Senior Living Content

The reason people conduct searches in Google is because they’re seeking information. On a new car. A new home. A new job. Celebrity scandals. Cheap airfare. Their next vacation. The symptoms their cat is experiencing. What year Back to the Future came out. And Google doesn’t disappoint, serving up the info—the content—to satisfy their needs.

And it’s not just younger generations who seek information online. We all do, especially when we shop. According to Qualtrics, 97% of all consumers use online media when researching products or services in their local area.

Read that stat again—97%. That’s nearly everyone you’re trying to reach as a senior living marketer: older adults looking to make a move now, seniors researching for a move in five years, adult children, referral sources, media.

So when we say content marketing is an incredibly important element in the marketing of your communities, we mean it. Ignore at your own peril. Or do the SMART thing and learn what to do next.

We don’t have to tell you how competitive the senior living space is. You live and breathe it every day. And as the American population continues to grow and age, the competition is only going to increase.

What makes things even more challenging is the fact that senior living operators are essentially selling a commodity. Sure, floor plans and locations will vary, but every operator is selling living spaces, services, and amenities for older adults.

To stand out, you need to dig deeper and find what makes your community truly different, special, and memorable. Maybe your community boasts a James Beard Award-winning chef. Maybe your community boasts views of the ocean. Maybe your community is pet-friendly—and has an engaged and active community of pet lovers to prove it.

You get the idea. Developing your community’s value proposition and using it as the foundational element of your content marketing will help elevate your brand and truly make it memorable.

Your senior living website is your virtual front door to your community. More people will visit your site than will ever walk through your physical front doors.

Getting found

How (and if) your site gets found will depend on a variety of factors, primarily whether . . .

• Your site has been optimized for organic search using a combination of keyword types—core keywords, location-specific keywords, and long-tail keywords.
• You’ve claimed your Google My Business listing.
• You’ve claimed business listings on popular/relevant sites that rank well (like SeniorAdvisor.com).
• You’re using paid search strategically to complement and even boost organic efforts.

In the “old” days of content marketing (fifteen years ago), it was enough to simply focus on core keywords and optimize your site accordingly. Today, you need to take a much different approach to keyword research and optimization—an approach that needs to remain nimble since what works today might not work so well a year from now.

Getting visitors to explore

Getting people to your site is the first step. Great keyword optimization lures them in. But a stellar website experience is what gets them to stay and explore.

Today’s websites need to wow—but not just visually. The entire experience from start to finish needs to be satisfying.

For example . . .

• When someone lands on your site, no matter what page they enter on, will they be able to easily find what they’re looking for, thanks to clear navigation? (Sure, many people will enter via your homepage, but not everyone.)
• Does your website look great across devices—phones, tablets, laptops, and desktops?
• Does your site offer a variety of content types for different learners—short blog posts, longer guides, videos for people who prefer viewing to reading, and interactive tools that make exploring your site fun, not a chore?

You must provide an excellent experience from top to bottom. And at the heart of this experience will be compelling content. While great design and navigation do matter, people might be willing to forgive a mediocre layout as long as the content delivers. But rarely is the reverse true.

Getting visitors to act

Why bother attracting all these fabulous visitors to your site if they end up leaving without taking any action? The main goal of your site is to inspire the website visitor—no matter where they are in their journey—to take the next step that’s right for them.

Excellent content will help drive these “conversions.” For example, if someone is in the very early stages of thinking about senior living, you might offer them a guide with financial planning tips. On the other hand, someone further along in the decision-making process might like downloading a checklist called “How to get the most out of your tours at senior living communities.”

For each piece of premium content (more on this below), you’d simply request some info (name, email, etc.) from the person in exchange for the goods. And presto! The site visitor converts into a bona fide lead. From there, you can score the lead as a marketing-qualified lead (MQL) or sales-qualified lead (SQL). Or if you have marketing automation set up, it can do the lead scoring for you.

Scoring leads as MQLs and SQLs is an important element in a successful content marketing strategy. Why? Because how you score the lead will determine what happens next.

Getting visitors to come back

With marketing-qualified leads, you’ve identified that the person is likely the right fit for your community. They match your buyer personas, but they’re in the earlier stages of the buying process. In other words, they’re not ready for a sales call quite yet.

So, with these leads, the goal is to nurture them by inviting them back to explore other areas of your site. Perhaps you invite them to take an interactive quiz or survey. Or maybe you offer another piece of excellent content related to the interests they’ve already expressed interest in on your site. Again, this is where enticing content comes into play—both in the lead nurturing emails themselves and in the deeper content on your site.

When most people talk about “content marketing,” this is what they’re thinking about. That awesome senior living blog post. That helpful white paper. The cool Twitter feed. The email with the provocative subject line that got someone to open it. Those are elements of content marketing. But content marketing itself is so much more than any one element.

Think of your core website as the bicycle wheel and the various content elements—from blog posts to free guides, emails to social media channels—as the spokes. Each spoke needs to be in good working condition in order for the wheel to turn and provide a smooth ride, right? Plus, don’t mix brands! You need the branding between the wheel and spokes to be consistent to have true success.

So, ask yourself this: Sure, your core website—your wheel—might be in tip-top shape. But what about the spokes?

• Do your senior living blog posts focus on important keywords—and take the next step by going deeper into topics with related keywords and long-tail keywords?
• Do you slap blog posts together, or do you have a blog editorial calendar that ties in with marketing and sales goals as well as the messaging people will find on the main site?
  • For example, if your value proposition is about the fact 80% of residents own pets, does your blog include posts with resident-and-pet spotlights (“Meet Claire and her chihuahua”), how your community helps with vet care, or a feature on the community’s dog park?
• Do your lead nurturing emails reflect the tone and messaging you have on your site? Or is there a disconnect?
• Do you offer premium content (more on this below) for every stage of the buyer’s journey?
• Are your social media channels consistent with your branding? Do profiles and “About” sections reflect the current messaging?
• Do you have a social media strategy, which is a subset of your overarching content strategy?
• Are your Facebook posts, YouTube videos, and Instagram pictures engaging? (And do they drive conversions?)

Blog posts, tweets, pictures on Instagram—anyone can browse that content while remaining anonymous the entire time. But with premium content—think guides, ebooks, white papers—people need to provide basic contact info via a website form (usually their name and email) to get the goods. It’s a fair exchange. At least, if you do it right, people will think it is.

Premium content offers many benefits, one of the most notable being that these content pieces give you the space to dive deeper into a topic and tackle complex questions. Because premium content tends to take longer forms (like guides and ebooks), people usually see the value in this content, which is why they’re willing to give their contact info to access it. Remember, this conversion point is critical. Turning anonymous website traffic into MQLs and SQLs is the whole point, and premium content goes a long way in accomplishing this goal. Plus, great premium content can be used to nurture MQLs into SQLs over time.

Bottom line: The most effective content strategies involve a mix of premium content and ungated content.

We’re not going to lie: Developing an effective content marketing strategy is an investment of both time and money. It’s not a “once and done” endeavor, either. The most successful senior living communities will always be working on new content and refining their strategy over the long haul.

Keep in mind that creating compelling content requires excellent writing and excellent design. You can’t skimp on these elements. Sure, you might be able to entice someone to download a guide, but if the guide is poorly written, it won’t help move the person down the sales funnel, which defeats the purpose.

If you have people on staff who are qualified writers and designers—and they have time to manage your content marketing—that’s wonderful. But we’ve found most senior living companies don’t have people with those specific skill sets. So collaborating with a content marketing agency would be a wise decision since the agency can help bridge the gap.