Capturing demand that shows itself via the myriad ways one can search and learn nowadays seems to be the hottest topic in senior living right now. From working hard to be present and (even better) an authority in SEO, GEO and on AI Chatbots, to making sure no call is lost by using an AI “back-up” phone assistant, everyone is making sure that when someone starts searching, theirs is the community that secures the good quality lead. Capturing demand well is a noble and good venture, and we should all do our very best at it.

We didn’t create this.

But we cannot forget as the “sudden displacement of the ocean” begins that it’s not headed our way because we’ve done an amazing job with demand generation. The silent and greatest generations just created more people.

In the senior living category, capturing someone interested in learning more is far easier than convincing someone to investigate senior living earlier than it’s needed (no shade to my capture-focused friends in marketing). I firmly believe we must continue to spend a portion of our resources trying to generate demand earlier in our target audience’s life and condensing the buyer’s journey. This is especially true for Life Plan communities, but delaying a move to assisted living has consequences too.

We say that we sell something most people don’t want, because what they want is to stay at home. But it’s also true that most people don’t know what they don’t know. And too frequently, even our planners who inquire stop being open-minded to a proactive decision and start living with a perennial hope that they’ll have another good year at home, not really thinking about the consequences until they are living in the consequences.

We wish you did it sooner too.

The comment “I wish I’d done it sooner!” should really give us pause. So many senior living professionals lament on LinkedIn that senior living isn’t doing enough to create lifestyles people find desirable. Improving that effort could certainly generate demand and sales. But as we wait and advocate, what can we do about our current communities filled with people who wish they’d done it sooner? Whose fault is it they aren’t doing it sooner? I’ve always felt it was all of ours.

We need to continue to make space in our conferences and our conversations for discussions on brand and generating brand awareness. We need to innovate the sales process and buyer’s journey, so when we pull in the young 70+ year olds they don’t walk away and come back when they are 85 and tell us they wish they’d done this sooner.

We have an enormous opportunity headed our way.

Here are 5 suggestions for how we can use the occupancy boost being provided courtesy of our fertile friends in the greatest and silent generations to gain intelligence:

  1. Capitalize on scarcity. Nothing, absolutely nothing sells like scarcity. Nothing fills an expansion faster than a waitlist loaded with people who have watched your community stay 100% full for a year or more. They. Want. In. And building a waitlist during scarcity is much cheaper than filling an expansion when you do not have a waitlist.

  2. Try some crazy stuff. Experiment with new things. It’s never less risky to innovate than when you have increased demand that supply hasn’t caught up with. And let’s be honest: we created the “sea of sameness,” so it’s up to us to change it!
  3. Get exceptionally good at living your brand. Give your advertising agency some really excellent, perception-busting content to work with.
  4. Test some theories. Could you survive on Google my business, organic and direct traffic alone? Do a risk assessment based on data and consider giving it a shot. You can’t really know what the true impact will be till you pull your ads off the SERP. And yes, I’m aware of the dreaded learning period, but human learning periods are a thing too!
  5. Flip the script. When demand is strong, you have time to apply critical thinking to the many things we’re being told we must do, and the things we’re told we can’t possibly not adopt. Sometimes being the odd man out makes you stand out.

If you are a kindred spirit, interested in using this time for gain – not rest – please reach out.