Assisted Living Marketing Staff vs. Ownership/Management?

Lots Of Responsibility, Little Authority

Some assisted living marketing directors and representatives get little support for their efforts – from management and/or staff. I really feel for them. Yes, I do realize that operations are critical. In the care business, you must provide great care. However, for a variety of reasons, the marketing personnel and plan are also vital elements in assisted living facility success.

Marketing, and its results, directly effect all the major players in assisted living – owners/management, residents/family members, staff members..

• Enable the owner make a profit, and the management to meet their goals and responsibilities.
• Drive (and increase) the revenue that enables the residents and family members to continue to get superior services.
• Help the staff to keep their jobs and get paid fairly.

I feel ownership/management must give their marketing staff the freedom to make decisions and the resources to be successful. And why not? The return on investment (ROI) in assisted living is pretty good…in most cases the new revenue per move-in is more than $30,000/yr.

Management’s Point Of View

On the other side of the coin, would I just give carte blanche to a marketing director or staff member? No way. Authority does not come until a professional shows me that they have a management mindset, a marketing philosophy and a work ethic that they believe in…and I am willing to support. They must prove to me they have a strategy, plan and systems that will get a good return on their time and talent, and on my money. Put bluntly, they must sell me on their ability to make me more successful.

It seems that the road between owner/management and marketing is a two way street.

Working Together, Building Trust

Here are recommendations for developing a business culture that allows ownership/management and marketing to respect and support one another, and work as a team to increase an assisted living census.

Owner/Management	Marketing
Hire a person with: The necessary marketing, organizational, communication and technical skills. An ability to continue learning and to keep up with the trends, especially the technology trends. The heart to care for seniors and to care for your business. Then trust them and let them do their job.	Treat your responsibilities less like a job and more as an owner would. More support and freedom will come when an owner/management feels that you see their perspective, understand what they are risking and can lose, and act in their best interest.
Require a strategy and a plan. If your trust level is low, then you should assist the marketing staff in developing their strategy and plan. However, do not micro-manage.	Develop and work a strategy and a plan. To gain trust and support, you may involve owner/management in the development process. Update when necessary and keep management "in the loop". Remember, they are also a target market that has to be sold.
Set a budget and spending guidelines. Allow a certain amount of money to be spent without approval. Note: When a marketing director cannot spend $100 without permission, they lose credibility with their referral sources. In addition, their ability to act with confidence and at the right time is extremely limited.	Prioritize and wisely allocate your budget. Show how monies are spent (and will be spent) and what business they generated. That means a good database with a tracking and reporting system that is easy to use and does not bog you (or anyone else) down.
Do not laden your marketing staff with serving you. It wastes their time and your money. It also creates stress that saps energy and hurts morale. Instead, support them. Ask "how can I help?" If you want a report, set it up so you can quickly grab the data and/or reports directly from the marketing database.	It is my belief that management should be informed, yet not annoyed by trivial interruptions. To avoid bogging yourself down, set up a template/report in which you can easily update information they like to keep track of. You can "cc" and "forward" important e-mails. And you can even send them Google Analytics reports to show your website traffic.
In general, put yourself in the marketing staff’s place. Look through their eyes.	In general, put yourself in ownership’s and management’s place. Look through their eyes.

Choose The Same Side

A lack of respect and/or support between ownership/management and the marketing staff creates tension. Each side wastes energy on their lack of trust and looking for how the "opposition" is messing up. The result – less move-ins.

When a client has a low census, this type of disfunction is one of the first things I look for. I know that even proven strategies and systems will fall apart when there is internal tension. It is critical that there is only one side when it comes to filling an assisted living facility. Marketing must be integrated into the business and the care culture. Respect and support must flow back and forth between ownership/management and the marketing staff. The result – more move-ins.

My Mom’s Article & Assisted Living PR

My Mom recently sent me a newspaper clipping. Her arts & crafts club was honored (along with other organizations that serve seniors) by a local nursing home for all the work they do. The Holiday City West club makes helmet liners for soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. They also make wheel chair caddies and Easter baskets for veterans, some of whom are living at Crystal Lake Healthcare in New Jersey.

Article from the Berkeley Times - May 5, 2010

(Go to the Berkeley Times – page 14 – May 5, 2010.)

When I received the article, it immediately brought to mind how word-of-mouth marketing was done, and now needs to be done.

Most marketing professionals, including many is assisted living and senior care, treat a press release as a one-time bonus. That is out-dated thinking. A press release should be strategic tools that:

• Promotes your facility and/or event..and can be reused.
• Rewards those who are involved by putting them in the limelight.
• Promotes the media outlet that publishes the article, and encourages them to publishing your future releases.

Mom’s article inspired me to put together an article for the Assisted Living Marketing Guild on how to use technology to magnify the effects of press releases. Members can click – Events & PR: Driving Word-Of-Mouth Marketing – log in, and see suggestions on how to turn a press release into a marketing tool that can get people talking…and e-talking.

If you have any innovative ideas on how you reuse press releases, let me know. I will be happy to relay them to Guild members

Earn Loyalty Of Assisted Living Referral Sources

Developing loyal referral sources should be a key part of any assisted living marketing plan. Our latest marketing tip addresses the strategy on how to include key professionals in your events/activities and make it easy for them to show, share and shine. Assisted Living Marketing Guild members can view the Tip at www.MarketingWithCare.com.

Marketing Assisted Living During The Holidays

Some assisted living administrators and marketing directors have told me the holidays are a bad time for marketing. Of course it’s certainly not a good time in the cluttered world of advertising or direct mail. So I would cut back in these areas. However, how can the most social time of year be bad for marketing in an industry that is built on relationships and referrals? It’s marketing nirvana if you and your staff focus on using the holidays to start and nurture long-lasting relationships.

Strategically plan to use social, face-to-face encounters as opportunities to highlight strengths, demonstrate care, solve problems and personally serve. Whether inside or outside your community, focus on making sure everyone watching places value on these actions so you earn recognition and raves. Most important, create reasons (and make commitments) to do the same in the months to come. The holidays are the springboard into the new year. The goal is to create move-ins for the next 4 months and build/solidify your referral pipeline.

So you and your staff should plan to enjoy the holidays. Celebrate…with purpose! Reap the personal and business rewards long into the new year by having Happy Holidays.

For more suggestions, go to www.MarketingWithCare.com and SEARCH the word “holiday”.

Use Integration To Improve Your Assisted Living Marketing Plan

Don’t Think Piecemeal

Even a growing marketing (like assisted living) is effected by the down economy. In this type of environment, those with a more effective marketing plan will attract a larger share of the available move-ins. Those with weak plans will suffer. So its critical to hone and strengthen your plan. One way to do this is to weave integration into the strategy.

What do I mean by integration? The commonly designed marketing plan is designed to be piecemeal…elements of the plan are treated independently and executed separately. For example, a marketing director will visit professionals in the community and hand out their brochure to “earn?” referrals. When the visit is over, they may send a thank you card and set their calendar for the next visit. (After all, it is the visiting part of their plan.) But they will seldom think about interviewing the professional while they are there and including that professional’s expertise in an advertisement for their facility or on their website.

If they would, they would acquire valuable content (along with its credibility) for their ad and/or website. At the same time, they would also be building a stronger relationship that can turn a professional into an ally, and even a key referral source. And the new information on their website would help them to serve their community. This one effort would inject continuity and synergy into their plan, making it more dynamic and effective. The end result, more people take notice, are attracted and are referred. That leads to move-ins.

Flow From One Element To Another

There are seven key elements to any assisted living marketing plan are:

1. Referral Source Development
2. Advertising
3. Community Outreach & Inreach
4. Public Relations
5. Visits & Tours
6. Inquiry and Family Member “Keep In Touch”
7. Website & Internet

When executed well, each element can lead to move-ins. However, when organized as a team, each one can become more powerful and increase their results. For example, what is shown on a tour of the facility will be remembered and trusted more if it has already been seen on the company website. When a variation is also seen on a community bulletin board or in a follow-up mailing, the trust level increases even more. (FYI – Trust is critical to the assisted living selling process.)

Place The Website In The Center Of The Plan

The website is commonly thought of as an extended brochure and an independent element. Big mistake! It should be the hub of all marketing. Most (if not all) strategies should either start on the website or lead back to the website. Some should do both. The dynamics of the added continuity and synergy, as well as the use of technology the market has come to expect, result in a more effective plan. In addition, the staff can save a lot of time on the creative process and may even lower the expenses of execution. Here is an example of what I mean.

• Visit and interview a local professional who serves seniors and/or caregivers…
• That leads to adding their information and a sample of their expertise to the “Support Services” page on your website…
• That leads to including that sample of their expertise in an advertisement in the local newspaper for your community outreach event…
• That leads to the community outreach event that involves the same referral source…
• That leads to a news story released to the local media outlets…
• The event is also added as an “Activity Scrapbook” entry on your website…
• The Scrapbook entry is easily converted into a new, quick, printed in-house handout…
• That leads to follow-up mailings and e-mails to event attendees, family members and referral sources…
• And the new handout is also added to community bulletin boards you have set up.

This one strategy blends together six of the seven key marketing plan elements – referral source development, advertising, community outreach or inreach, public relations, inquiry “keep in touch” and the website. It can also share copy, design elements and photos which saves time and money. Note: Of course, to do this effectively and efficiently, their must be systems in place that take advantage of technology.

Put Me In Coach

Adding integration is similar to managing a team sport. You have to recognize and understand the individual players at your disposal (marketing elements and people), then blend them into a cohesive unit that performs better as a team than as individuals. When designing a plan, you should look at your list of key elements, then weave (at least) some of them into each campaign. They could work together or they lead to one another. The goals of this integrated team include:

• Creating added credibility.
• Building trust faster with the help of continuity and synergy.
• Providing tools to those would like to promote you.
• Saving time and/or saving money.
• Attracting more inquiries.
• Providing more incentive to offer referrals to your facility.
• Improving inquiry/tour/move-in ratios.

This concept of integration is not new, but it is underutilized. A big reason why is that it demands an organized leader who sees things differently, has the ability to blend the positive attributes of people and marketing elements, and works within a company culture that allows change to what has been done in the past. Is it worth the effort and the change? I believe it provides a marketing advantage that should not be overlooked or underestimated. An assisted living company that utilizes integration properly will come out of this down economy with added market share and will be well positioned for growth in better times.

Note:
If you would like to see how Strategic Care is applied to the tour of an assisted living facility, go to the free Marketing Tip (#70) on the Marketing With Care website – Create Strategic “Tour Stops” That Provide Evidence & Guarantee Consistency Of Message at www.MarketingWithCare.com