Our Guest: Debbie Howard, Co-Founder, and CEO of Senior Living Smart

In this episode, Debbie Howard discusses the power of adapting to technology as a business during the pandemic and some of the valuable strategies that have increased the success of Senior Living Smart, an agency that provides proven strategies for boosting occupancy in senior living communities. She divulges their best marketing practices, including mapping the prospect’s journey and personalizing the experience with their clients’ brands down to the individual person. She describes the effectiveness of marketing automation, using technology to reengage old leads and gain new customers, and speeding up the rate at which they receive leads.

Tune in to learn why third-party lead aggregators are a problem, why it’s important to pivot client interactions, such as tours, into virtual experiences, and why Debbie’s business is growing so quickly during COVID-19.

Conversation Highlights

  • How Debbie got into this industry and why she launched her agency
  • Senior Living Smart’s best marketing practices and programs
  • The major factor in why businesses are either growing or failing during the era of coronavirus
  • The problem with third-party lead aggregators
  • The temptation to venture outside of your niche or specialty

Key podcast Moments

  • [1:03] Roundtable Discussion: Debbie’s children’s band called Kid Rock
  • [4:16] Roundtable Discussion: How Debbie got into music
  • [5:20] About Senior Living Smart + Why she decided to launch the agency
  • [8:40] How Debbie got into the senior living marketing industry
  • [11:17] Senior Living Smart’s best marketing practices
  • [13:43] Stay in Touch Program: Reengaging old leads and generating new leads during COVID-19
  • [16:40] Do you think your experience in the industry may have opened your eyes to see things that you may not have seen otherwise?
  • [17:28] Third-party lead aggregators are a huge, expensive problem in the senior living marketing industry
  • [19:44] Speed to the Lead Program: Receiving leads into their marketing automation platform at the same time it’s going into CRM
  • [21:00] Was there ever any temptation to go outside of your niche?
  • [22:30] Future plans for the agency and their clients + Why they’re growing so quickly during COVID-19
  • [25:25] How to connect with Debbie + The perfect person to reach out to her

Magic Marketing Quotes from our Guest

  • “That’s when marketing gets really powerful, is when you can take a look at every interaction that a prospect is having with your brand… and from that information, use progressive profiling to find out about their motivation and their persona and what’s important to them. And then take all of that and create a personalized path to conversion based on that information.”
  • “Our industry experience is our superpower.”
  • “I think the reason that we’re growing so quickly in this COVID world is that if you didn’t have a digital strategy before, you are completely irrelevant now.”

Resources Mentioned

About Our Guest

Debbie Howard has more than 30 years of experience in senior living sales & marketing working at the community, regional, divisional, and national levels. She is successful in growing occupancy and revenue by improving marketing strategy and execution. Debbie specializes in building websites that attract ideal prospects, generate qualified leads, and mapping the prospect journey to maximize every opportunity to grow organic leads and reduce reliance (and expense) of third party aggregators.

Get in contact with Debbie Howard

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