What do Senior Living Visitors Really Think?
If you’ve ever tried to sell your house, you know how frustrating the whole process can be. All the cleaning and spiffing up. Shipping the family dog off to grandma’s house. Buying all those fresh flowers to arrange around your home. Then nothing. Zilch. Nada. Nothing. You never hear a word about what the buyers thought about your beautiful home. As a seller, you just want a little feedback on how the tour went. Insight that may help you figure out if there are issues you aren’t aware of in your home or neighborhood that are putting buyers off. Unfortunately, many realtors aren’t so terrific about sharing it.
It’s much the same for seniors and families who are touring an assisted living community. We pay mystery shop companies big bucks to try to find out what really happens on a senior living tour. But we know that can yield mixed results. Mystery shoppers aren’t too hard to spot. Word can spread quickly through your community and your region that the annual mystery shop is underway! And, quite honestly, many mystery shoppers just aren’t that good at it. The feedback they provide isn’t always helpful or even accurate. That is why we are happy to be able to share the results of a Caring.com survey of tours.
Here’s What Happens When Families Toured Your Senior Living Community
Caring.com surveyed over 1,100 family caregivers and seniors who were looking for a senior living community last year. They asked them to share their candid comments on their visit and tour experience. Here is what they found:
- People who tour your community are typically looking at three or more of your competitors. One third of respondents toured four or more senior living communities. Just 17% only toured one.
- Even though many of you are trying to improve the visuals on your sites, 68% of visitors are still surprised at how nice communities are.
- 91% of people commented on the staff. Nice matters! 10% of these people specifically cited observing the residents staff interaction as a reason for the tour.
- 20% felt their tour was too much of a sales pitch.
- The tour is a good predicator of timeline. 40% of those who had toured a community moved in and 8% were planning to do so.
- We know staying in touch before and after the family visits is a core part of nurturing the lead. 18% of families reported no follow-up contact from a community they visited, and 26% said they were only contacted once after their tour.
- Don’t give up when an initial tour is declined. 75% of those who initially declined a tour were open to scheduling it at the time they were surveyed.
- Transportation to your community for a visit might be an issue. 9% of those who declined a tour did so because they didn’t have a ride.
We saved the big complaint for last.
The topic that has been discussed in our industry more times than Olivia Pope’s wardrobe and wine glass on Scandal: Pricing.
The single most common complaint was the way pricing discussions were managed. Most families resented the fact they some communities still hold fast to not sharing pricing information until the day of the tour. To quote one family directly, “That approach may have been fine for previous generations, but this next generation is mainly email and text messaging. We need our information online.”
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