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To Publish or Not to Publish? That is the Question About Community Pricing Webinar

To Publish or Not to Publish? That is the Question About Community Pricing Webinar

Here’s what you’ll learn: 

  • How to build a family/prospect experience strategy that scales.
  • How to interject powerful touch points that wows the family/prospect.
  • How to measure the efficacy of your customer experience strategy.
  • How to build your customer experience plan to deliver.
Utilizing Voice Technology in Senior Living Communities Webinar

Utilizing Voice Technology in Senior Living Communities Webinar

Here’s what you’ll learn: 

  • How to increase resident attendance at activities by up to 40%
  • Solutions to easily keep the visual and hearing impaired seniors engaged in the community
  • Easily Increase staff productivity
  • Increase health and safety using Amazon Alexa enabled devices and voice technology
  • Increase resident and family engagement
  • Easy ways to inform stakeholders during emergencies
  • How leading communities are increasing prospect attendance at events and tours

Inbound Marketing: Your Best Employee Recruitment Tool

Inbound Marketing: Your Best Employee Recruitment Tool

In today’s job market, the candidates have the upper hand. We know that 95 percent of the people that companies want to hire for critical roles are not actually looking for a job. As a result, companies are competing for the best candidates. In order to effectively vie for great talent, you need the right tools.

As part of their recruitment strategy, many companies are using outbound marketing. This involves reaching out to potential candidates through job postings, paid advertising, or a third-party recruiter.

But today’s recruitment efforts need a more advanced strategy—one that you’re likely already using to attract residents: inbound marketing.

With inbound marketing, you create content that attracts new prospects to your company. From there, you can engage with them and determine if they’re the right fit. It’s an opportunity to establish a dialogue with passive and active job seekers, create a unique candidate experience, and build relationships with top talent.

Here are five quick ways to get started with inbound marketing as a recruitment tool:

1. Define Your Objectives

Before you start, decide on which positions you are trying to attract. Do you want to focus on executive level and above? Or do you also want to also use inbound marketing to source your nursing and care staff?

2. Define the Candidate “Persona”

Once you know which roles you want to recruit for, you also have to determine the characteristics that you are looking for in your ideal candidate. You should start with educational background, previous experience, and any technical requirements (licensure, software knowledge, etc.) that you may want in a candidate. Then dig a little deeper. Look at employees who are successful in their roles and identify traits and skills that help them prosper.

3. Define Your Culture

Think about your company culture. How do you define success in your company? What are the company non-negotiables when it comes to character and performance? What are the top 10 words you would use to define your culture?

4. Create “Hooks”

According to Career Builder, 75% of job seekers start their search on Google. So you should create search-friendly content that will attract the ideal candidates to your site (which is one of the reasons you develop the candidate personas).

Content can include why you are the best company to work for, associate testimonial videos, and educational info. Find the best channels to connect with your prospective candidate. This could be Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, You Tube, as well as industry sites.

Get creative where you share this content. Based on chats with your current successful employees, is there anything that most have in common? For example, maybe most are members of the local YMCA. If that’s the case, see if you can conduct an informal job fair there or post some info about open positions on the Y’s bulletin boards.

5. Create Opportunities to Build Relationships

Applying for a job is an investment. Today’s candidates want to know more about the company culture and role before they commit to the process. If a candidate isn’t ready to apply, create opportunities to engage them and develop a relationship. Give them opportunities to learn more about your company. This can be done with additional educational content, blog content, company resources, or signing up for a “keep in touch” newsletter.

It often takes many touch points to influence a decision, so invest the time in these relationships now to reap future rewards.

Learn more in this webinar: Inbound Marketing: Your Secret Weapon In Winning the Recruitment Game →

Senior Living Employee Recruitment: Tips for Attracting Great People

Senior Living Employee Recruitment: Tips for Attracting Great People

Question: Do you know the top five reasons a candidate would want to work for your senior living community?

If you don’t know the answer, start thinking about it. Because understanding why your company is a great place to work will help you attract great staff.

It’s no secret that it’s a competitive hiring market in senior living. Many companies are vying for the same candidates, from care staff to executive directors. So when you find a candidate you like, how do you convince them that they should work for you? You have to market your community to potential job candidates with the same intensity you market to prospects.

Which is why knowing the top five reasons candidates would want to work at your community is a great way to engage prospective employees and stand out from the crowd.

How do you come up with your list? Start by asking your current employees why they work for you and what they like about their job, the community, their co-workers, their managers, and even the residents. You’ll probably get some valuable feedback and great insights into why staff members stay with your community.

When you’re talking to job candidates, share these insights with them and ask which one is most important. Then, talk about that particular topic in more depth. For example, if a collaborative workplace culture is important, show them the ways your community and team foster this sort of environment.

Senior Living Sales: It Doesn't Have to Be Like "Groundhog Day"

Senior Living Sales: It Doesn’t Have to Be Like “Groundhog Day”

I sometimes miss working on the operations side of senior living, so much so that I’ll do occasional sales trainings and coaching projects to stay sharp. Whenever I dip my toes back into sales, the thing that surprises me most is this: marketing is like The Jetsons – innovative and exciting. Sales, however, is still like that Bill Murray classic: Groundhog Day. It’s as though time has stood still over the last 15 years as sales reps continue to struggle with the basics.

So let’s change that for good, shall we? Here are some ways to improve the sales process and results.

1. You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

Look at your community through prospects’ eyes and be honest about the basics. Start with the experience of arriving at the community. Can you improve the locations, landscaping, and visibility of signage (even at night)? Will zoning allow you to add feather banners or A-frames? Is there dedicated parking reserved for tours near the front door or are prospects circling endlessly? Is the landscaping inviting year-round? Is the outdoor furniture clean and arranged?

These small details can make a huge difference between your tour arriving relaxed and feeling welcome or stressed out and frustrated.

Bonus tip: Personalize your tour parking signage to add the names of expected guests so there will be a parking spot with their name on it.

2. Create a sense of belonging.

Prospects are typically looking at four to six communities. And let’s face it: most communities are very similar in design, services, and amenities. Prospects make decisions emotionally, which means you must build a strong sense of belonging from the minute they walk through your door. This starts with planning the visit to incorporate their life story, preferences, wants, needs, motivations, and non-negotiables.

Spending time as a team to plan every step of the visit will pay off with higher conversions. The better the discovery call, the better the planning and conversions. It takes the whole team to create a sense of belonging. For example, be sure the front desk is notified of all visits and has all the information they need to personalize their greeting. Also, provide notification to the line staff so they can participate more personally in the tour – and reward them when they do a great job!

 

 

 

Bonus tip: Use our turnkey “Red Carpet Tour” kit with all the resources needed to plan and execute the perfect tour.

3. It’s a $100,000 lifetime value sale, so why is there Styrofoam?

It now costs an average of $1200 to get a family to tour. This is an emotional decision and families will be sharing personal concerns, so setting up a hospitality suite with refreshments is a must. Conference rooms and offices are not conducive to sensitive and personal conversations.

And let’s get rid of Styrofoam, paper cups, and plastic cups and plates once and for all! The average resident lifetime value is usually greater than $100,000, so let’s roll out the glassware and china. Please use name-brand beverages. Store brand and generic brands shout “cheap.”

Bonus tip: Here is everything you need to create an inviting hospitality suite.

4. Location of the model apartment is critical.

I can’t tell you how many times I find the model apartment at the farthest end of the building. Why? So the maintenance department will not have to move it! The result? By the time the family gets to the model, they are already questioning if their loved one will be able to manage due to physical or memory deficits.

Always think of your prospect first—and what will be convenient to them. Ideally, the model apartments should be located in proximity to the hospitality suite. The model apartment should engage all senses: lights on, music playing, scented plug-ins, soft fabrics, and refreshments available. This is a place to linger, so have calendars, newsletters, floor plans, and menus out to create meaningful conversations.

Bonus tip: Use this model apartment checklist to see if your models are up to snuff! (download model apartment checklist)

5. Goodbyes and Advances.

Once the visit is wrapping up, it’s time to get a commitment to advance the relationship. This will be different for each prospect based on their unique situation. For earlier stage leads, a home visit, luncheon, or upcoming event may work best. For those closer to making a decision, a deposit, assessment, or re-tour with other decision-makers would be appropriate. Giving prospects something special is a memorable way to part ways, so consider having a swag collection available so you can find the right gift for each prospect. I recommend having dog/cat treats, teas/coffees, mugs, candies, small books etc. so I can find just the right gift for each prospect.

Bonus tip: Walk all tours out to their car to end the visit with a personal gesture.

Try free samples of our Red Carpet Tour kit!

Execute the perfect tour with planning tools, including forms, signs, staff recognition & post-tour gifts and followup resources.

Changes to the Veterans Pension with Aid & Attendance Benefit

Changes to the Veterans Pension with Aid & Attendance Benefit

The Veterans Pension Aid & Attendance Benefit, commonly called Aid and Attendance, is for veterans and their surviving spouses. Some important changes and updates happened in October 2018.

We interviewed Patty Servaes, founder of Elder Resource Benefits Consulting, a VA accredited agent and expert on the VA Pension. Here’s what you need to know about the changes:

Q: What are the major changes to the qualification and approval process for the Aid & Attendance benefit for veterans and their surviving spouses?

A: The big change everyone is talking about is the three-year “look back” for assets transferred or annuities purchased after October 17, 2018. If a veteran purchases an annuity or transfers an asset and then applies for the benefit, the VA will add any transfer made after October 17, 2018, back to their assets when determining if total assets are less than $127,061.

This change is fantastic for those folks in their 80s and 90s who were failing the life expectancy test for assets. People who had in excess of $100,000 but less than the new asset limit (and who thought they needed to wait to have assets below $80,000) were able to file with confidence on October 18, 2018.

As of October 18, 2018, if veterans and their surviving spouses are living in independent or assisted living or a nursing home and they have a primary home they wish to rent, the VA will not count the house as an investment, but will keep it excluded as their primary home. While the rental income will count as income, the exclusion of the home as an asset will allow families to maximize the earning potential of the home to pay for care while retaining the home for later sale or inheritance by the veteran’s heirs. I think this will result in more veterans aging in place.

Unfortunately, with the addition of the three-year “look back,” the VA form that collected financial data has gone from 4-5 pages to 19 pages. When you add in the other forms and supporting documents, most of our applications are now in excess of 40 pages!

Q: How does this impact financial planning tools?

A: Because the VA is adopting the Medicaid Community Spouse Resource Allowance as the assets an applicant can have (which is $127,061 as of Dec. 1, 2018), many applicants will qualify earlier without having to transfer assets—this is a good thing.

For veterans and surviving spouses with assets in excess of $127,061, it’s important to understand how long it will take for their assets to be below the maximum and to realize that transferring assets may keep them out of the pension program longer than waiting for their assets to decline naturally.

Since the primary home doesn’t count, many of our clients qualify the day they contact us. Others pre-pay their funerals and qualify. And still others might just need to wait a few months. And you would be surprised at how many people have no desire to transfer assets in order to qualify for a government program!

Q: What are the most common misunderstandings of this benefit?

A: It’s hard to say what the new myths are going to be after these sweeping changes. I still hear that you can’t get the benefit in independent living—I imagine that myth will continue. Veterans and their surviving spouses rated Aid and Attendance (meaning they need regular supervision or assistance with two activities of daily living) are allowed to use independent living expenses.

I would think that a new myth would be that the look-back period works the same as the Medicaid look-back when in fact it is much more generous.

And of course, I am sure we will continue to see folks who were told they didn’t qualify and they assume that means they won’t ever qualify. The truth is that eligibility changes as medical conditions, income, and assets change over time. It’s not a “yes or no” award, but “if and when.”

Q: Are there any changes to the benefit amount for 2019?

A: Yes, Social Security increased by 2.8% for 2019, and we will see a similar increase for the VA Pension. The VA likes to round down, so these figures might be off a dollar or two, but we are looking at monthly maximum awards for Pension with Aid and Attendance of approximately $1,197 for a surviving spouse, $1,881 for a single veteran, and $2,230 for a married veteran.

Q: Does this benefit still work with independent living, assisted living, and skilled nursing?

A: Yes, it does! In fact, it starts with home care and can stay with the veteran through their move to independent living and all the way through skilled nursing as long as they continue to meet the medical, income, and asset criteria. For skilled nursing providers, qualifying patients with a veteran status for the Aid & Attendance benefit may increase the time of private pay status.

Q: It is still possible to get a partial benefit?

A: Absolutely. If an applicant’s income minus home care and residential facility costs leave them with a positive number (known as “Income for VA Purposes”), but one less than the Maximum Pension Benefit, they can receive, approximately, the difference between the Maximum Pension and the calculated Income for VA Purposes figure.

Q: How difficult is it for older adults, families, and community teams to complete the application process?

A: Well, at over 40 pages long, it’s significantly harder than doing your taxes!

Q: How long is your time to award?

A: Our average time to award is fewer than four months, which is significantly less than the 12-18 months the VA tells you to expect.

Q: Why is this benefit so important to senior care and housing providers?

A: The Pension benefit has the ability to significantly increase the buying power of our senior veterans. This allows people to stay in assisted living longer and allows them the peace of mind they need to move into the senior care community of their choice.

Just last week, I was working with a family who thought their 89-year-old dad could never afford assisted living since his income was only $1,500 per month, and he only had $30,000 left in assets. He’s living in Florida and with an estimated assisted living fee of $3,000 a month, he would be out of funds in under two years.

We were able to show them that with the $1,830 in Aid & Attendance benefits per month, he would not have to access his assets to pay for his monthly fee. They could not believe it and called me on Saturday to tell me they had chosen the room with the pond view for him at $3,200, were going to buy him a new couch, and that they hadn’t realized how stressed they had been worrying about how he was going to pay for this care.

Q: How do you assist families and providers with the application, approval, and appeal process?

A: It all starts with a free no-obligation phone call where we assess the medical and financial situation of the veteran or surviving spouse. If the potential claimant resides in a community that advertises on Elder Resource Benefits Consulting website, we assist them pro bono with the analysis and application.

If a resident doesn’t reside in an advertising community, they can hire us privately for a one-time pre-application analysis fee of $800 ($700 for Senior Living SMART members!) and then we assist them pro bono with the VA benefit for the remainder of their life.

Interested in learning more?

Check out Elder Resource Benefits Consulting

Elder Resource Benefits Consulting

Elder Resource Benefits Consulting has been helping families understand the cost of Senior Care since 2005.

Senior Living Marketing Tips to Kick Start January 2019

How to Create an Effect Senior Living Marketing Plan

It’s that special time of year. Dreams of sugar plum fairies and winter wonderlands are interrupted with the seasonal realities of Q4. A blizzard of demands grows our To Do list. And all of a sudden, it’s next year. Still a bit hazy from some holiday cheer, you might rush to cobble together a senior living marketing plan for Q1.

It’s fine, you think. After all, look at all those online and aggregator leads coming in!

But is it really OK?

Maybe not, especially when you consider the following…

  • Online leads tend to have a lower quality score than other lead sources, such as referrals.
  • Move-outs tend to increase this time of year, meaning you’ll need even more move-ins.
  • In some regions, weather can wreak havoc with promotional efforts.
  • Not to mention, as we update this article, a pandemic has changed senior living marketing (possibly for good).

So what can you do to make sure you’re not panicking on January 1?

Here are some strategies to follow NOW so that you can hit the ground running with an effective senior living marketing plan for the upcoming year, quarter, or month…

1. Set goals based on real numbers.

Number-driven goals are best, since it’s easier to measure their success. Move-in volume is a typical, measurable sales number (or, at least, it used to be pre-COVID). Set a realistic move-in goal for each month. If you’re not sure, look at the last 12-24 months. (You’ll want to consider 2018 and 2019 numbers to get a realistic sense of what the numbers look like during “normal” times. Then, you’ll want to consider 2020 numbers, too.) And set a monthly marketing budget. You need these numbers to plan.

Once you have a move-in number and a budget number for the month ahead (or better yet, the upcoming quarter or even the whole year), planning becomes easier.

For this exercise, let’s say the move-in number for January is 4.

Based on a budgeted 4 move-ins, how many leads do you need? Leads will equal the number of move-ins divided by your community’s lead-to-move-in conversion rate.

So let’s say your average lead-to-move-in conversion rate over the past 12 months is 12.8%. The math: 4 move-ins divided by .128 = 31 leads. So, in general, you’ll need 31 leads to produce 4 move-ins.

But is that really the number? Probably not for January.

Why? Well, what do we know about Januarys?

  • Online and lead aggregator volume typically spikes.
  • Move-outs often increase.
  • The weather stinks in ¾ of the country. Think ice, snow, rain, wind, and cold. And even if you’re working in a community that’s welcoming snowbirds, you’re thinking how you can keep them with you year-round.

Now, what do we know in general?

  • Not all lead sources are equal.
  • So many variables impact an average annual conversion rate.
  • Leads produced in the current month will most likely convert next month depending on several factors both in and out of your control.

So, most likely, you will need more than 31 leads.
All that said, 31 leads is a good starting point. From there, you can develop a senior living marketing plan that will generate these leads. Then, you can let lead aggregators produce gravy for you.

2. Identify target personas.

How do you bucket the various types of people contacting you and sitting in your CRM? Keep your various buyer personas in mind, including where they might be on their journey:

  • Some know they have problems, but don’t know what will solve them.
  • Others are researching their options on the internet (perhaps prompted by a postcard or a newspaper ad they saw).
  • Some are now calling you, touring communities, talking with lead aggregators, and actively weighing all the options (meaning your direct and indirect competition).
  • Meanwhile, a few are ready to buy, but they may have some concerns.
  • Others may move back up the funnel because of a bad tour, guidance from a friend, a change in financial situation, or other reasons.

You’ll want to bucket your targets.

  • On the lead generation side, you’re looking at seniors, their adult children, professional influencers, and residents with friends they can refer to you.
  • On the consumer side, you’ll look at demographic and socio-economic sweet spots based on an analysis of your CRM data with a data insights company.
  • On the lead nurture side, you most likely are bucketing by time frame to moving in – hot, warm, and cold.

Some of you may have more sophisticated lead scoring in place. Your hot and warm leads should be a enjoying a very personalized sales approach based on your discovery.

3. Select the right marketing campaign to get the job done.

Now that you’ve bucketed your targets, what will you do to generate new leads, nurture your various lead types, and influence professionals and residents to refer to you?

Consider three types of senior living marketing campaigns:

  • Event promotions
  • Product/brand promotions
  • Price promotions

Event promotions are designed to work hard to encourage someone to visit your community and experience the lifestyle you offer. If you are promising an event, you need to ensure you can pull it off successfully. Events are valuable for lead generation and lead nurturing. However, you can also leverage daily resident activities, clubs, and outings as lead nurturing events once you better understand the various interests of people in your CRM.

We recommend one event a month for lead generation. Yes, they are time consuming, but if executed well, you really drive home the value of what you offer to residents. (Psst. Need help creating collateral to promote your events? Check out SMARTbrand.)

Product/brand promotions focus on people on the early side of the buyer’s journey. So your message should focus on things like what you do and what makes your community different/better than your competitors. In essence, you’re making the local market aware of your community. This might involve placing advertisements in places that reach your target audience, both online and off.

Price promotions. We don’t recommend price promotions for lead generation. It cheapens your product and really confuses potential leads about how pricing works at your community. Price promotions are good sales closing tools for a part of your lead base already aware of all you do to offer value, quality, and peace of mind.

What are good ways to come up with promotions?

First, get a calendar of all the holidays during the year. Second, bring your community leadership team together to discuss promotions, especially event promotions. You’ll need their help to pull off successful events for lead generation purposes. Third, you can look at all the promotional options in a “brand-on-demand” system. These systems typically have a catalog of postcards and flyers, and you simply add your branding, event details, and community details. From there, you get them printed and distributed. (A great option is SMARTbrand.)

Select the right media.

Once you’ve figured out your promotions each month for your various targets, you’ll need to determine how you’ll get the promotions to them. This is where budgets are necessary. Some things you can do very inexpensively. For example, with SMARTbrand, you can easily customize digital banners, download them, and place them on social media or your website. But for lead generation, typically you’ll want to look at direct mail, advertising, and online services, too. You’ll also want some materials to hand out to residents and professional referral sources.

Measure a job well done.

How will you measure success? Remember, it’s import to record every inquiry. You may have criteria on what determines who goes into your senior living CRM, but knowing a postcard, print ad, or web page works to generate an inquiry is critical, even if the person ultimately isn’t interested or doesn’t qualify for your services.

You can use things like call-tracking numbers and special website landing pages for direct mail (there are seemingly countless ways to measure—we’re just mentioning a couple).

Bottom line: over time, this information will help you identify media and promotions that give you the biggest bang for your marketing buck.

Need help creating an effective senior living marketing plan?

You’ve come to the right place! We have decades of experience in the senior living industry. Let us help you create a strategic marketing roadmap that achieves the goals you’ve identified. GET IN TOUCH NOW!

Making It Stick - Healthcare CRM Adoption

Making It Stick – Healthcare CRM Adoption

Let’s face it: one of the least favorite tasks of senior living sales and marketing professionals is updating their lead management database or healthcare CRM.

They prefer building relationships with seniors, families, and professionals. Or maybe they gain energy from personal interactions rather than administrative tasks. Entering data, updating notes, and documenting activities . . . not so much. However, for sales managers, this documentation is crucial to identifying trends, barriers, and opportunities. Not to mention creating effective strategies.

Reduce resistance and improve healthcare CRM adoption:

1. Create a User Advisory Board

Include all user groups and stakeholders in the vetting and decision-making process. Create focus groups comprised of community, regional, and corporate sales and operations team members.

  • Assess. Make a list of everything that the team likes and dislikes about what they are using. Ask each group to make a list of their “hopes and dreams.” Sometimes teams are more comfortable using a terrible system that they know and despise rather than making a change to a better solution. Why? Fear of change. Or concerns about losing their job.
  • Brainstorm. Create a wish list of features and functions that would make their jobs easier. Ideas include intuitive user experience to simplify data entry, automated lead integration with website, live chat,  goal setting, quick links to social media, integration with training resources, and document libraries. Dream big. This is an important decision!
  • Test. When you get to the testing stage with vendors, select a representative sampling from the advisory board to have them test and provide feedback. Always include your lowest-tech community user. Because if it is too complex at that level, then none of the fancy reports, dashboards, or bells and whistles will matter.  Provide each tester with prospect info to enter. Test the steps throughout the sales process. Think documenting advances, adding notes, scheduling tours, and so forth.

Be Mindful Regarding Your Healthcare CRM Selection

  • Compare. Take the feedback from the focus groups and look for commonalities. Select a CRM that meets everyone’s needs. Each user group needs to get a win—something that saves them time, makes documentation easy, integrates systems etc.
  • Alignment. One of the most important considerations is to align your new CRM with your sales culture. For example, if your goal is to motivate your sales team to spend time developing relationships with prospects and referral sources, the CRM should have the ability to measure and reward for that behavior. If your sales culture is more task, activity, and conversion ratio-driven, select a CRM that provides that data in real time. Your CRM won’t stick if your sales culture and training says one thing, and your CRM measures something else. Your sales team will always behave according to the structure of the CRM rather than the culture and training.

Selecting the Healthcare CRM Isn’t Enough

Once you’ve made your selection, you need to prepare your team for implementation. Here’s what to do.

  • Training & Reinforcement. Budget generously for the rollout! If possible, use a training center to train small groups outside of the community setting to limit distractions and interruptions. It usually takes two to three days for the initial training. Day one is a reinforcement of your sales culture and training to create alignment with the new CRM. This can be done in a community setting. You’ll then need a full day of classroom training using a test site to practice entering leads and explore all the features and functions. Day 3 can be either a half day or whole day training to demonstrate report functions, dashboards, and more sophisticated features, such as marketing automation. Users should leave this initial training feeling competent and confident. Schedule ongoing training sessions using remote screen sharing as well as open hours and help desks for questions.
  • Data Migration. This is a great opportunity to clean up your data. Work with your CRM vendor to “de-dupe” or merge your duplicate records for leads and referral accounts. Decide if you want to migrate all of your data or move only those within a specific timeframe (for example over two years old) or with specific stages (e.g., leads labeled as “lost”). Providing a clean data set will go a long way in getting users onboard.

Want to learn more about senior living CRM adoption? Watch for our FREE WEBINAR

Senior Living Marketing and Sales: CRM Search Made Easy

Senior Living CRM Search Made Easy

Choosing new senior living CRM software can be a daunting task. But it can also be an opportunity to discover new features that can enhance your sales culture. Below, you’ll find helpful tips for choosing a new CRM.

The Senior Living CRM Search: Make Your List and Dream Big

Before you schedule demos, make a list of what you like about your current CRM and everything that frustrates users. Create three lists: Must Haves, Would Be Nice to Have, and Non-Negotiables.

Here are some of the top considerations when researching senior living CRMs:

  1. Ease of Use: Like our prospects, we’re comfortable with the familiar. Change is difficult. We want our users to transition with ease.
  2. Better Reporting: With more robust reporting, you can increase transparency between marketing and sales teams. Look for a system that delivers what you want on all levels of reporting. Think basic user through leadership team.
  3. A Refined User Experience: Sales and marketing teams today don’t function on recording activity alone. There are many roles within the department. Look for a system that delivers an experience tailored to different roles.
  4. Simultaneous Support of Multiple Service Lines: Communities are no longer operating within the brick and mortar communities. Today, there are multiple lines of service, community outreach efforts, and census management functions. Each one has its own set of data fields, workflows, and supporting reports. Choose a CRM that can deliver on the expanding markets your community is either currently immersed in or considering for the future.
  5. Defined Sales Process: Senior living counselors are no longer order takers. Competition is fierce. Having a defined sales process that everyone follows is the key to success. Whether you want a pre-defined process or you want to build your own, make sure to implement a CRM that supports process. Bonus points if it can simultaneously support multiple processes or workflows that tailor the experience for your different service lines.
  6. Marketing Automation: Whether it’s simply having a more efficient way to send and track personal email or you’re seeking full-blown marketing automation, the future of senior living marketing and sales involves marketing automation. Select a tool that supports forward-thinking and emerging marketing trends.

Senior Living CRM: Fear of Data Migration

Make sure the vendor you select can seamlessly move your data, including your waiting lists and prospect activity history. Ask potential vendors the following:

  • Do you have a reliable process covering all data migration facets of extraction, translation, cleansing, and validation?
  • Will you perform analysis and inspection of the information to validate data quality? Will you pinpoint required data and highlight gaps in the data from the current system?
  • Are you well versed in detailed mapping and transformation exercises to define migration rules, cleansing routines, and final execution plans?

Senior Living CRM Training, User Support, and Flexibility

Learning a new system requires training, reinforcement, and on-going support. Here are some questions to ask before you sign a contract with a new CRM provider:

  • How do you train people on the new CRM?
  • What kind of ongoing support do you offer? Do we have to pay extra for it? (Think online learning center, live support, built-in knowledge base.)
  • Is the CRM flexible enough to support future changes users may want to make in data fields, workflows, and reporting? Can we make these changes ourselves, or will we have to pay you (the CRM vendor) for any changes?

Senior Living CRM Implementation: Embrace the Change

Regardless of which CRM you choose, you will experience a learning curve. Embrace this fact and go with it. Fear of change can be paralyzing and inhibit the ability to accept and retain new information. Remember, the impact of learning a new system will be far less scary if each member of your team is open to change.

Finally, don’t let the fear of change keep you from diving into the search. The process of vetting, selecting, and implementing a new CRM may take longer than anticipated. Budget at least 90-120 days for the process.

Using Data to Uncover New Possibilities in Senior Living

Using Data to Uncover New Possibilities in Senior Living Webinar

Using Incidence Analytics to Identify Market Need

Improving Senior Housing Performance with Precision Market Analytics

We are a data driven world. It can be good or it can be overwhelming. This webinar will highlight three scenarios where data is used to make intelligent business decisions, improve current assets and increase referrals to your communities. Learn how to use incidence data and medication data to improve your business results.

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