Digital leads continue to be a top lead source for senior living operators, but with conversion rates not where they should be, one senior living marketing consultant is asking why.
“We’re still having a real problem with speed to lead,” Bild & Co. CEO Jennifer Saxman told McKnight’s Senior Living. “We just seem to not treat digital leads with the same sense of urgency as we do someone calling or walking in.”
The standard response time for a digital lead should be two hours. But Saxman said that many of them still go unanswered, leading her to wonder whether a technology issue exists with a community’s website or a lack of backup for those digital leads.
“It’s still very much a broken process,” she said.
Mystery shopping of senior living community websites has revealed a high number of non-working links, Saxman said. Simple things such as regularly testing website form fills and making sure the “contact us” links are properly working can prevent losing those digital leads, she added.
Operators also need to ensure that their salespeople are doing their jobs. Saxman suggested copying the executive or regional directors on digital leads to have a true backup team, and holding people accountable for following up on leads. In fairness, she said, a salesperson might be at an event, conducting outreach or referral source development, leaving a digital lead to sit for five hours or more.
In some cases, senior living communities aren’t seeing quality digital leads, but Saxman said such instances reflect more of an issue with marketing and positioning.
The industry still hasn’t embraced digital leads, relying heavily on third-party referrals, she added. A preconceived notion exists that if prospective residents or family members truly were interested, then they would call or walk into a community, Saxman said.
There is some validity to that thought process, she said, adding that digital leads come with “a lot of noise.” But that doesn’t mean the leads aren’t good, Saxman said.
In a recent white paper on lead sources, Bild noted that overall, in 2023, 49.4% of new leads came from paid referrals, whereas 43% of new leads came from digital sources. In addition, 41.86% of tours were generated from digital sources in 2023, compared with 38.66% coming from paid referrals. Digital sources also totaled 38.64% of move-ins in 2023, compared with 36.86% of move-ins originating from paid referrals.
Breaking down lead sources should be a reflection of how much time sales teams are spending on those leads, Saxman said. Digital leads, she added, take five to six weeks to “pop” (when someone wants to take a tour). The problem, Saxman said, is that most sales team members send a generic email and may follow up a digital lead with a call, although it’s rare that someone does.
“We are very, very weak at our outbound follow up,” she said. “If it’s inbound, we’ll be very reactionary to that. We aren’t leading the charge, lighting the fire on a really strong outbound approach.”
Mindset, Saxman said, is very important. She added that many communities have individuals working in sales roles who aren’t really salespeople. Saxman called such people “pleasers” who are great at customer service but lacking in the skill set to pick up the phone and create a sense of urgency related to a digital lead.
“If we’re not training on it and spending time on improving their skill sets, we’re not going to get much better than where we are,” she said.
