living” has a monthly search volume of nearly 1700 with moderate competition. So, turn that blog post you likely already have about “what is senior living” into a video to maintain visibility and get more traction via YouTube.

Keep in mind that once you’ve done one video, you can repurpose it across multiple channels:

• Share across all social media channels where your community has a presence, like Instagram and Facebook.
• Include on relevant website pages and blog posts
• Embed in emails

Focus on optimizing for other search engines, including SearchGPT once it launches. We’ll do another post at some point about OpenAI’s SearchGPT, which is one of the biggest threats to Google. Note: As we go to press, SearchGPT isn’t widely available yet, but it’s just a matter of time.

Don’t be afraid of a zero-click world. We’ve been living in it for a while. Here’s an excellent article from SparkToro about our zero-click reality and why marketers should embrace it.

Remember, this too shall pass. Seriously, every time Google does something big—or it says it’s going to—everyone freaks out. Sometimes the freak-out is for good reason. But other times? Not so much. (We’re looking at you, abandoned plans for third-party cookie deprecation.)

Bottom line: Don’t panic about AI Overviews.

Continue following best practices for senior living SEO, and make sure you’ve optimized your site for local search.

Need help? That’s what we’re here for. Get in touch. We’re always happy to jump on a free brainstorming call.

When it comes to content brainstorming, the biggest mistake that senior living marketers make is overlooking the “why.”

Don’t create content just to create content or to check off a box. A chaotic approach like that might have worked fifteen or even ten years ago. But it won’t get you far in an ultra-competitive landscape.

To succeed with content marketing today, you must have a thoughtful strategy guiding your content creation, one that aligns with the buyer’s journey.

Below, we approach content brainstorming by matching it across the three stages of the buyer’s journey: Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. (In senior living, we also talk a lot about the “where, whether, and when” stages since the journey is rarely linear.)

Content Brainstorming for the Awareness Stage

In this stage, people are just starting to become familiar with senior living. Maybe an adult child is looking into options for a parent. Maybe an older adult is thinking about downsizing. Or perhaps an urgent medical condition—a fall or dementia diagnosis, for example—has forced someone to begin researching.

They’re learning what senior living is, what it isn’t, who pays for it, and the different levels of care. They might have had a hazy understanding before entering this stage—maybe in the past they knew someone who lived in a community—but now they’re looking at senior living with a fresh eye.

This is an important stage since people often encounter your community for the first time. Helpful, educational content is critical.

But what if you’ve been writing educational content and feel you’ve already answered every question under the sun?

Here’s where to look for fresh content ideas.

1. See what’s trending—literally—with Google Trends.

Google Trends allows you to see what topics are hot across Google Search, Google News, and YouTube.

We like using the Explore function in Google Trends and occasionally plugging in broad terms like:

• Independent living
• Assisted living
• Memory care
• Senior living
• Retirement

You can certainly come up with plenty of other topics, but if you regularly check the ones above, you might spot a trend worth exploring content-wise.

For example, we explored “independent living.” Here’s what’s trending in related topics.

Notice the query “what is palliative care” is up 150%. We went to Semrush and plugged the phrase into the keyword tool. That query alone is highly competitive, with a monthly search volume of 33K. But when we sorted by keyword difficulty, we got the following, which shows this could be a great long-tail keyword phrase to focus on. You could create an informational blog post or guide (or both) that answers some of these less competitive keyword phrases and discusses how palliative care fits into senior living.

Nope, “what is palliative care” isn’t the sexiest of topics, but consider this:

• It’s a topic people are searching on.
• It’s absolutely related to what your IL community is selling. What happens if someone becomes seriously ill while living in your community? How does palliative care fit in?

Don’t like that topic? No problem. Look at one of the other related topics, like “cost of independent living.” Maybe it’s time to revisit existing assets about funding IL or develop a new guide altogether.

2. Check out AnswerThePublic.

With AnswerThePublic, you can uncover what questions people are searching for in Google. Then, you can create content that answers those questions. Content formats can include:

• Blog posts
• Social media
• Videos
• FAQs
• Lead nurturing emails
• Relevant website pages

By creating a free account on AnswerThePublic, you unlock three daily searches. Here are the results for “senior living.”

Sure, you’ve likely already answered some of these questions in your content. But these questions serve as a reminder that certain queries are evergreen. There will always be people wondering how much senior living costs, whether Medicare covers it, who qualifies for senior living, etc.

Revisit evergreen topics and produce fresh takes.

• You could do something like “Fact or Fiction Friday” on Facebook and set the record straight on some of these common questions.
• You could group a bunch of the Q&As into a blog post.
• You could add them to your FAQ page.
• You could create a one-sheet that the sales reps share with tour attendees.

3. Visit Quora for more authentic conversations people are having about senior living.

Pay attention to how people answer questions on Quora and who’s answering them. You’ll likely see comments from current and former senior living employees, residents, and families.

People on Quora share their candid, authentic insights that can inform content for all stages. These insights can also influence content needed for things like recruitment.

Content Brainstorming for the Consideration Stage

In the consideration stage, people compare options and schedule tours—hopefully with your community.

Make it easy for people to compare.

 

Create highly visual charts.

At-a-glance comparison charts make it easy to see the differences between your community and your biggest competitors. (Don’t sugarcoat, and never misrepresent your community.)

Encourage residents to share the experiences they’ve had with your community and with other communities.

• Don’t just ask residents or their families why they chose your community—ask them why they didn’t choose your competitor.
• Reach out to residents who moved in from another environment, whether that’s another community, home care, or a family member’s home. Get their take on why the move into your community made sense at this time.
• Ask people to leave reviews about all their experiences with your community—from touring, to moving in, to living in your community.
• Encourage user-generated content where people create their own content and tag your community so you can share/repost (with permission, of course).

How to turn these stories into helpful content:

• Record the person (use your smartphone) and share snippets on social media.
• Do a write-up as a blog post.
• Use the story as a sidebar in relevant guides (for example, “Senior Living vs. Other Options”).

Differentiate your community in the “sea of sameness.”

Think about the stories that would help people wavering between your community and a competitor.

For example, is your move-in day process better than your competitors? If yes, create content around that process:

• Publish a comprehensive website page that discusses the move-in process, what to expect, helpful resources, etc. Need inspo? Look at college websites. They know how to build excitement around moving in.

• Include a call-out to this page on tour confirmation emails. Include a note saying, “We can’t wait to show you around. And even though we might be getting ahead of ourselves, we wanted to show you how easy it is to move into our community.”

Talk about how your community addresses specific elephants in the room.

• Create content around anxiety over moving. Have an honest discussion and provide strategies for effectively managing anxiety.
• Talk about romance and sex. Yes, really.
• Talk about death and dying. Buzz kill or refreshing take? How you write about it is key. Our point: don’t avoid hard topics simply because they’re hard.

Read more ways to differentiate your community.

Content Brainstorming for the Decision Stage

During this stage, people tour and make their final decision.

Elevate the tour experience. (Yes, fabulous content can help!)

We don’t have to tell you how critical tours are. Treat the entire tour “path” accordingly.

• Don’t just have a simple “request a tour” button on your site. Again, take your cue from colleges and create a page that helps people plan their visit. Where should they park? Where should they go upon entering? Who should they ask for? What can they expect during the tour (length, food, etc.)?

• Make it easy for people to schedule tours. Ideally, someone should be able to schedule their desired day and time directly on the page—and receive instant email and/or text confirmation. (It’s 2024, folks. There’s ZERO reason why your site shouldn’t have this functionality.)

• Provide genuinely helpful post-tour content. You should have a follow-up email workflow for people who just attended a tour. Remember, at this stage, people don’t require more education. They already know what senior living is, and they’re familiar with your brand. Instead, focus on content that will speak to them about this monumental decision they’re facing.

o   “How I decided” videos/stories. Create a series of videos or stories where residents talk about the moment they decided to choose your community. What was the deciding factor? What was the moment like?

o   Tips for deciding between two close contenders. For prospects having trouble choosing between a couple of communities, create a checklist or toolkit (more on this below) that helps them look at the pros and cons.

REMINDER #1: The best content in the world can’t make up for a lousy tour experience—or a community that doesn’t match everything the content has been promoting.

REMINDER #2: Even the most logical among us make decisions based on emotions. (Once we’ve made a decision, we often look for a logical rationale to support it.) Make sure some of the content you create triggers emotional reactions.

For example, you could send a series of emails with built-in emotional triggers:

• “Remember how you felt when you walked through our gardens? Here’s a reminder.” (Include images or a video walk-through.)
• “Remember how wowed you were by our incredible menus? Here’s what our residents recently had for dinner.” (Again, include images or video.)

Create content that empowers people.

At this stage, many people need the courage to sign on the dotted line, so to speak. Create empowering content that helps them do exactly that.

For many of our clients, one of the most powerful pieces of content is a “how to decide” toolkit. People crave guidance, and if you can provide a tool that helps them, even better.

We’ve also created a “What are you waiting for?” campaign for those who’ve stalled post-tour. It’s a highly visual email campaign that reminds people what they could be experiencing if they lived in your community compared to what they’re likely experiencing in their current environment.

For example, in one email, you could have an image of a harried person lugging a laundry basket down to the basement. Next to that image, you’d have a shot of a cheerful staff member handing freshly folded towels to a relaxed resident.

Need more help with content brainstorming?

That’s what we’re here for. We have fabulous content writers and strategists who can help you create winning content that aligns with the prospect journey. Get in touch and let’s talk about your content needs.