Hey, Google! Search for “senior living communities near me.”
When on the hunt for a retirement community, active seniors or their loved ones are compelled to browse the web. Google has become a great resource to research and gain insight on just about anything on the web — including your retirement community.
As you expand your search, Google grants a long list of results of communities in your area. Now, this is where paid search comes in. A list of results pops up and a user has a choice to pick between organic and paid searches. Paid searches will appear as sponsored content and will presumably be the first to grab users’ attention. The amount you are willing to spend on a click, ad quality and landing page relevance are all major factors in where your ads are positioned. These factors all need to be considered to put more eyes on your community.
Your digital presence says everything about your community! Angell Marketing can help you with paid search to target potential prospects. We asked our Director of Digital Marketing, Brian Bothamley to enlighten us on paid search in the senior living industry and how to have successful campaigns.
how does paid search benefit senior living communities?
Paid search or pay-per-click is a beneficial marketing tactic for a variety of reasons, but before all else, serves as a primary lead generation tactic and a key element to any marketing plan focused on generating new leads. Within the senior living industry, paid search has continued to rapidly grow in demand as the need for lead generation continues to grow across all levels of care. As opposed to traditional marketing, paid search provides transparent results. In addition, it allows brands to get their name, brand message and key selling points in front of their desired audiences who are directly interested in their services.
how does paid search generate leads?
PPC is known to widely generate new leads and remarket to specific audiences like — those who have either visited a website, visited certain pages or taken certain actions. These efforts will essentially get a non-lead website user to re-engage and become a lead. However, it is important to note that Google does have visitor threshold requirements, so oftentimes this can prevent many of our clients from remarketing.
why does senior living experience matter when setting up campaigns?
Senior living is a very unique industry, and it requires knowledge of the industry to execute effective PPC campaigns. To an outsider, senior living may mean different things to different people. To some, it could mean a “nursing home,” and to others, it could mean “independent living.” Understanding this and many other dynamics within this space is very important to not only setting up campaigns but executing and optimizing.
Needing to understand the audience and applying the appropriate messaging between audiences is a key element in being able to set up and run successful campaigns. For example, if we are running an assisted living campaign, it’s not as important to speak about the amenities as much as it is to speak about the important care elements the community provides.
what our the best practices for paid search?
Structure campaigns in an organized fashion by breaking each keyword theme out into its own campaigns, or at least ad groups. For instance, independent living and assisted living should have separate campaigns. It is best to use negative keywords in every senior living campaign in effort to negate unwanted traffic.
Since Google is not familiar with the senior living space, it is best to use exact match keywords as opposed to broad match. Not to say broad match terms can’t be used, but there needs to be a very methodical and planned-out approach to this. A campaign that is driven by broad match terms requires more oversight. When using this tactic, Google tends to be more relaxed with what queries your ads are being shown for.
Pick a conversion-friendly page while choosing which landing page to direct traffic. When driving users to a page that is difficult for them to navigate or take action, it’s not going to set the campaign up for optimal success. Direct traffic to form fills, tools, schedule a tour, downloadable assets or a contact page.
Lastly, it is necessary to ensure all conversions are fully tracked in Google Analytics and linked to Google Ads. This guarantees that PPC efforts are getting full credit where it’s due for any conversion that takes place.
what are some examples of successful campaigns?
In 2022, The Variel, a senior living community in Woodland Hills, CA saw rapid growth in conversion volume including both tours and deposits from our PPC efforts. This community saw a 42% growth in form submission volume (vs. the previous year) along with higher conversion rates and lower conversion costs. During the year, we segmented keyword coverage into more nuanced groups, retreated from any broad match coverage and implemented a variety of new messaging in our ads. Not only did we see the conversion growth, but client feedback reflected obvious growth in active lead volume with tours and depositors.
Another one of our clients recently saw huge success for both independent and assisted living campaigns. In 2022, The Carrington, a senior living community in Lincolnwood, Illinois, saw significant lead volume growth from paid search as we began driving all traffic to pages that are more conversion friendly and/or have downloadable assets on the page. During the year, there was a 50% growth in all submissions including contact forms, website users and asset downloads.
All things considered, each of our clients saw tremendous growth over the past year due to various efforts.
What’s next?
Paid search can be an effective way to reach potential residents and their loved ones as well as help increase their visibility in the interweb.
Are you looking to increase brand awareness or generate leads? Angell Marketing can help you achieve your community goals. Our full-service marketing agency is happy to help. Let’s chat!