Every salesperson knows the single most important reason someone will choose a community is the connection they feel with the salesperson on a tour. Once you get to that tour stage, it’s already a major win. It’s a big deal, but not the time to lose momentum. Tours are your opportunity to build trust with your leads and let your community shine. They’re a critical step to converting more move-ins that become happy residents.
If you’d love for more seniors to call your community home, what KPIs can your team track to maximize your sales and marketing strategies, schedule more tours, and get the conversions you desire? Berlin-based data analytics firm, DataPine, says, “It’s no longer good enough to simply glimpse at gargantuan chunks of organization and hope for the best. In these modern business times, you must extract every last drop of value from the metrics that matter.”
At Serviam, we’ve studied certain metrics that simply just work.
Speed-to-Lead
Do you know your daily call volume? How quickly does your team return calls, and do you have a standard time limit in place to respond to inquiries? Most communities aren’t measuring this, and it’s costing them tours.
People often choose the first community where they make a meaningful connection. So let’s break down what that means:
In today’s world, a business that’s quick to reply to leads is expected. When seniors put their lives and livelihoods into your care, they want to feel the comfort of a community who’s organized and on-the-ball. It’s the first moment you can build an incredible sense of trust, especially in circumstances that are oftentimes very sensitive for seniors and families. Connecting with your leads quickly is such an important part of the process. When people don’t hear back soon enough, they’ll move on to the next community. An hour or more response time is just too slow.
Serviam contacts leads within five minutes because that five minutes is the secret to laying a foundation for superior service that leads to productive tours. Start tracking your speed to lead time. If you’re able to get it under 10 minutes, we promise it will lead to more tours.
Contact Rate
What is your contact rate? If you’re merely speculating as to what this could be, you’re unfortunately foregoing thousands of dollars per missed call. Consequently, how many tours are you losing in the mix?
The benchmark for your community’s contact rate should typically be at 80%. A much lower percentage is a sign to reevaluate your approach. For instance, do you have a system in place to answer after-hours and weekend calls? 22.5% of all total calls handled by Serviam’s contact center come in after hours or on the weekends. Knowing this significant number helps communities manage their communication tactics, and if need be, reach out for additional help. Serviam calls your leads up to 10 times to make sure you don’t miss a potential tour.
If you’re losing leads and forfeiting those conversations because of lack of contact rate analytics, you’re actually not alone. A lot of sales teams are uncertain of this KPI. However, shifting your focus to such a crucial metric will drastically change your bottom line for the better. Think about it: If other communities are in a similar boat, you can break away and be a standout senior living residence just by ensuring you get that lead on the phone.
Conversion Performance By Lead Source
While third party sources like A Place for Mom and Caring.com produce significant lead volume, their performance is not always as successful down-funnel. Many communities use these services, but when they don’t achieve the desired results, it’s a cause for great dismay and perplexity.
Believe it or not, your own marketing plan is better for converting more tours. Measuring CRM sources like HubSpot, internet searches, Google Ads, your community’s website and social listening stats can give you a clearer idea about what’s working best for your community. Track tour scheduling and tour completion rates, find what strategies generate the greatest success, and determine how you’ll build upon your most effective measures. For example, did you know “email marketing’s average ROI is 122%?” Knowing which lead source creates more tours and move-ins will save you money, and help your sales team work smarter.
So there you have it, three KPIs to increase your tour conversions. If you want to learn more about your contact rate, speed-to-lead time, and conversion by lead source, we can help.