Does your senior community have vacancies that need to be filled? Or are you just interested in growing or starting a new community in general?
Running senior living community ads will be an effective way to generate new interest in the community.
According to arc.aarpinternational.org, over 10,000 Americans turn 65 every single day, and this pattern will continue until 2030.
With such a large number of people aging out of the work force and into retirement every single day, it is more important than ever for your target market to be able to find your community when they are online.
In today’s hyperconnect world, a vast majority of the population are internet users, including baby boomers.
According to www.pewresearch.org/ 81% of baby boomers use the internet.
Because such a large percentage of the market is online, it is important that you know how to reach them through advertisements and organic means.
Today we are going to take a look at the importance of your website, search engines, and landing pages as they relate to generating interest in your senior community.
Website
It’s no secret that we live in a hyperconnected world, and your website is the #1 way you can connect your senior living community to that hyperconnected world.
People in your target market are going to research your community and your competitors as they are searching for their new home.
This is why it is important to ask yourself, is my website as good, or better than, my competitors.
If the answer to that is no, it is time to make some improvements.
A few key features to think about when assessing your website are
- Does it load quickly?
- Is it optimized for all devices, desktops to smart phones?
- Is it easy for users to navigate?
- Is it visually appealing?
- Is it designed to convert?
All of the features listed above are important to a website, but an often overlooked aspect is the last feature.
Is your website designed with the intention to convert website visitors into leads?
Obviously it is important for your website to look and function professionally so visitors can trust your brand; but what next?
The most visually appealing website still falls short if it is not generating leads for your senior community.
So how do we generate leads from a website?
Call-to-Action
Your Call-to-Action or CTA is extremely important to a high performing website.
Your CTA is essentially the next step you are “asking” your visitors to take.
This “ask” needs to be clear and consistent across your website.
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Your CTA should at least be present at the very top and very bottom of the page so it is present when visitors first get to a page and when they are about to go to a new page.
Lastly, limit the number of different CTA’s you have on your website. A main CTA for your site and a contact page should do the trick.
It may seem like a good idea to give your visitors 4 or 5 different CTA’s to choose from; however, if your CTA is not clear and consistent, visitors will not know what step to take next.
So rather than choosing one of the many CTA’s they will just bounce off of the website and be on to searching for a different senior living community.
A professional website with a consistent CTA are important pieces when starting your senior living community ads.
Search Engines
Part 1 – Organic Results
Search engines like Google are obviously a powerful tool for consumers, but can also be a powerful tool for companies.
With effective search engine optimization, or SEO, your senior living community can rank on Google for the search terms your market is typing when searching for your services.
I am not going to dive into the details of how to rank with effective SEO, but for a great explanation, check out this blog by Backlinko.
What I do want to talk about, is Local SEO.
Mailchimp defines Local SEO as “a search engine optimization (SEO) strategy that helps your business be more visible in local search results on Google.”
Let’s say you’re a senior living community in Denver, Colorado.
The search term “Senior Living” get’s 33,100 searches per month, but has a Keyword Difficulty score, or KD, of 94.
That 94 is on a scale of 1-100 with 100 being the most difficult to rank for.
Not only would ranking on page one of Google for “Senior Living” be very difficult, a majority of the searches likely will not be interested in moving to Denver.
Shifting to a more localized strategy, the search term “Senior Living Denver” gets about 390 searches per month with a KD of 61.
It’s obvious the number of searches for this term every month are significantly lower, but so is the KD, making it easier to rank for.
Not only that, the searches are relevant to your geographic area.
By targeting these local keywords you increase your chance of ranking on page 1 of Google and, if you do rank, you gain visitors on your website who are likely in your target market.
Part 2 – Pay Per Click
Pay Per Click advertising is probably what you had in mind when you searched for senior living community ads.
Increasing your organic results as discussed above should be an emphasis for your business, but the main drawback is it can take time to increase organic traffic.
On the contrary, using paid methods like Google Adwords, you can increase visitors to your website, seemingly overnight.
Don’t get me wrong, it will take attention to your metrics and making the necessary changes to increase the click-through-rate (CTR) of your ad campaigns.
But this can typically be done on a shorter timeline than increasing traffic through SEO.
Typically, an effective PPC campaign will drive a comfortable return on investment (ROI).
These campaigns provide a good ROI because you are getting your senior living community ads in front of your target market, the moment they are actively searching for your services.
Let’s see if a comfortable ROI can be achieved for senior living communities.
In what Google calls the “designated metropolitan area” for Denver, there are 1,300 searches per month for “Senior Living Near Me.”
The low range for the top of page bid is $3.54 per click for this search term.
Let’s estimate it takes 200 clicks to generate 1 new client.
200 x $3.54 = $708
Now let’s assume the monthly rate for the community is $1,000 per month (estimating low on purpose)
On a 12 month agreement that is $12,000 in added revenue.
The ROI in this case would be 94.1%. This is a very good ROI.
Though this is already a strong ROI, there are ways to increase the conversion rate of your senior living community ads.
Landing Pages
Landing pages are a critical component of a successful PPC campaign.
So what is a landing page?
As defined by Unbounce –
“In digital marketing, a landing page is a standalone web page, created specifically for a marketing or advertising campaign.”
In other words, you are not running ads for your senior community and sending the clicks to the homepage of your website.
Instead, you are sending the clicks to one specific page, a landing page, that was created for a specific keyword.
When somebody in Denver searches “Senior living near me” and clicks on an ad –
The landing page could have the headline “Senior Living Denver Colorado.”
The headline and the rest of the page, are directly related to what the visitor typed into Google.
And, as mentioned in the website section, a clear and consistent CTA is important.
Find Out How We Can Help Grow Your Business
Let’s discuss your marketing needs, and we’ll help you put together a digital marketing strategy that will generate more leads and save you time.
A good option for this hypothetical landing page could be “Schedule a Tour” with an option to schedule right there on the landing page.
For an example of what scheduling right on the page can look like, check out our page here
A strong PPC campaign backed by well structured landing pages should give you a good return on investment for you senior living community ads.
Wrapping It Up
The market for senior communities is consistent and will remain that way for the foreseeable future.
That market is using digital platforms like Google to research communities before visiting.
Because your target market is researching online, it is important to –
- Have a professional website that looks as good or better than your competitors.
- Make sure that website is designed to convert visitors into leads.
- Develop a long term SEO strategy to increase website traffic over time.
- Utilize Pay-Per-Click campaigns to create an initial injection of leads.
- Have well developed landing pages so your PPC ads convert.
If you would like to learn more about having an agency develop your website, SEO, or PPC strategy click here.
Thanks for reading and I hope this article can be a resource as you develop your senior living community ads and grow your business!
If you want to learn more about some of the topics discussed, check out the links below.
