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Category Archive: Blog

  1. SEO and Digital Marketing Best Practices

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    Why SEO Matters to Your Senior Living Community

    By Dianna Leyton, Digital Strategist

    As a senior living professional in today’s digital age, you already know how critical your website is to your community’s success. Having an online presence matters, but what matters more is converting website visitors into inquiries. High performing communities generally see at least 40% of initial inquiries originating from their website. How do they accomplish this? Part of the answer lies in SEO.

    Let’s get started by reviewing some of the basics of SEO:

    What is SEO?
    Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a digital marketing practice that can improve the volume and quality of your website traffic. This can be accomplished in several ways including keyword research, content development, technical website adjustments and more to help websites gain higher visibility on search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing. Although only one piece of the overall marketing strategy, SEO is generally one of the most effective ways to bring in qualified web inquiries.

    Why does SEO matters and how can it help generate more online inquiries?
    When it comes to researching options for any major life decision like senior living, many begin their journey on a search engine, such as Google. The popularity of search engines is why organic search traffic is generally the primary source of website traffic. But, content also plays a major role in how your website will rank and appear as a search result.

    How is SEO and website content related?
    Creating valuable content and a great user experience is key to a great SEO strategy. This means developing valuable content that is easily accessible with a short path to discovery and fewer clicks. This can keep website visitors engaged and can signal to the search engine that you are a high-quality website, which can lead to more website visitors over time.

    What is the likely result of a successful SEO strategy?
    If you’re executing a well-developed SEO strategy, you will likely notice a greater influx of website visitors who are taking more desired actions on your website. These actions, or digital conversions, include submitting contact forms, calling your community or initiating a live chat conversation with a sales team member. This can increase your inquiry to tour ratio.

    What else can you do for a great SEO strategy?
    Your SEO strategy should include updating your local business profiles such as Google My Business, Yelp and Yellow Pages so information is complete and consistent across all directories. Updating these profiles not only makes you more visible in local searches, but it can also ensure that people are accessing the most up-to-date information.

    In addition to updating your local business profiles, online reviews that live within these directories should be given extra attention.  Now more than ever, prospects and influencers are looking at these online reviews to help them determine the best senior living communities in the area.

    Conclusion
    Understanding how SEO works and how to implement a smart digital marketing strategy to grow your senior living community may seem overwhelming. A great place to start is through a website assessment with a team of digital marketing experts. The SA digital team has helped many senior living communities with personalized website assessments. The assessments help identify gaps and areas for improvement in SEO strategy and other areas of digital marketing.

    We would like to put our skills to work for your community!
    Call us at (888) 312-0889 or submit an online form at Contact Us.

  2. Marketing Best Practice – Part Three: Direct Mail

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    Too often communities dismiss direct mail as ineffective after just one or two failed attempts.
    While it is true that seniors (as well as the rest of us) receive an overwhelming amount of unsolicited mail, direct mail is still a key lead generator and can be a cost-effective way to communicate to a large audience.

    However, there are several best practices that must be followed for direct mail to be successful:

    • Always have a clear call to action – In most cases, a direct mail invitation to an event will have a clear and simple method of response, either via phone or email. Your call to action should NOT simply ask the prospect to call for more information or call for a personal appointment.
    • Use authentic photos that represent your target audience – If you are a high-end community, your photos should represent the same; the opposite is true. Don’t show pets if pets are not allowed. Try not to use the same stock photos everyone else is using. If possible, conduct a professional photo shoot to develop a portfolio of photos you can use in a variety of ways, from direct mail to your website. Be cognizant of equal housing opportunity rules concerning minority representation based on your geographic market area.
    • Use a variety of formats and folds – Do not stick to one size postcard or format. Switch up between sizes and folds and use envelops on occasion. At Solution Advisors we’ve experimented with sizes, envelopes and even fonts to find formats that get opened. Variety is the most crucial factor.
    • Don’t mail everything to everyone – Avoid direct mail fatigue that occurs when you mail to the same list repeatedly. Revisit the desired outcome of the event and select your mailing list accordingly. Want to advance prospects to the next step? Select those who have already attended an event or toured your community. If new lead generation is the goal, review your primary market area and look for new zip codes or areas that have not been penetrated before.
    • Segment the mailing lists/All messaging is not the same for all people – the target market and call to action for the direct mail should be determined based on the ultimate intent of the piece. For example:
      • If your inventory has an abundance of one-bedroom styles, the content should speak to that smaller unit footprint. Additionally, the mailing list should be segmented based on those most likely to buy that style unit. In this example, messaging can be directed toward single individuals, older individuals or those with more modest incomes.
      • Append a large mailing list for square footages of existing homes. For example, the mailing list could be segmented to identify those people with existing homes with square footages under 1,500 square feet to market available inventory that is 1,000 square feet or under, or vice versa for larger inventory. Mail a downsizing event direct mail to only those prospects who have larger square footages and have resided in their existing residence for 10 years or longer who would benefit from this type of mailing.
    • Personalization and Variable Data – direct mail is a mass marketing tool. However, direct mail can be personalized to include the prospect’s name in the piece so they are more likely to open and respond. Varying data fields do not have to only include letters. Variable data can be on other types of mailers, including self-mailers. Personalization allows for a more person-centered approach to marketing efforts.

  3. Marketing Best Practices – Part 2: Plan Strategic Events

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    Having a successful event entails more than serving chips and dip. Breathe new life into events that generate excitement and build confidence with clients. Strategic event planning is an important component to successfully generating inquiries and, potentially, advancing sales through the sales cycle. Event best practices include:

    • The outcome of the event should be determined first, even before the event is planned. In other words, is the outcome to simply inform or educate the audience? Advance the prospect forward in her decision-making? Close the prospect? Depending on the desired outcome, we categorize events as follows:
      • Lead Generation Events have the sole purpose of generating as many qualified leads as possible. These events are usually promoted via a direct mailer sent to a purchased list of age and income qualified households to generate new leads.
      • Advancement Events have the dual goal of generating new leads and moving existing leads from one level to the next in the sales cycle. The goal is to communicate the lifestyle of the community by having depositors speak about what life will be like at the community, showcasing the type of activities residents will regularly participate in and to generate leads.
      • Conversion Events have the goal of moving prospects from one phase of the selling cycle to the next, typically from ‘planning’ to ‘action’. The events should be intimate in nature and have a high degree of resident involvement.
    • Events should incorporate the strengths of the community. For instance, if your community is focused on wellness, plan events that will demonstrate the benefits of your wellness program. If food is the focus, plan events that will showcase the culinary experience at your community. Pet friendly? Plan a “Yappy Hour” for prospects to mingle with residents and their pets. Remember to capture the results of the event in terms of attendance, follow up appointments and sales, to measure the effectiveness and outcome of each direct mail campaign and event.
    • Events should be a cornerstone of your professional outreach strategy, giving team members a reason to call on referral sources and invite them into the community for continuing education, as a thank you, for pampering (manicures and martinis), or giving something of value to them (perhaps CEUs.) While professional events are typically not as highly attended as prospect events, they serve two purposes: first, they provide ongoing, fresh opportunities for referral sources to hear from your team, by phone, evite, and in-person; second, they create deeper connection into your organization and your referral source organizations, providing onsite opportunities for these partners to meet and mingle with your team members at once. Professional events for independent living are a good way to generate awareness and brand the community.
    • The most successful event topics include:
      • “Dine and Discover” (off-site for communities in pre-opening) for initial introductions into the market – Lead Generation
      • Sales center (or sales office) open house for communities in pre-opening – Lead Generation
      • Social event tie-in with state wine month or similar type of focus (food) – Lead Generation
      • Grand opening event one to two months following the opening of the community – Lead Generation
      • Farm-to-Table – When able, partner with a local food delivery group (farm-focus, organic) to deliver fresh fruits and/or vegetables to the community and have an event hosted around the food and wellness component of the community – Lead Generation or Advancement
      • Resident Panel explaining the experience of choosing the right community – Advancement
      • A “University” type of event for communities with interesting residents with strong backgrounds; teaching and sharing their expertise – Advancement
      • Standard moving and downsizing events to educate prospects on moving, the real estate market and downsizing – Advancement
      • Coffee/Lunch/Cocktails/Dinner with residents (roundtable event) – Advancement
      • Coffee/Lunch/Cocktails/Dinner with the executive director (small, roundtable event) – Conversion
      • Progressive dinner for select/hot prospects – Conversion
      • CEU event for professionals – Outreach
      • Yappy Hour (Halloween dog costume) for Professionals – Outreach or Advancement for prospects

  4. 5 Quick and Easy Tips to Improve Your Digital Marketing Performance

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    As we head into the last quarter of the year, sales and marketing teams are feeling the pressure to accomplish multiple initiatives before the calendar flips. From developing marketing plans and budgets for 2019, to scheduling those last events in 2018, to making a final push for depositors and move-ins, there’s often little time to focus on functionalities such as your digital marketing efforts.

    Knowing how stretched sales and marketing teams are this time of year, we’ve put together a list of five quick-hit tips that take little time, effort and cost to implement but can have big (positive) impacts on your digital marketing efforts.

    1. Take Advantage of Google Posts. Released in June 2017, Google Posts allow for additional content postings within the Google My Business profile. It’s a free feature for businesses to promote incentives, events and advertisements. If your community is actively publishing blogs and news articles, this is a great way to further promote that content. Events will stay live up until the event date and all other content (blogs, articles, news, etc.) have a 7-day lifespan on Google Posts.
    2. Scoop Out the Competition. A new feature Facebook introduced in June 2018 to make Pages and ads more transparent was the Info and Ads section. Go to any of your competitor’s Facebook pages and locate ‘Info and Ads’ in the left sidebar. If they’re running paid advertising campaigns, you’ll see the exact sponsored content. Keep tabs on the competition to know what incentives and content (videos, downloadable white papers, cost calculators, etc.) they may be promoting. You won’t have access to their targeted audience or performance metrics, but at least you’ll know what you’re competing against in the paid Facebook advertising market. Think this feels seedy? Don’t worry…this information is public and they’re looking at your ads too.
    3. Respond to Reviews. The senior living industry has done a great job of telling its participants how important it is to respond to negative reviews on third-party review sites. This cannot be stated enough. But equally important is responding to positive reviews. A simple ‘thank you’ to a compliment or positive message tells the review reader that your community finds input from others to be important and improves the community’s opportunity at creating a dialogue with the review reader.
    4. Add Calls-To-Action to Your Content Posts. Regular postings of blogs and news articles are an excellent way to drive visitors to your website. At the end of your blog or news article, don’t leave readers hanging without a next step. Adding a call-to-action function such as ‘download a white paper,’ ‘watch a video’ or ‘sign up for an enewsletter’ puts the reader just one click away from a deeper dive to answer their questions and provides new pieces of information.
    5. Add Directional Buttons to Your Blog Posts. A user-experience best-practice is to add a small toolbar or buttons at the bottom of each blog post or news article to allow the reader to go to the <Previous> or <Next> blog or news post. This is particularly effective if you categorize your posts by subject such as Healthy Living, Retirement Planning, Caregiving, etc., since the directional buttons will take the reader to other articles common to their interest. Combined with tip #4 above (adding calls-to-action to content posts), this practice engages the reader and improves the chance for a conversion.

    Performance improvements to your digital marketing campaigns don’t always require time-intensive and costly investments. Often just a few tweaks to an existing campaign is all it takes to make a good campaign great. For more information about the 5 tips noted above, contact Jeff Felton, Vice President of Interactive Innovation, at jfelton@solutionsadvisorsgroup.com.

  5. Marketing Best Practices – Part 1

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    There was a time when the saying, “if you build it they will come,” was true in senior living: time when prospects lined up to make a deposit, when wait lists were long and the sales cycle short, and when sales people were ‘order takers’ with little need to actually ‘sell.’ And while there is evidence that occupancy of senior living communities began dipping in the early 2000s, it took a nose-dive following the 2007-2009 recession and has yet to fully recover in many parts of the country.

    In fact, the recession may have done more harm to the senior living industry than reduce occupancy. In a Perkins Eastman white paper, a survey of 200 providers and industry consultants conducted in 2015 showed that sixty-one percent of respondents feel the 2008-2012 downturn of the residential market and economic conditions permanently changed people’s outlook and expectations for their housing and service choices in their later years.¹

    The implication for the senior housing industry is that, as people’s expectations change for housing and services, the way in which we market and sell to this audience needs to change as well. Generational differences play a huge role in how we market to the senior audience. The “GI Generation” born from 1901 to 1924 are now in their 90s and, if alive, are likely to be in a nursing home. The “Silent Generation,” born from 1925 to 1942, currently are the primary market for senior living and active adult communities. And, of course, we now eagerly anticipate the dawning of Aquarius – the “Baby Boomer” generation – born 1946 to 1964. Over the past several years consultants, architects and all types of industry pundits and experts have been tripping over themselves trying to predict and forecast what this new generation of seniors will want in housing when their journey begins to enter the senior living world. Yet, at 72, the oldest boomers have just started on that journey and, at 54, the youngest boomers are not even on the bus.

    This 40-year age gap between the oldest members of the silent generation and the youngest boomers make marketing to older adults even more difficult. Add to the mix the influence of adult children and you have a wildly disparate group with vastly different experiences, needs and desires. While some are getting their information through traditional channels such as print advertisements or television/radio commercials, other savvier seniors are using laptop, computers or mobile devices to get information via the internet. A Pew Research Center report on seniors and technology issued in May 2017, shows that four in 10 seniors own smartphones and 67 percent of adults 65+ are online. Thirty-two percent have tablet computers and a growing number are comfortable with social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter.² Scott Townsley, founding Principal of Trilogy Consulting, asserts that “Today’s consumer (not tomorrow’s) has high expectations regarding the availability of technology. Tele-health/telemedicine, the ability to monitor and manage health and well being, to socialize and otherwise connect will fast become the standard.”³

    When it comes to senior living marketing, one size does not fit all. Multi-channel marketing is a best practice, meaning the utilization of more than one – and often several – types of media, from traditional media to digital marketing. This paper constitutes what we feel are the best practices to consider as part of the multi-channel marketing mix.

    Do the Research (Step One)

    Critical to the marketing effort is doing upfront research to understand both your market area and your audience. Established communities have the advantage of historical data to understand who their customers are: where they came from, their age at move-in, marital status, gender, home value, income and assets. Communities not yet opened must rely on understanding potential geographic and psychological barriers as well as overall local knowledge to determine the primary market area (PMA). And, over time and testing, this market area may change based on what the marketing efforts tell us.

    • Define your primary market area (PMA): Plotting the prior addresses of your residents will give you an idea of how wide (or narrow) your primary market is and may point out untapped market areas or areas you should be penetrating but are not. Understanding age, marital status and average income of residents as well as other demographic information will lend a clue as to how you are positioned in your marketplace: what prospects are you appealing to and why; alternatively, who aren’t you appealing to and why not?
    • Understanding the psychographic attributes of your residents and prospects is also an important component of attracting prospects more likely to move in. People prefer to live with other people who have similar interests and lifestyles. Conduct an interest survey of residents or potential prospects to understand what extracurricular and cultural activities they enjoy. For deep markets with a large population of age and income qualified prospects, narrow down your target market to include psychographic parameters, including interest in:
      • Cultural activities
      • Art/Theater/Performing Arts
      • Nutrition
      • Health and wellness
      • Outdoor activities
      • Subscriptions to specific publications based on interests
    • Competitive research should be conducted to understand who your competition is, their occupancy, pricing and services. How does your community stack up against your competition? Put your eyes on the competition or, better yet, secret shop them to find out if and how they may be marketing against you. The more data you have about your own community and customers as well as the competition, the better you can position yourself for success.

    Look for Marketing Best Practices – Part 2 in the September Solutions Advisors eNewsletter.

    ¹ “An Industry Poised for Change” Perkins Eastman Senior Living Survey 2015

    ² Pew Research Center “Tech Adoption Climbs Among Older Adults”, May 17, 2017

    ³ “CCRCs and Life Plan Communities, A Heretics View” Scott Townsley, Professor of the Practice, University of Baltimore

  6. Nurturing Leads from Downloadable Content

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    Don’t Write Off Those Leads Just Yet

    Incorporating Lead Nurturing into your Downloadable Content Strategy

    Senior living marketers have readily embraced the tactic of creating downloadable content for their search and website visitors, but have they embraced a strategy to nurture these leads?

    No matter what you call them (Resource Guides, E-books, premium content, etc.), downloadable gated content in the form of brochures or educational guides have proven to be popular and effective vehicles for informing your prospects about the community culture, history, lifestyle, residents, services and living options. But these aren’t just ordinary website leads … these are top-of-the-funnel (TOFU) prospects that are far from being ready to speak to a sales team member about scheduling a tour.

    Too often we hear frustrated sales teams lament the fact that prospects who have recently downloaded a content piece, either through both paid and organic sources of traffic, are unqualified. Many go so far as to write off leads entirely that come through downloadable content channels. It’s easy to see why sales teams have this perception. Most prospects who download educational content aren’t ready to talk to a sales person. They’re in the information-gathering phase and are likely visiting several competitor websites to learn about their options. The last thing they want is yet another sales person to call and ask for a commitment to a scheduled tour.

    And that’s where senior living marketers need to rethink how, what and how often they communicate to these TOFU prospects in order to move them from the thinking stage into consideration and eventually action. The best way to do this is through an email automation campaign.

    Outlined below is a simple, yet effective lead nurturing strategy for deeply connecting with your target audience to drive engagement and action.

    Step 1. – Develop your different buyer personas. What questions a prospect may have or what choices they might be considering can help you plan the type of content to serve to them. This can vary for different service lines or markets. For a luxury IL in a big city, the prospect may want to be assured that they’ll maintain connections to all the features a big city has to offer.  While an IL prospect in a small town may want to know that they can stay close to the neighborhood they grew up in and still have the personal connections to friends and family.

    Step 2. – Pick an email automation platform that best suits your needs and budget. Keep in mind that not all campaigns will need a full blown automation platform to be effective. Several email service providers (ESPs) will have all of the necessary tools and functionality to manage a simple lead nurturing campaign.

    Step 3. – Identify your audience(s) and plan for their workflow. If you have multiple downloadable content pieces for multiple service lines (AL, IL, MC, SNF, etc.) then you’ll need to develop a separate campaign for each audience. Segment your email list by buyer persona and create separate workflows for each audience. For example, write emails for adult children seeking AL for their parents and then have another workflow aimed at the prospects themselves looking for AL.

    Step 4. – Develop your workflow document. This will serve as your master blueprint for your lead nurturing campaign. For each email, identify the email name/purpose, content to be included, desired outcome and the timing of the email. Creating this outline will help you stay organized when you input your emails into your marketing automation platform or your email service provider. See below example:

    Internal Email Name Desired Outcome Email Content When Will it Send?
    Email 1: Thank You For Downloading the Guidebook Primary: Click to open Guidebook

    Secondary: View Blog

    		 Guidebook/Blog Immediately after guidebook download
    Email 2: Get to Know a Resident Primary: Read Pat’s story

    Secondary/Bonus: Contact Applewood

    		 Resident Story 2 days after first email send
    Email 3: Virtual Tour Primary: Visit the virtual tour page

    Secondary/Bonus: Schedule a campus tour

    		  Virtual Tour 1 week after email 2 sent
    Email 4: How Can We Help Primary: Call or set up a visit

    Secondary: Visit the website

    		 Contact Us page 1 week after email 3 sent

     

    Step 5. – Write copy for your emails all at one time, no matter how many emails are in the lead nurturing workflow. This ensures that tone, voice and flow are consistent throughout. Make your emails personal. Automated emails generally get better response rates when written from a person’s perspective vs. a company or brand. Open rates generally improve when you see an email coming from a person’s email like dianna@company.com vs. info@company.com. Add in prospects name using mail merge functions so that the emails are addressed directly to them. Those simple touches can make a mass email look less automated and more genuine.

    Like any marketing campaign, there’s no guarantee that moving leads coming in from downloadable content into a lead nurturing automation program will be a home run. However, it’s nearly a certainty that labeling these TOFU leads as unqualified from the outset without making an effort to engage would be akin to leaving every stone unturned. Solutions Advisors, already experts in sales and marketing, are equally adept at developing highly effective lead nurturing campaigns that connect and create action. Contact us to learn more about our approach.

  7. Attracting & Engaging High-Performing Team Members Using Social Media

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    The labor market is tightening. In April, unemployment hit 3.9%, a low seen only twice since 1970 according to the US Labor Department. The fight is fierce to draw top talent into the senior living market, to drive down turnover and to improve team member engagement in a way that sets your organization apart.

    More than ever, senior living organizations need to attract and retain great talent with a quality work environment and strong culture, but how? The average adult spends 116 minutes per day on social media. Not surprisingly, the platforms with the lion’s share of those eyeballs are YouTube, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram and Twitter. Solutions Advisors’ VP of Sales and Strategic Services, Angela Green Urbaczewski, recently spoke at the Colorado Leading Age Conference about how to leverage social media and team member’s social promotion to attract and keep talent.

    Step 1- Build the Foundation:

    • Decide which social media platforms you want to invest time and resources
    • Set up consistent, branded company pages on each that showcase your culture and message
    • Set a target for growth in followership or post shares and likes
    • If you’re just getting started, we recommend Facebook and LinkedIn

    Did you know that 70% of new hires read online reviews of a company before accepting a job? And many read more than seven! For organizations that already have the basics down, we recommend an online review campaign that can populate your company website, Google My Business, Glassdoor and industry sites like SeniorAdvisor with positive feedback from team members and residents. This builds your profile with potential team members and potential residents.

    If you already have company profiles on Facebook and LinkedIn, go ahead and set up a branded YouTube channel, Instagram feed or Nextdoor business listing.

    Step 2- Empower Champions:

    • Uncover the social media mavens on your team. This is a great leadership development opportunity for the millennials in your community, regardless of position.
    • Lifestyle team members are typically the ones closest to the action that depicts your lifestyle and culture. Make sure they have the technology they need: a smartphone or tablet with Wi-Fi access.
    • Set expectations for frequency of posting. We recommend four to six times per week, with mostly lifestyle posts, including one to two posts per week that celebrate team members or community partnerships.
    • Nielsen research tells us 81% of consumers trust a social media recommendation from a friend, but only 34% trust advertising on social media. It’s a good practice to encourage associates to follow or link to your company page. As they like and re-share posts , those items start to reach their networks of contacts.

    Step 3- Measure. Adjust. Promote. Repeat.

    Measurement campaigns start by tracking and promoting increases in followers and likes. Once the audience is built, track likes, shares, new reviews and responses. We recommend measuring monthly. Share progress and benchmarks with your team, and show them the most interacted-with posts so they will think creatively about how to do more of what works. We’ve even helped some teams set up automation of new blog posts to team members’ emails.

    What should I post to attract and engage great team members?

    1.       Always include a photo, a link to your website or company page, or infographic. Social media users are typically attracted to posts with visual appeal, and they get more interaction time on our smartphones.

    2.       Recognize, recognize, recognize.

    • Your Facebook audience is very likely comprised of team members, residents, their family members and, if you’re really engaging with others, some referral partners. This is your social media “inner circle.” Celebrate team members’ promotions, anniversaries, birthdays, graduations and accomplishments.
    • Your LinkedIn audience is presumably referral partners, competitors, industry leaders and professional staff. Promote company awards, training and community partnerships that build your credibility. Share thought leadership in original blogs and re-shared articles.

    3.        Showcase your core values.

    • Do you recognize team members who display your core values at your daily stand-up or monthly meetings? Extend that recognition to your social media channels, especially Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat. Encourage your team members to re-share with their networks and family and friends.
    • Do you commit time and resources to team-building or community service? Set up a hashtag or sharing campaign for your next community service or community partnership event and reward those who share it to their social networks.
    • Do you create intergenerational opportunities for residents or team members to celebrate special events with their families? Create a photo booth as part of the event, and cue participants to share their photos.

    4.       Create Testimonials

    • Whether they are from happy family members, residents or long-time team members, video testimonials are a powerful way to connect with future teammates and reinforce the strong performance of current teams

    5.       Promote key roles on the right channels.

    • Use LinkedIn to promote managerial and administrative roles. Link back to postings on your company website so potential team members can explore your community and company. Ask key team members who have built their online networks to re-share the post.
    • Leverage Nextdoor and hyper-local social media for front-line roles like dining, housekeeping or part-time weekend roles that appeal to candidates who want to work close to home

  8. YouTube Pre-roll Advertising for Senior Living

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    The Longest 5 Seconds in Senior Living Advertising

    Creating YouTube Pre-roll Ads That Engage

    As senior living marketers, we’re always looking for a new technique or wrinkle in an existing technique within our digital marketing efforts to help give our communities more visibility and engagement with prospects and active leads. One such ‘wrinkle’ often overlooked is right under our noses and easier to implement than many believe…YouTube pre-roll advertising.

    If you’ve spent time searching on YouTube, you’ve seen pre-roll ads and there’s a good chance you’ve found them to be annoying. You click to watch a video and suddenly there’s a commercial you’re required to view for five seconds before you can click ‘Skip Ad’ and make it go away. These commercials can be annoying because they aren’t the least bit relevant to your search.

    But they can be relevant and highly effective at reinforcing your brand and driving visitor traffic to your site where engagement can lead to an inquiry.

    Similar to other forms of pay-per-click advertising, YouTube pre-roll ads allow for several targeting options including:

    • Interests – based on audience categories
    • Demographics – age, gender and location
    • Keywords – specific keywords that are relevant to the video ad
    • Topics – the particular subject and similar subjects as related to the video content

    You don’t have to contract with a video production company to create a new YouTube pre-roll ad. Many senior living communities already have videos existing that provide tours of the community, testimonials from residents and family members and highlights from events and activities. With the help of a video editing expert, any of these videos can be turned into an effective YouTube pre-roll ad.

    A few important tips to keep in mind when creating your pre-roll video ad:

    • The first 5 seconds are critical…your video needs to be engaging and relevant to avoid the ‘Skip’ button
    • Make sure your viewer knows who you are…either with text overlay or in the voiceover
    • Limit the video to 15 or 30 seconds. Go longer and you risk losing the viewer’s interest
    • Make sure your video content is aligned with your targeted keywords
    • Your pre-roll video should live on the community’s YouTube channel with other community videos
    • Optimize your YouTube channel’s profile so viewers can easily click over to your main website for more information

    There’s no denying that YouTube is a powerful marketing force, albeit often neglected. There are 1.3 billion YouTube users with almost 5 billion videos watched per day. In an average month, 8 out of 10 individuals aged 18 – 49 will watch a YouTube video. Do you see an adult child influencer in there?

    Solutions Advisors are experts in search engine and content marketing, including video content and promotion. To learn more about how we can help improve your community’s video campaign, please contact us.

  9. Senior Living is the gift that gives year ‘round.

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    This time of year we pause to reflect on our blessings.

    The many reasons why we’re thankful to work in senior living:

    1. We get to work for and alongside some of the brightest and most inspiring people of any industry.
    2. Helping others find compassionate care and engaged living is eternally fulfilling.
    3. Listening to older adults share their life stories and understanding the importance of one’s own legacy is powerfully moving.
    4. We love being on the leading edge of a digital revolution, with the opportunity to communicate with older adults in new and exciting ways.
    5. We have a front-row seat in the senior living classroom where we are each learning new ways to live a more fulfilling life.
    6. The gratitude, grace and appreciation older adults exhibit for how we listen, guide, counsel and care for their well-being is inspirational.
    7. The benefit of life lessons gained from the knowledge and experience that seniors share with us.
    8. We’re at the forefront of tectonic (and exciting!) shifts in the way we view retirement living.
    9. We’re here to witness the coming of age of boomers and their impact and influence on everything from architecture, to lifestyle and to advertising in senior living.
    10. The work is demanding, challenging and often exhausting but knowing that our efforts add a value to our clients, community partners, residents and future residents is priceless and beyond measure.
    11. Being leaders in an industry that has shifted from a care focus to a supportive successful aging focus.
    12. To see innovative changes in care-focused initiatives and intergenerational movements.
    13. The ability to witness a shift away from ageism and towards embracement of the many great facets of aging.
    14. Knowing we can positively influence a person’s life trajectory leaves you feeling pretty good at the end of the day.

  10. Unleash Your Website for a Breakout 2018!

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    3 Tips For Improving Your Community Website’s Performance

    A few clicks or flips of your calendar and the reality will be jolting…it’s almost 2018! Fortunately for many senior living marketers, particularly those responsible for digital marketing efforts, the calendar is a welcomed friend. Only by looking backwards at year-over-year, quarter-over-quarter and month-over-month comparisons can we tell if all of the efforts like technical SEO optimizations, content generation and pay-per-click advertising will bring successes to our community websites in the future.

    But if your senior living community website didn’t receive the attention it needed this past year due to budgetary constraints or shifting priorities, it’s not too late to implement tactics that will help your website work harder in 2018.

    Here are 3 tips you can implement now to improve the engagement between your website and your website visitor.

    1. Start Blogging Away. Blogs are one of the most effective vehicles for delivering resourceful information to your target audience and shows your audience that you are an authoritative thought leader in your area of expertise. The bonus benefit is that when search engines see how many visitors go to your blog post, take time to read the content, and click through to your main website; they’ll reward your overall website with improved search engine rankings.

    You don’t have to overthink blog posts. Write about topics on which you are an authority, but make sure you back up your statements with solid research and facts. If you have confidence in the writing abilities of your team members, then empower your wellness director, medical director, dining services director and others to contribute a 500 – 700 word article that would be of interest to prospective residents and family members.

    A rule of thumb to keep in mind is that your blogs need to deliver relevant keywords that a prospect will be keying into their search engine browser. Make sure to include the most important keyword(s) related to your article in the title of the article and interspersed within the article copy. If you have a comfortable grasp on the technical side of postings, then include those keywords in the title tag, meta description and H1 tag.

    2. Know What People Are Saying About Your Community. Keep tabs on reviews written about your community, particularly the number of stars your community averages with third-party review sites like Google Reviews, Caring.com, Facebook, APlaceForMom.com and others. Your prospects will do research on your community and part of that research is reading what others are saying about you.
    We tell our clients that while a perfect score of 5 out of 5 stars sounds great, it doesn’t seem authentic. A mix of reviews including lesser star ratings is a good thing, with the 4.6 to 4.8 stars rating really being the target range.

    If your star ratings are lagging, take action to improve your scores by encouraging positive reviews from your current residents and families. To make it easy for them provide a review, create a web page with links to third-party review sites. Send out the link to this page via email or create a flyer with graphics and copy to encourage review generation.

    One of the most important aspect of reviews management is to address negative reviews in a thoughtful and timely method. Not only are you addressing one person’s poor experience with the community, you are showing your readers that you care about their experience. We addressed the keys to responding to negative online reviews in a prior post and encourage you to read that article to learn more.

    3. Embrace Videos. Website visitors love to watch videos to learn more about your community, the campus, the resident lifestyle and the local area. And the metrics prove it…visitors stay on a website with videos longer than those without videos. It is truly an authentic channel to demonstrate, and not just tell, what life could be like at your community.  Viewers are able to pick up a real sense of personality and emotion that words alone cannot express.

    And like other forms on online content, search engines will score a website higher in their search rankings if they detect the presence of videos on the website…particularly those that are visited and viewed frequently.

    You don’t have to be a seasoned videographer to create engaging video content. Today’s smartphones can serve as quality video-recording devices. Resident testimonials are an obvious source of video content, but branch out by taking a video tour of the community amenities, videos of events and video interviews of staff members. Prompt staff interviews to include what makes your community unique from other senior living communities including programming, culture, features and amenities. Keep videos to a moderate length (up to 3 minutes) to retain the attention of the viewer.

    To promote the videos, create an account with a video-sharing service such as YouTube or Vimeo where your videos will live. Add a video gallery page to your website and drop in the videos as they are produced, paying careful attention to give each video a separate URL so they can be shared individually through social media posts and paid advertising.

    Having the right digital strategy in place is critical to making sure your website is visible to the searcher, delivers relevant information to the visitor and provides an opportunity for the visitor to engage with the community. Solutions Advisors knows that every community’s needs and resources are different which is why we provide a customized digital strategy for each community client we serve. Contact us to learn more about our digital capabilities and approach to providing solutions.

  11. How to keep Direct Mail from becoming Junk Mail

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    7 ways to ensure a successful senior living direct mail campaign

    To achieve a measurable response, direct mail campaigns must be executed strategically through a combination of creative design, pin-point timing, a compelling call to action and a well-targeted mailing list.

    Solutions Advisors was recently honored with 11 National Mature Media Awards, seven of which were for direct mail campaigns for our senior living community partners.

    Regardless of the marketing channel we use, our approach is to always tell a story – through  messaging, design and photography. Our unique story-telling approach applies to direct mail, too – there’s an art and science that goes into ensuring the brand positioning and uniqueness of your community is communicated in a limited amount of printed space.

    There’s a limited time factor, too. With direct mail, you are granted a split second to capture the attention of the recipient – or meet the immediate fate of the recycling bin. But by following our 7 tips, your mailer can linger a few more moments in the hands of your recipient, and even compel them to act.

    1. Fun, Free Event + Key Selling Point + Proper Targets = Successful DM Campaign
    Rarely do we send direct mail without coupling it to a community event – but we don’t stop there. The event must showcase key selling points and be tailored to the amenities that make the community special. (It must also be properly targeted, but see No. 7 for more on that.)

    At Fox Hill in Bethesda, Md., for example, we wanted to showcase the wide range of foods prepared by the chef, so we held an exclusive lunch and tour. Food stations were set up throughout Fox Hill, encouraging visitors to walk around and experience the food, while getting a feel for the lifestyle of the community.

    A key selling point of Fox Hill is its focus on arts and entertainment. A few years ago, we started the Strathmore Music & Arts Showcase at Fox Hill, a series featuring jazz ensembles, vocalists, string sections, and other performers in the community’s performing arts center. The direct mailers highlighted the engaging, intellectual aspects of being a Fox Hill resident, and the events were well attended by both current and prospective residents.

    2. Avoid fatigue: Change it up!
    If you frequently send direct mail, don’t hold the same event or send look-alike mailers every month, or your piece will make a beeline from mailbox to trashcan. We did monthly mailers for the Strathmore Music & Arts Showcase for Fox Hill which are unique each time we drop – not just in design, but in the way the pieces fold and even feel (a painting event featured paper that felt like canvas). Some mailers should be in envelopes while others are self-mailers with various-sized postcards.  We’ve even experimented with fonts that mimic handwriting on the outside versus the typical mail house addressograph.

    3. Initial offers should be low barrier to entry
    So much of the direct mail we receive is, in fact, junk mail – get-rich-quick offers, department store sales, or coupons that entice recipients to spend money. Direct mail from a senior living community should not offer discounts or feel condescending – rather, it should feel conversational and welcoming. The goal is to get your prospect to experience your community, so make your call to action easy to get to “Yes” with meet-and-greets and fun events (more than a simple “Open House”). Note: while free food is always a draw, we believe not all events need to be ‘food-focused.’

    4. Follow-up mail should move prospects through the conversion funnel.
    If a prospect attends an event, they’ve shown interest. The next event they attend should be a hybrid format – still entertaining, but also educational. Send your invitation only to those individuals or couples who attended the first event.

    The third event-mailing, sent only to those who have attended the first two events, is about conversion – make it special, framed as a meet-and-greet with current or prospective new residents. In this mailing, you are targeting a very specific group of people – in fact, your marketing to them may not be in the form of a mass mailer, but rather a personal letter, phone call or well-designed email invitation inviting them to take the next step.

    5. Invest in good design and copy.
    Marketing messages bombard us every day, at nearly every moment: picking up your mobile device, reading the news, commuting to work. At the mailbox, you are not only competing with other senior living community mailings, but with every other piece of mail in the box. Don’t skimp on the actual copy and design – try not to use the same stock photos as everyone else.  A professional photo shoot is a good investment and will give you a library of photos that will differentiate your community. Your copy should speak to the individual, not to the masses, and have a compelling call to action.

    6. Make the CTA clear.
    Be sure to include a clear and visible call to act. We suggest putting the call to action on the mailing panel. We find that most people tend to look at their name and address when they grab their mail, and having your offer nearby, visually, is a good way to make certain it’s seen. Consider multiple contact options – some people hesitate to pick up the phone, so be sure email is a viable way to RSVP or consider a dedicated RSVP landing page.  Note: if your only call to action is ‘call us to learn more,’ you just wasted a lot of money on direct mail!

    7. Target, target, target.
    If your mailing list is not strategic or highly targeted, you will very likely spend lots of money with little or no return. Don’t settle for just ‘age and income’ – you can narrow your focus by home ownership, home value, marital status, and much more. Depending on the community type – luxury, assisted living, or a more value-priced neighborhood – your target list should be specific to the market you are trying to attract. Depending on the size of your market, your mailing may range from 5,000 to 50,000 pieces – so make every postage, design, printing, and mailing list dollar count.

    Direct mail can be a cost-effective lead generator as well as a way to segment your prospects and advance them through the sales journey. But direct mail has to offer a clear, singularly-focused offer with a low barrier entry. Be sure the design reflects your community’s brand positioning, using photos and copy that stands apart from other mailers in the recipient’s mailbox. If your direct mail campaigns have had less than stellar results, consider Solutions Advisors as your marketing partner.

    Direct mail costs can be kept efficient if you use the right partner. Solutions Advisors has a national footprint, extensive direct mail and marketing channel knowledge, and can help develop award-winning direct mail campaigns that yield results. Contact us online, via email, or by phone to learn more about our marketing services.

     

  12. Meet the Digital Team Behind Our Award-Winning Websites

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    Creativity without functionality is a dead-end as far as websites go. The Solutions Advisor’s digital team works side-by-side with our account management team, graphic designers, copywriters and web developers to turn creative ideas into websites that not only engage and excite, but convert visitors to leads.

    Our team of digital experts understands the back side of digital programming, knows what makes a website ‘sticky’ and makes the complex and ever-changing world of Google rankings and search engine optimization easier to comprehend.  Behind the scenes are bewildering terms like meta descriptions, 301 redirects, anchor text and alt tags; but what the user sees is a clean, engaging and easily navigable website with useful information and compelling calls to action that makes them want to ‘turn the page’ and take the next step towards making a connection with the community.

    Jeff Felton, Director of Marketing Services, has over 20 years’ experience in traditional and interactive production management whose primary focus is implementing digital strategies for clients.  Kimber Karn, Digital Project Coordinator, brings her disciplined, even-tempered approach to the technical side of digital strategies; while Emily Fox, the newest addition to the team, brings both web content, design and social media expertise to website development.  No doubt their digital expertise, along with Solutions Advisors’ creative and strategic marketing teams, will fill the trophy case with more website awards.