April 9, 2025 • 35 mins
Building an effective home care marketing and sales team requires more than just hiring the right people—it demands creating systems that scale as your agency grows. Whether you're a solo owner-operator handling all aspects of marketing or managing multiple marketers across a larger organization, the foundations remain the same.
The cornerstone of successful home care marketing lies in three key elements: a compelling differentiator, deep understanding of referral sources, and unwavering consistency. Your differentiator answers the crucial question skilled nursing facility staff often ask: "Why should I work with you when I already have relationships with dozens of other agencies?" Without a clear, meaningful response, you'll struggle to gain traction in competitive markets.
Qualifying your referral sources emerges as a critical strategy for maximizing limited marketing time. Using Medicare.gov to identify facilities with higher percentages of Medicare patients (versus Medicaid) helps focus your efforts on locations most likely to generate private pay clients. This strategic approach ensures you're not spinning your wheels with referral sources unlikely to produce results.
The conversation around scalable sales processes reveals how effective marketing systems must function across team sizes. As one participant noted: "If it's not in the CRM, it didn't happen." This philosophy underscores the importance of documentation, tracking, and analysis in building sustainable marketing operations. Proper tracking helps identify which marketing activities generate the best outcomes and which relationships need attention before referrals drop off.
Perhaps most compelling is the insight into how referral sources—particularly skilled nursing facilities—evaluate home care agencies. They need partners who can not only provide quality care but also successfully convert referrals into signed clients, ensuring safe discharges and preventing readmissions. When you consistently demonstrate this ability, referral sources keep sending business your way.
Ready to transform your home care marketing efforts? Join our comprehensive 12-week sales training program and discover proven strategies for building referral relationships that generate consistent private pay clients.
Continuum Mastery Circle Intro
Visit our website at https://asnhomecaremarketing.com
Get Your 11 Free Home Care Marketing Guides: https://bit.ly/homecarerev
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, friends, hey everyone.
Hi everybody, hey there, happyWednesday.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Get started here and just to give people a little bit
of time.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hey Junie, it's so hard to not say happy Friday.
I almost say it every darn time.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Hope everyone's having a great week so far.
Guess it's hump day, right?
Is that what they say?
Wednesday is the halfwaythrough.
Happy Wednesday.
Happy Wednesday I don't know ifyou guys joined last time or
not.
We've changed things a littlebit.
We're not going to go throughall the things and how to log in
and all of that in thebeginning.
This goes out in a podcast.
I think it's good listening andif you guys know how to log in,
(00:45):
you probably don't want to hearit again.
So we will go through that atthe end and that's it so.
I'm going to go ahead and getstarted.
People are logging in.
It looks like we've got somechat stuff going on, so
everybody knows where the chatis.
Please keep your lines mutedand speaking.
We'd love for you to sharestories, experiences and tips.
(01:05):
Ask us some questions, makerecommendations, tell us what
you want to know.
Sometimes we run out of whatshould we bring up?
There's a lot to talk about inhome care.
We could probably talk all daylong.
Get to our own, what 24-hourlive kind of thing.
There's a lot to talk about.
But if there's somethingspecific you guys want to hear
that we haven't talked about ormaybe we talked about it a long
(01:28):
time ago and we could getdigging a little bit deeper let
us know.
I'm going to introduce myself.
I'm Dawn Fiella.
I have been working at ApprovedSenior Network almost for three
years now.
I've been in home care for areally long time, done
everything in home careoperations.
I've been in sales.
I've done recruiting, retentionFavorite part of the business
(01:48):
is probably the sales side andgrowing the private pay side of
the business.
I'm very happy to be here today.
I love that I get to continueto work in home care through you
guys and the mission and thepassion all of you have is just
unbelievable.
Go ahead, you're next here onmy screen.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Hi everybody, I'm Annette Ziegler.
I too I've been in home carefor 20 plus years, worked in a
CCRC for about 13, had that sideof the community business and
worked for a home care companyfor seven and a half years,
helped them grow from 1 millionto 4 million.
I loved what I did and now I'vebeen with ASM for about a year
(02:23):
and I teach the sales trainingclasses and I love teaching all
of you how to get those privatepay referrals, what to say, what
to do, and it's just glad thatyou're all here.
I see some of my class membershere, so welcome, and Dawn's got
a great program today.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, I know I see a lot of folks here.
I'm Lisa Marcella.
I have been in home careforever and a day as well, and
I've worn all hats, because it'sreally hard to stay in your own
lane in home care and you justwant the best for the company.
The caregivers, your clients,all of that Move and groove in
all those directions, but I alsoworked in newspaper and online
advertising way back in the daytoo.
(03:00):
Anyways, I love home care somuch and I love being here with
you guys.
Thank you so much for lettingme be a part of your journeys
and I just like to help you guysget where you need to get.
From this side, I love being apart of it all.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
And Valerie Van Boeven.
She is the co-owner and founderof Approved Senior Networks and
she's been doing this since2008.
She does all of the onlinestuff and we're more of the feet
on the ground piece of it.
So we will go ahead and getstarted.
Before we get started, we aredoing another free giveaway, so
(03:33):
one attendee will receive a setof customized June leave-behinds
with your logo, colors andcontact information.
You must attend here today,which all of you are here.
To be eligible, there is acaveat you have to promise that
you're going to send us pictures.
So we give you all the Juneleave behind.
You're going to take picturesof you doing this, or at least a
picture of what you came upwith.
(03:54):
People take what we give youand create their own kind of
thing, and we love to see that.
So if you would like to be inthe drawing, please type in the
word yes in the chat.
Looks like we've got somepeople going in there already.
Lisa is going to take down allthe names and we will do the
drawing right after and we'llget those sent out to you.
So today we're going to talkabout and this is one of my
(04:14):
favorite subjects building andtraining and effective home care
marketing and building andtraining and effective home care
marketing and sales team.
Again, I love the marketingside of this business and
growing and all of that, and sosometimes I talk to lots of
clients across the country andsome of you are solo.
You're the solo owner andyou're running the show all by
(04:36):
yourself and you're marketingand doing all the things.
And then we talk tomedium-sized companies who might
have maybe one marketer ontheir team and they wanna team
and they want to grow and theywant to scale.
And then we also have verylarge home care agencies as
clients that have five, six,even more marketers.
So I wanted to make sure wewere talking to everyone and
give everyone a little bit ofsomething.
(04:57):
How do you start and scale thisside of your business?
So we're going to talk aboutsales foundations, from the solo
marketer to small teams andlarge teams, how to develop a
scalable sales process, andtraining and accountability for
sustainable growth.
So a sales foundation reallymatters.
I know in home care, especiallyas you're growing, there's like
(05:20):
growing pains right and it'svery hard to.
It's almost like you grow sofast you grow past the place
where you would have laid downsome foundation and you got to
go back and figure it out right,or it's not scalable.
Maybe you've hired a reallygood marketer and she is killing
it out there, but there's notime to say stop, why is this
working?
(05:41):
What are you doing exactly?
How can I show somebody elsehow to do this too?
It's very hard.
So, regardless of what stageyou're in, at some point you're
going to need a sales foundation.
It matters.
It's the core structure thatsupports all your sales efforts,
whether you're a one personwearing multiple hats or a
growing team with defined roles.
It includes essentialprinciples, systems and habits
(06:02):
that are going to driveconsistent results, and so there
are three things that you wantto make sure are part of your
foundation.
There's lots of pieces to it.
The three things you don't wantto forget, though, is you need
a differentiator.
All of you should be speakingthe same language.
If there are a lot of people onthe sales team or just one
person, you have to have adifferentiator.
I was speaking to a client theother day.
(06:23):
He said he went to a skillednursing facility.
He actually got in front of thesocial worker and she said do
you see that wall over there,the wall was full of home care
companies.
She said I'm working with allof them.
Why should I even talk to you?
And that is what they say.
They don't have much time totalk to you.
If you don't have somethingdifferent about your company
that really stands out and meanssomething, they're not going to
(06:45):
talk to you.
This is how you get them totalk to you.
Yes, I see you're working withall of them, but we do this at
my company.
They don't do that.
Let me tell you about.
It Must have a differentiator.
That differentiator should alsobe in your social media.
It should be on your website.
You have to stand outeverywhere.
You really need to understandyour referral sources.
Maybe in our sales training weteach you all of those things,
(07:08):
but figure out who they are, whoyou should be, seeing, how to
speak their language.
All of that's going to bereally important in your sales
foundation.
And then consistency.
I cannot express this enough.
I know you can go and you cango see someone maybe two times.
They refer.
That doesn't mean they're goingto refer forever and ever.
(07:28):
You have to be consistent.
Consistency is 40 to 50 stops aweek.
Sprinkle in some lunch andlearns.
See everybody every eight to 10days not a face to face, but
you're some kind of touch pointevery eight to 10 days.
It's about creating strategicrhythm that ensures you stay top
of mind.
They always know that you'reout there Every time they're
dealing with talking to apatient.
(07:50):
Patients stay with them in asniff anyway.
14 days 10 to 14 days.
You have to have popped induring that 10 to 14 for every
single patient that's comingthrough.
So that's why the consistencyis so important.
Patient that's coming through.
So that's why the consistencyis so important.
So a strong foundation.
Your sales effort becomesreactive instead of strategic.
There are so many places inhome care where we're reactive.
(08:12):
Right Care evidence show wehave to react.
Client fell, we have to react.
Everything is reactive.
Wouldn't it be nice to have onearea of your home care agency
maybe not one, but an area ofyour home care agency that is
strategic and not reactive?
You have that control.
So that's when theopportunities start falling
(08:35):
through.
The cracks is when you're beingreactive in your sales, in your
marketing, when you're beingreactive instead of being
strategic.
A solid foundation makes iteasier to scale and grow your
team when you're ready.
So, solo marketers, how do yousucceed?
You're just doing everything.
You're juggling all the ballsin the air and you can't let one
of them drop.
(08:55):
Make sure you set aside timefor marketing.
This is crucial for any stageof growth that you're in,
because this is what goes by theside.
Marketing is not screaming atyou.
I need you.
I need you to come do this withme.
You don't have anything pullingat you making you do this.
A client adds four shifts.
That gets your attentionbecause you have to find a
(09:17):
caregiver, right, you don't havea choice.
You can't ignore that.
Marketing gets ignored.
Marketing gets set asidebecause it's not something that
is screaming for your attentionright now.
You have to start the marketing.
It requires you doing that.
You have to set aside time formarketing.
Maybe you go.
You say every Tuesday, I'mmarketing the whole day, no
matter what's happening.
(09:37):
I'm going to market everyTuesday or every morning these
days and every afternoon thesedays.
You have to set aside time toget this done.
Focus on high impact activities, because you have a small
window for marketing.
Whatever you're doing out thereneeds to be really effective.
So qualifying your referralsources is gonna be huge and I'm
not gonna go deep into this.
(09:57):
We've been through this lots oftimes but you will get the
slide.
So the link is here.
You can click on it.
The link will be live in theslide.
Anyone who is being paid byMedicaid or Medicare is on this
website.
We've got doctors, hospitals,nursing homes, rehab, home
health all of them.
I'm going to go to nursinghomes, including rehabs, because
(10:19):
this, to me, is the number onereferral source.
You enter your zip code.
This, to me, is the number onereferral source.
You enter your zip code, searchand all the SNFs and rehabs pop
up.
They're even on a little maphere for me, so I can even just
follow along and use this routeif I want to.
The way you qualify there's alot of things you can do to
qualify.
I'm just going to show youquickly and you guys should go
(10:40):
in here and spend some time inhere.
This website is incredible.
So you're going to see theirhealth inspection and what areas
they're well at, what areasthey're maybe not doing so well,
any violations, fire safetyinspections, all of that good
stuff.
But this is where the goldennugget stuff is.
This tells you how many bedsthey have.
It tells you what they take intheir building Medicare,
(11:02):
medicaid.
If they take both Medicare andMedicaid, you still have more
research to do.
A building that takes more than80% of their beds are Medicaid
is probably not a great placefor you to spend a lot of time,
because you're not going to geta lot of private pay clients out
of a building that's over 80%Medicaid.
People on Medicaid typicallydon't have the money to pay for
(11:25):
private pay home care.
People on Medicare, however, do.
If you see that they are doingboth, you're going to have to do
some research and find that outand you can ask to do a tour
and as you're touring, oh, howmany of your beds are Medicaid?
How many are Medicaid?
You can ask those questions.
Also, as you're scrollingthrough down here, there's
resource guides like how tochoose a good nursing home,
(11:47):
guide for living in a nursinghome.
So these are things that helpyou be a better resource for
your clients.
So there's lots of greatinformation.
So I'm going to show you anotherone, and I'm familiar with
these because I used to marketto these people Wellsprings at
Gilbert and, as I scroll down,they only have 32 beds, which
doesn't sound like a lot, butthey are 100% Medicare.
(12:08):
That is all they take.
That means everybody in thatbuilding can afford private pay
care.
Am I going to go hard afterthis one, harder than maybe
Allegiant that we just looked at?
You, betcha?
Maybe I'm going to find out.
Maybe they don't have very manyMedicaid beds at Allegiant.
I happen to know that they dohave quite a bit.
But either way, if it'sstraight Medicare, this is where
you're going to spend your time.
(12:28):
If you are a solo marketer andyou only have I don't know five
hours a week to market if itsays straight Medicare this is
one of the top places I'm goingto go.
So I just wanted to share thatwith you guys.
Give you a little bit ofsomething to help you qualify
those referral sources so you'respending your time in the right
places.
And then you want to builddaily habits, be consistent with
(12:49):
your follow-ups, networking,use some automation.
We have a great CRM here atApproved Senior Network.
Get a CRM that's going to workfor you and that's automated and
you can put all of your salesnotes in there and you can run
reports and look at all of thedata and make quick, effective
decisions.
So this is for the solomarketers.
(13:10):
If we're expanding to a smaller,large scale sales team to
transition, what works for oneperson doesn't always scale.
So when you transition from asolo market or a team requires
structure and processes.
You've got to sit down that oneperson, even if you're the
owner and you've been the oneperson what are you doing?
What are you doing?
(13:30):
What's working, what isn'tworking?
We've got to figure that out sowe can build that strong
foundation as you grow.
You're going to need clearprocesses for outreach,
follow-ups, tracking, referrals,to ensure consistency and avoid
missed opportunities.
Define clear roles who focuseson new business?
Who manages referral partners?
Who handles community outreach?
(13:51):
Who signs the job?
I could go on and on.
Where does one role start andone end?
That's going to be reallyimportant as you scale.
Everybody needs to know.
I pictured our home care agencythe ones I worked at where part
of the company was like.
If it was like a whole person,okay, the recruiting team is the
head, or maybe scheduling isthe head.
Marketing is the left hand.
(14:12):
This is the right hand.
Can we walk together like awhole person?
Is the company working all atthe same pace, the same level?
If we were running a robot andwe were all different parts of
that robot, would we be able toactually walk?
It's hard as you grow, it'sreally difficult.
Those are the growing pains.
Communication is key.
Hold regular sales meetings.
(14:32):
Use CRM I can't stress thatenough.
Track key metrics to stay onthe same page and drive
performance, no matter the sizeof your team.
So what is a scalable salesprocess?
A system that works for anysize team, whether you're a solo
operator or managing a team of10,.
A scalable process ensuresconsistency.
Everyone follows the same stepsto generate and manage
(14:54):
referrals.
So for me, I would think okay,a sales lead just came in over
the phone.
What do we do?
What is our process, from thatcall coming through all the way?
Speaker 3 (15:07):
to the opening of the case and they've been signed.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
What does that look like?
Let's get that down on paper.
And can we make it better?
And does?
And everybody needs to knowexactly who's in charge of what
parts of that.
Every lead must be followed upon.
Every referral source getsattention.
You should set timelines onthat.
If a lead comes in throughagingcarecom, I don't know when
do we call.
What's the rule?
Do we call it's Saturday?
(15:31):
Do I call today?
Do I wait till Monday?
When Lisa's on call, they getcalled in 10 minutes.
When Dawn's on call, they getcalled Monday.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
That's not okay right .
Speaker 2 (15:43):
These are the things we're talking about.
It has to be scalable.
Everybody needs to be workingat the same level, so a strong
process ensures no one fallsthrough the cracks.
Referral partners feel valuedand leads get the timely
follow-up needed to convert theminto clients.
Whenever we would get areferral whether it turned into
a job or not we brought them athank you and all of us knew
that was what we were going todo.
(16:04):
We knew we didn't spend a lotof money on it.
Sometimes it was just ahandwritten thank you note,
sometimes it was a handwrittenthank you note with a coffee.
We knew the guidelines.
We knew how much we could spend.
We knew when the thank you notewent out.
We all knew that.
And when someone new comes onboard, their training tells them
that's what we do.
So those are the kinds ofthings that tend to fall through
(16:25):
the cracks.
Repeatability brings clarityand better results.
When your team follows a provensystem, you reduce guesswork,
improve efficiency and create afoundation that can grow with
your agency.
The key stages of the salesprocess.
So if you can break these downand decide what you're doing at
every stage and who's doing it,this can also be helpful.
(16:46):
So prospecting is identifying,reaching out to the referral
sources, engagement you'rebuilding trust by focusing on
the needs and goals of yourreferral sources and letting
them see you in action, showgenuine care for the client and
their family.
Conversion is closing that loopand getting clients signed up.
Referral sources are countingon you.
This is a big piece that tookme a really long time to
(17:09):
understand.
When a referral source,especially a social worker,
knows they need to have a safedischarge, this person needs to
go home and not readmit.
They're going to give thisclient to someone they trust yes
, and someone they know who hasa good company, is capable.
They're also going to give itto someone who can get this
client to agree to sign up,because it's not going to be a
(17:30):
safe discharge If you go inthere and the client goes nope,
I don't want the services notgoing to talk to you and you
just leave.
I'm not saying you need to bepushy and awful, but you need to
be able to get past thatgracefully and get them to sign
up and understand they have todo this to get home safely.
So they're counting on you tohave the hard conversations and
to guide families towardsaccepting the care they need.
(17:52):
Referral sources need that safedischarge.
If they know you're going toget them to sign, they'll refer
to you more often.
And it has to happen becauseyou care about them, not because
of the money or because you'rebeing pushy.
It's basically, mr Smith,you're in the sniff because you
fell in the shower.
We don't want that to happenagain and you're going to be
weaker when you leave here thanwhen you fell in the shower
(18:13):
three weeks ago.
It's really not safe for you togo home without somebody
assisting you in the shower.
You need a shower chair, youneed a shower hose like getting
into all of that.
That's a piece of it is beingable to convert them into
clients.
Retention, keeping referralsources engaged over the
long-term.
Consistency and reliability arekey there.
(18:34):
Going back over and over again,bringing the really fun
leave-behinds that Lisa makes.
They look forward to you coming.
They love the creativity andjust being reliable when they
text you on a Friday at fouro'clock that they can reach you
and you're going to followthrough and do what you've told
them you were going to do allalong Automating and tracking
the sales process.
This is where the CRM comes in.
(18:55):
Use a CRM software to trackoutreach, follow-ups and
referrals.
So 40 to 50 stops a week withthe theme each week is hard to
remember.
So you must track what'shappening.
If it's social worker month,like it has been in March, it's
social worker month and I'mbringing around those stickers.
We had a client that broughtaround a flowering can.
Am I going to remember, out ofall 50 stops, who got what Am I
(19:17):
going to?
I've done this myself.
I pulled up into a parking lotand thought did I bring them a
pumpkin?
I can't remember.
And you're going to come inwith another pumpkin.
I guess you can, but they'regoing to think you lost your
mind if you've already broughtthem one.
So the CRM can help with that.
It's going to help you trackyour stops.
It's going to there'sautomations where it'll set a
task so you make sure that yougo back next time.
(19:38):
You don't forget to go back.
And it also helps you toze whathappened.
So I did drop by with Mary,face to face.
Drop by, boom, got a referral.
What was it?
Did that happen with fivereferrals where I had a face to
face and the next week I got areferral?
Is that what it is?
Is it the face to face, is itthe lunch?
And learn.
What was it that not?
(19:59):
Did I bring a lead behind?
That was really fun.
Did I get more time with her?
What caused her to refer?
You will start seeing trendsand patterns if you're using a
CRM and tracking the results andanalyzing them.
Set up a system for automatedreminders to stay in touch with
referral sources.
This could be done through aCRM that prompts follow-ups.
(20:19):
It sends check-in emails toyour clients and referral
sources.
It schedules the visits for youto keep relationships active
and consistent so you rememberto keep going back.
Train the team to loginteractions consistently so
that no relationship gets lost.
So there used to be a rule inhome care for well sky clear
care, and I know Lisa agreedwith me, probably Annette too.
(20:41):
If you didn't put it in thesystem as a note, it didn't
happen, it doesn't exist.
It didn't exist, it neverhappened.
You talked to the caregiver andshe told you that she, that
so-and-so, took her meds.
No, you didn't.
It's not in the system, didn'thappen.
So it should be the same waywith marketing and your CRM.
If it's not in there, it didn'thappen.
(21:03):
So it's going to be reallyimportant that the whole team is
logging in.
Every call, every visit, everytouch point with the referral
sources should all be documentedin your CRM or tracking system.
However you're doing it.
This ensures seamless handoffs,avoid duplicated efforts.
It helps you identify whichrelationships are thriving and
which need more attention Overtime.
(21:24):
This data also reveals trendsthat can guide your strategy
moving forward.
Review reports regularly andrespond strategically.
Use the data from your CRM toidentify patterns who's
referring, who's gone quiet,where is your time spent best?
Look at both short-term andlong-term trends and any shifts
that have happened, and thenadjust your outreach plan
(21:45):
accordingly.
When all of this information isentered in there and you can
pull out analytics that guideyou in a certain direction, it's
just there's nothing better.
So this is going to be reallyimportant.
And then training andaccountability.
Even experienced marketers needongoing training and coaching.
(22:06):
While home care marketing maynot change drastically, there's
always room to grow.
Even for the most seasonedprofessionals, a single new
approach or idea can be the keyto landing a handful of
high-value clients.
Ongoing training helpsmarketers sharpen their skills,
stay fresh and pick up small butimpactful tactics.
It's not about overhaulingtheir style.
(22:28):
It's about refining it, stayingfocused and continue to improve
outcomes.
I know in my marketing meetings.
We would sit down and oneperson would say a little.
She felt stuck, I'm stuck withthis referral source, I just
don't know what to do.
We'd start talking about it andwithin seconds minutes we would
have a solution.
For oh, I didn't think aboutthat.
It's not because she doesn'thave the sales ability or
(22:50):
whatever.
Her brain just didn't go there.
It's important to talk thesethings through and to do ongoing
training.
Just a little tweak in somethingcan make a world of difference,
and I know it can be hardsometimes to hold people
accountable, especially amarketer who's doing really well
.
She's making it done, but maybeshe could be doing a little bit
more.
Or maybe with a little tweakshe could get more things, more
(23:11):
clients signed.
Maybe she's getting referralsbut she's not signing.
A little bit of ongoingtraining or a little bit of time
together could make a world ofdifference.
So without accountability,sales efforts become
inconsistent and ineffective.
Without a system of check-insand expectations, even the best
marketers can start to drift,missing follow-ups, prioritizing
(23:32):
the wrong context or losingmomentum.
Accountability ensuresconsistency, whether it's a
weekly one-on-one pipelinereviews or daily activity log.
These touch points createstructure, increase transparency
and keep everyone focused onresults.
I had a marketer that would sayhey, dawn, did you run the
report yet from last week?
Yeah, who'd I miss?
Who'd I miss?
(23:52):
I feel like I missed somebody.
That's terrible, right, wedon't want her missing anybody,
but she was counting on myreporting to make sure that
everyone got seen last week.
And it's because when you missthem, they quit referring and
you don't want to get to thatplace where they've quit
referring to realize, oh gosh, Ihaven't seen Mary in five weeks
.
You don't want to get to theplace because now you got to go
(24:12):
back in and break back in.
Somebody else has gotten infront of Mary and she's now
referring to somebody else.
You can't allow a visit to bemissed because then the
referrals stop and once thathappens you have to go back and
dig back in.
So it's much better to just notmiss in the first place, and
accountability helps with that.
The best agencies reviewperformance metrics regularly.
(24:35):
You can't improve what youdon't measure.
Top performing agencies look atnumbers consistently how many
contacts were made?
Which sources are referring?
How quickly leads areconverting?
Where are things falling off?
Reviewing this data on aregular basis helps you adjust
strategies in real time,recognize team strengths.
It helps you address problemareas before they grow.
(24:55):
It also reinforces culture ofperformance and results.
So structuring initial andongoing sales training.
Initial sales training is anabsolute must.
It does not matter if they'vebeen a salesperson their whole
entire life.
If they're new to home care,they need sales training.
It doesn't matter if they'vebeen in home care their entire
life.
If they are new to the salesrole, they need training.
(25:17):
And someone with no home careor sales experience absolutely
needs training.
This is a very unique industry.
Every referral source type isdifferent.
No home care or salesexperience absolutely needs
training.
This is a very unique industry.
Every referral source type isdifferent.
The language, your approach,your leave behinds they're all
different.
Having a clear understanding ofwhat to do will set your team
up for continued success.
Weekly sales meetings forstrategy discussions these
(25:38):
sessions keep the team aligned,allow space to address
roadblocks and help reinforcepriorities.
You do need to have a meetingweekly.
It doesn't need to be more thanan hour, but you need that time
together to talk about.
What's the game plan this week?
What's the theme this week?
Did we get to everybody lastweek?
Are there some we need to goback to?
(25:58):
What are we struggling withRole-playing?
We did a lot of role-playing inour meetings real-world referral
scenarios to sharpen yourskills.
Annette does a ton ofrole-playing in their sales
training.
The role-playing is reallyimportant because it builds your
confidence.
Someone like Annette, who'sbeen doing this for years and
years.
She can pretend to be a socialworker and she can say things to
(26:20):
you that no one on your teamwould know a social worker would
say.
So it really can sharpen yourskill.
It gets you ready for thoseobjections they're going to
throw your way.
Oh, that sounds expensive.
What do you say to that?
Right, and so the salestraining is really important.
And the role playing isimportant because it gets you
ready to overcome thoseobjections.
(26:40):
It gets you ready for toughconversations.
It ensures, too, that you havea consistent message across your
team.
If you're all role-playingtogether, you wouldn't believe
that oh, I didn't know we did itthat way, or I know that's how
we did that.
You won't believe the thingsthat the team will say because
they don't know.
And it comes out in theserole-playing sessions or in your
sales meeting and training.
(27:02):
Bringing an industry expert forperiodic training sessions.
I would bring in hospiceagencies.
I would bring in home healthagencies.
I would have them present theirservices, but they would also
talk to us a little bit abouthow hospice works.
Or they would talk to us alittle bit about home health and
bathing Like, how long does thebathing go on?
Because I used to see them as acompetitor.
(27:22):
I used to think we do bathing,they do bathing.
Why am I going to want to workwith a home health agency if
they're also doing bathing?
They can educate your teamabout how that works and, yes,
when the bathing is no longergoing well in the home health,
we will pick up the bathing.
So bringing in those industryexperts is really helpful and
your team will really like thattoo.
They want to learn more aboutthat.
(27:43):
Fresh insights from outsidevoices can reinvigorate your
team and introduce strategiesproven to work in other markets.
Do we have any questions?
I've just been going on and onEverybody, okay.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
We just Tess said that she uses the tracking sheet
that we gave her during salestraining and it's been working
great for her.
She changed it to fit her needsand when she goes back to the
office she logs all herdrop-offs.
And she also learned that shethanks every follow-up.
Just like you said, dawn,making sure everybody.
(28:15):
Yeah, oh good.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
That's right.
Okay, we've got any questions atall, please, please, let me
know.
All right, holding the salesteam accountable.
So we're going to need to setclear performance goals, clear
expectations, give your teamdirection, create accountability
and help everyone understandwhat success looks like.
This is industry standard stuffhere 40 to 50 stops a week,
(28:38):
full-time marketer.
Out of those 40 to 50 stops, 15to 20 of them are face-to-face.
The number of referrals youwill eventually get from these
efforts is five to seven a week.
So you're doing all thesethings every single week.
Eventually, you're going to getfive to seven referrals.
They don't all turn into jobs,right, but a lot of them do.
When you take a service inquiryof the phones, it might be an
(28:59):
agingcarecom, it might be asocial worker, it might be a
social worker, it might be afamily member, adult daughter.
70% of those should be booked.
So if you've taken 10, sevenshould be booked.
All the assessments should goout on 90% signing ratio, so
nine out of 10 should sign.
So when you get through all ofthese things, at the end of the
week you should have three tofour signed jobs a week
(29:21):
Eventually.
It's not going to happenovernight.
You've got to have reallystrong relationships out there,
be consistent and do all thethings Track progress in a CRM
and review your metrics monthly.
This helps identify trends,uncover gaps in outreach and
ensures accountability bycomparing goals with actual
results.
And then you want to recognizeand reward success, to keep
(29:42):
motivation high.
Celebrate the wins, big orsmall.
Encourage healthy competition.
This boosts morale andreinforces behaviors that drive
growth.
So talk about those 24s thatgot signed.
Talk about okay, this weekwe're all going after 24s, let's
see what we can do.
Whoever gets the most 24s thisweek, this is what they're going
to get.
Have some fun things like thatgoing on in the office.
(30:05):
I think it really helps tobuild morale.
Lisa, did you have something toadd?
Speaker 1 (30:09):
I was just going to say high fives, go through and
high five each other and be eachother's biggest cheerleaders.
Yeah, sure, definitely.
Speaker 3 (30:18):
Everyone motivated.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
You need the motivation.
You're out there a lone wolfsometimes you are and sometimes
need the motivation out there.
You're out there alone, lonewolf, sometimes you are and
sometimes you feel beat up.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
I would call my boss and say I've been beat up all in
the first one.
I called you what I meant.
No one wants to talk to me.
I'm starting to think I havebad breath.
Something's bad today, like Iknow one one, and it feels like
that sticks to you.
Like the first two places yougo, you feel defeated and beat
up.
And so then the next place yougo, you're just wearing that, I
(30:46):
think, and they can sense it.
You got to get rid of it.
So you do.
You are out there alone andit's hard to smile all day and
be a cheerleader all day long.
So, yes, it's great to motivateyour team, be there for them,
and I would announce wins.
Even in a group chat, youwouldn't believe this.
And I would announce wins evenin a group chat.
You wouldn't believe this.
So-and-so went to.
She got in.
You guys, she's been trying forthree months.
(31:06):
She got in.
She got past the gatekeeper.
She has a lunch and learnscheduled oh my gosh.
So that's going to be reallyimportant too, because it's not
an easy job.
It can be tough.
Some days are really wonderfuland exciting and some can be a
challenge.
So, all of that being said, wedo have a home care sales
(31:27):
training.
It is 12 weeks of live Zoomtraining with Annette.
She does a great job.
By week six most of ourattendees are getting referrals
from skilled nursing facilities.
We only have a few spots leftin our April 15th and April 30th
classes.
So if you want more informationabout that, you will get the
slide link so you can go intohere to get the registration
link.
But if you want any moreinformation about that, you will
get the slide link so you cango into here to get the
registration link.
But if you want any moreinformation about the sales
(31:49):
train, you can ask now or we canget with you after it's been
going really well.
We've had I think April 30 isour 30th class in it.
Wow, I know.
Wow, that's crazy, crazy.
We've had over 100 people gothrough the class and it's just
going gangbusters, gangbusters.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yay, marie, marie's starting next week.
We're so excited for you, marie, and you're gonna just love it.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
I just it just goes really well.
You get your leave behind, youget.
I had an owner say to me theother day I didn't know you were
spoon feeding my marketers andI said, yeah, you gave them the
words to say and I go yes, thatthat's the whole point.
We want them to be successfuland I think the reason this
works over some other one anddone bootcamps like come to our
(32:34):
bootcamp this week or come tothis weekend, where it's not a
one and done it takes 90 days.
Because it takes 90 days, wegive you the.
This is what you do with asniff Go do it, come back, let's
talk about it.
This is what you do withindependent living Go do it,
come back, let's talk about it.
And I think that's why it worksso well is because you're
getting that feedback.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
And I was going to say Dawn, you were just talking
about celebrating the wins.
We're together 12 weeks forthis class and it's just so
exciting.
I had somebody yesterday.
He was totally new to marketingand he got his first referral
and he was so excited, and it'syou have to, we had to give him
a call.
I said, hey, oh my gosh, youdid this and it's you have to
(33:16):
celebrate the wins because it'shard.
He was going to, you could begoing 50 places, 10 places a day
, and they're just closing thedoor on you.
Then you get that referral.
You did it, you did it.
And what I told them was if youdidn't walk in there, they
would have never known you andyou would have never.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
And you have to know, like, when to push and when to
you always have to go back.
It's never going to be.
Oh, they were rude to me, Ican't go back there.
That's not a thing you have to.
You got to figure it out andthat's what's so great about the
class is that for 12 weeks youhave somebody that's going to
help you strategize and figurethat out.
(33:53):
Whatever comes up, you're notalone at all.
And you do get 12 hours ofvideo sales training.
Maria is saying that Donnastarted the 12 hours of the
video training and is alreadylearning so much from the video
training.
So the 12 hours of videotraining, you take that at your
own pace.
You can take it while you'retaking the class or before you
take the class, and that's goingto give you a lot of
(34:13):
information already.
And then you start andsomeone's asking for the link.
So I'm going to give them thelink to the actual sales
training real quick so they canread more about it.
And then the registrationwhoops, okay.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
I think the registration's on the slide.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
I think, yeah, the registration link is on this
slide, but here is the link sothat you can read more about it.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
What I like about this, too, is that you can see
after each class we ask maybefor a testimonial or whatever,
and the people that are notcamera shy give that and you can
see those testimonials on thelink or on the page and those
are just really just a greattestament to what's happening
Everyone getting their referrals.
It's great.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yes, I'm going to put the registration link in here
too, just so you guys haveeverything you need.
Okay, and so this is theregister link.
All right, so we're going tomove on and again, if you.
Okay, and so this is theregister link.
All right, so we're going tomove on.
And again, if you and joinedlater.
If you want to be in thedrawing for free june, leave
behinds.
Please type yes in the chat.
Hey, friends, hey everyone.
Hi everybody, hey there, happyWednesday.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Get started here and just to give people a little bit
of time.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hey Junie, it's so hard to not say happy Friday.
I almost say it every darn time.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Hope everyone's having a great week so far.
Guess it's hump day, right?
Is that what they say?
Wednesday is the halfwaythrough.
Happy Wednesday.
Happy Wednesday I don't know ifyou guys joined last time or
not.
We've changed things a littlebit.
We're not going to go throughall the things and how to log in
and all of that in thebeginning.
This goes out in a podcast.
I think it's good listening andif you guys know how to log in,
(00:45):
you probably don't want to hearit again.
So we will go through that atthe end and that's it so.
I'm going to go ahead and getstarted.
People are logging in.
It looks like we've got somechat stuff going on, so
everybody knows where the chatis.
Please keep your lines mutedand speaking.
We'd love for you to sharestories, experiences and tips.
(01:05):
Ask us some questions, makerecommendations, tell us what
you want to know.
Sometimes we run out of whatshould we bring up?
There's a lot to talk about inhome care.
We could probably talk all daylong.
Get to our own, what 24-hourlive kind of thing.
There's a lot to talk about.
But if there's somethingspecific you guys want to hear
that we haven't talked about ormaybe we talked about it a long
(01:28):
time ago and we could getdigging a little bit deeper let
us know.
I'm going to introduce myself.
I'm Dawn Fiella.
I have been working at ApprovedSenior Network almost for three
years now.
I've been in home care for areally long time, done
everything in home careoperations.
I've been in sales.
I've done recruiting, retentionFavorite part of the business
(01:48):
is probably the sales side andgrowing the private pay side of
the business.
I'm very happy to be here today.
I love that I get to continueto work in home care through you
guys and the mission and thepassion all of you have is just
unbelievable.
Go ahead, you're next here onmy screen.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Hi everybody, I'm Annette Ziegler.
I too I've been in home carefor 20 plus years, worked in a
CCRC for about 13, had that sideof the community business and
worked for a home care companyfor seven and a half years,
helped them grow from 1 millionto 4 million.
I loved what I did and now I'vebeen with ASM for about a year
(02:23):
and I teach the sales trainingclasses and I love teaching all
of you how to get those privatepay referrals, what to say, what
to do, and it's just glad thatyou're all here.
I see some of my class membershere, so welcome, and Dawn's got
a great program today.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, I know I see a lot of folks here.
I'm Lisa Marcella.
I have been in home careforever and a day as well, and
I've worn all hats, because it'sreally hard to stay in your own
lane in home care and you justwant the best for the company.
The caregivers, your clients,all of that Move and groove in
all those directions, but I alsoworked in newspaper and online
advertising way back in the daytoo.
(03:00):
Anyways, I love home care somuch and I love being here with
you guys.
Thank you so much for lettingme be a part of your journeys
and I just like to help you guysget where you need to get.
From this side, I love being apart of it all.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
And Valerie Van Boeven.
She is the co-owner and founderof Approved Senior Networks and
she's been doing this since2008.
She does all of the onlinestuff and we're more of the feet
on the ground piece of it.
So we will go ahead and getstarted.
Before we get started, we aredoing another free giveaway, so
(03:33):
one attendee will receive a setof customized June leave-behinds
with your logo, colors andcontact information.
You must attend here today,which all of you are here.
To be eligible, there is acaveat you have to promise that
you're going to send us pictures.
So we give you all the Juneleave behind.
You're going to take picturesof you doing this, or at least a
picture of what you came upwith.
(03:54):
People take what we give youand create their own kind of
thing, and we love to see that.
So if you would like to be inthe drawing, please type in the
word yes in the chat.
Looks like we've got somepeople going in there already.
Lisa is going to take down allthe names and we will do the
drawing right after and we'llget those sent out to you.
So today we're going to talkabout and this is one of my
(04:14):
favorite subjects building andtraining and effective home care
marketing and building andtraining and effective home care
marketing and sales team.
Again, I love the marketingside of this business and
growing and all of that, and sosometimes I talk to lots of
clients across the country andsome of you are solo.
You're the solo owner andyou're running the show all by
(04:36):
yourself and you're marketingand doing all the things.
And then we talk tomedium-sized companies who might
have maybe one marketer ontheir team and they wanna team
and they want to grow and theywant to scale.
And then we also have verylarge home care agencies as
clients that have five, six,even more marketers.
So I wanted to make sure wewere talking to everyone and
give everyone a little bit ofsomething.
(04:57):
How do you start and scale thisside of your business?
So we're going to talk aboutsales foundations, from the solo
marketer to small teams andlarge teams, how to develop a
scalable sales process, andtraining and accountability for
sustainable growth.
So a sales foundation reallymatters.
I know in home care, especiallyas you're growing, there's like
(05:20):
growing pains right and it'svery hard to.
It's almost like you grow sofast you grow past the place
where you would have laid downsome foundation and you got to
go back and figure it out right,or it's not scalable.
Maybe you've hired a reallygood marketer and she is killing
it out there, but there's notime to say stop, why is this
working?
(05:41):
What are you doing exactly?
How can I show somebody elsehow to do this too?
It's very hard.
So, regardless of what stageyou're in, at some point you're
going to need a sales foundation.
It matters.
It's the core structure thatsupports all your sales efforts,
whether you're a one personwearing multiple hats or a
growing team with defined roles.
It includes essentialprinciples, systems and habits
(06:02):
that are going to driveconsistent results, and so there
are three things that you wantto make sure are part of your
foundation.
There's lots of pieces to it.
The three things you don't wantto forget, though, is you need
a differentiator.
All of you should be speakingthe same language.
If there are a lot of people onthe sales team or just one
person, you have to have adifferentiator.
I was speaking to a client theother day.
(06:23):
He said he went to a skillednursing facility.
He actually got in front of thesocial worker and she said do
you see that wall over there,the wall was full of home care
companies.
She said I'm working with allof them.
Why should I even talk to you?
And that is what they say.
They don't have much time totalk to you.
If you don't have somethingdifferent about your company
that really stands out and meanssomething, they're not going to
(06:45):
talk to you.
This is how you get them totalk to you.
Yes, I see you're working withall of them, but we do this at
my company.
They don't do that.
Let me tell you about.
It Must have a differentiator.
That differentiator should alsobe in your social media.
It should be on your website.
You have to stand outeverywhere.
You really need to understandyour referral sources.
Maybe in our sales training weteach you all of those things,
(07:08):
but figure out who they are, whoyou should be, seeing, how to
speak their language.
All of that's going to bereally important in your sales
foundation.
And then consistency.
I cannot express this enough.
I know you can go and you cango see someone maybe two times.
They refer.
That doesn't mean they're goingto refer forever and ever.
(07:28):
You have to be consistent.
Consistency is 40 to 50 stops aweek.
Sprinkle in some lunch andlearns.
See everybody every eight to 10days not a face to face, but
you're some kind of touch pointevery eight to 10 days.
It's about creating strategicrhythm that ensures you stay top
of mind.
They always know that you'reout there Every time they're
dealing with talking to apatient.
(07:50):
Patients stay with them in asniff anyway.
14 days 10 to 14 days.
You have to have popped induring that 10 to 14 for every
single patient that's comingthrough.
So that's why the consistencyis so important.
Patient that's coming through.
So that's why the consistencyis so important.
So a strong foundation.
Your sales effort becomesreactive instead of strategic.
There are so many places inhome care where we're reactive.
(08:12):
Right Care evidence show wehave to react.
Client fell, we have to react.
Everything is reactive.
Wouldn't it be nice to have onearea of your home care agency
maybe not one, but an area ofyour home care agency that is
strategic and not reactive?
You have that control.
So that's when theopportunities start falling
(08:35):
through.
The cracks is when you're beingreactive in your sales, in your
marketing, when you're beingreactive instead of being
strategic.
A solid foundation makes iteasier to scale and grow your
team when you're ready.
So, solo marketers, how do yousucceed?
You're just doing everything.
You're juggling all the ballsin the air and you can't let one
of them drop.
(08:55):
Make sure you set aside timefor marketing.
This is crucial for any stageof growth that you're in,
because this is what goes by theside.
Marketing is not screaming atyou.
I need you.
I need you to come do this withme.
You don't have anything pullingat you making you do this.
A client adds four shifts.
That gets your attentionbecause you have to find a
(09:17):
caregiver, right, you don't havea choice.
You can't ignore that.
Marketing gets ignored.
Marketing gets set asidebecause it's not something that
is screaming for your attentionright now.
You have to start the marketing.
It requires you doing that.
You have to set aside time formarketing.
Maybe you go.
You say every Tuesday, I'mmarketing the whole day, no
matter what's happening.
(09:37):
I'm going to market everyTuesday or every morning these
days and every afternoon thesedays.
You have to set aside time toget this done.
Focus on high impact activities, because you have a small
window for marketing.
Whatever you're doing out thereneeds to be really effective.
So qualifying your referralsources is gonna be huge and I'm
not gonna go deep into this.
(09:57):
We've been through this lots oftimes but you will get the
slide.
So the link is here.
You can click on it.
The link will be live in theslide.
Anyone who is being paid byMedicaid or Medicare is on this
website.
We've got doctors, hospitals,nursing homes, rehab, home
health all of them.
I'm going to go to nursinghomes, including rehabs, because
(10:19):
this, to me, is the number onereferral source.
You enter your zip code.
This, to me, is the number onereferral source.
You enter your zip code, searchand all the SNFs and rehabs pop
up.
They're even on a little maphere for me, so I can even just
follow along and use this routeif I want to.
The way you qualify there's alot of things you can do to
qualify.
I'm just going to show youquickly and you guys should go
(10:40):
in here and spend some time inhere.
This website is incredible.
So you're going to see theirhealth inspection and what areas
they're well at, what areasthey're maybe not doing so well,
any violations, fire safetyinspections, all of that good
stuff.
But this is where the goldennugget stuff is.
This tells you how many bedsthey have.
It tells you what they take intheir building Medicare,
(11:02):
medicaid.
If they take both Medicare andMedicaid, you still have more
research to do.
A building that takes more than80% of their beds are Medicaid
is probably not a great placefor you to spend a lot of time,
because you're not going to geta lot of private pay clients out
of a building that's over 80%Medicaid.
People on Medicaid typicallydon't have the money to pay for
(11:25):
private pay home care.
People on Medicare, however, do.
If you see that they are doingboth, you're going to have to do
some research and find that outand you can ask to do a tour
and as you're touring, oh, howmany of your beds are Medicaid?
How many are Medicaid?
You can ask those questions.
Also, as you're scrollingthrough down here, there's
resource guides like how tochoose a good nursing home,
(11:47):
guide for living in a nursinghome.
So these are things that helpyou be a better resource for
your clients.
So there's lots of greatinformation.
So I'm going to show you anotherone, and I'm familiar with
these because I used to marketto these people Wellsprings at
Gilbert and, as I scroll down,they only have 32 beds, which
doesn't sound like a lot, butthey are 100% Medicare.
(12:08):
That is all they take.
That means everybody in thatbuilding can afford private pay
care.
Am I going to go hard afterthis one, harder than maybe
Allegiant that we just looked at?
You, betcha?
Maybe I'm going to find out.
Maybe they don't have very manyMedicaid beds at Allegiant.
I happen to know that they dohave quite a bit.
But either way, if it'sstraight Medicare, this is where
you're going to spend your time.
(12:28):
If you are a solo marketer andyou only have I don't know five
hours a week to market if itsays straight Medicare this is
one of the top places I'm goingto go.
So I just wanted to share thatwith you guys.
Give you a little bit ofsomething to help you qualify
those referral sources so you'respending your time in the right
places.
And then you want to builddaily habits, be consistent with
(12:49):
your follow-ups, networking,use some automation.
We have a great CRM here atApproved Senior Network.
Get a CRM that's going to workfor you and that's automated and
you can put all of your salesnotes in there and you can run
reports and look at all of thedata and make quick, effective
decisions.
So this is for the solomarketers.
(13:10):
If we're expanding to a smaller,large scale sales team to
transition, what works for oneperson doesn't always scale.
So when you transition from asolo market or a team requires
structure and processes.
You've got to sit down that oneperson, even if you're the
owner and you've been the oneperson what are you doing?
What are you doing?
(13:30):
What's working, what isn'tworking?
We've got to figure that out sowe can build that strong
foundation as you grow.
You're going to need clearprocesses for outreach,
follow-ups, tracking, referrals,to ensure consistency and avoid
missed opportunities.
Define clear roles who focuseson new business?
Who manages referral partners?
Who handles community outreach?
(13:51):
Who signs the job?
I could go on and on.
Where does one role start andone end?
That's going to be reallyimportant as you scale.
Everybody needs to know.
I pictured our home care agencythe ones I worked at where part
of the company was like.
If it was like a whole person,okay, the recruiting team is the
head, or maybe scheduling isthe head.
Marketing is the left hand.
(14:12):
This is the right hand.
Can we walk together like awhole person?
Is the company working all atthe same pace, the same level?
If we were running a robot andwe were all different parts of
that robot, would we be able toactually walk?
It's hard as you grow, it'sreally difficult.
Those are the growing pains.
Communication is key.
Hold regular sales meetings.
(14:32):
Use CRM I can't stress thatenough.
Track key metrics to stay onthe same page and drive
performance, no matter the sizeof your team.
So what is a scalable salesprocess?
A system that works for anysize team, whether you're a solo
operator or managing a team of10,.
A scalable process ensuresconsistency.
Everyone follows the same stepsto generate and manage
(14:54):
referrals.
So for me, I would think okay,a sales lead just came in over
the phone.
What do we do?
What is our process, from thatcall coming through all the way?
Speaker 3 (15:07):
to the opening of the case and they've been signed.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
What does that look like?
Let's get that down on paper.
And can we make it better?
And does?
And everybody needs to knowexactly who's in charge of what
parts of that.
Every lead must be followed upon.
Every referral source getsattention.
You should set timelines onthat.
If a lead comes in throughagingcarecom, I don't know when
do we call.
What's the rule?
Do we call it's Saturday?
(15:31):
Do I call today?
Do I wait till Monday?
When Lisa's on call, they getcalled in 10 minutes.
When Dawn's on call, they getcalled Monday.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
That's not okay right .
Speaker 2 (15:43):
These are the things we're talking about.
It has to be scalable.
Everybody needs to be workingat the same level, so a strong
process ensures no one fallsthrough the cracks.
Referral partners feel valuedand leads get the timely
follow-up needed to convert theminto clients.
Whenever we would get areferral whether it turned into
a job or not we brought them athank you and all of us knew
that was what we were going todo.
(16:04):
We knew we didn't spend a lotof money on it.
Sometimes it was just ahandwritten thank you note,
sometimes it was a handwrittenthank you note with a coffee.
We knew the guidelines.
We knew how much we could spend.
We knew when the thank you notewent out.
We all knew that.
And when someone new comes onboard, their training tells them
that's what we do.
So those are the kinds ofthings that tend to fall through
(16:25):
the cracks.
Repeatability brings clarityand better results.
When your team follows a provensystem, you reduce guesswork,
improve efficiency and create afoundation that can grow with
your agency.
The key stages of the salesprocess.
So if you can break these downand decide what you're doing at
every stage and who's doing it,this can also be helpful.
(16:46):
So prospecting is identifying,reaching out to the referral
sources, engagement you'rebuilding trust by focusing on
the needs and goals of yourreferral sources and letting
them see you in action, showgenuine care for the client and
their family.
Conversion is closing that loopand getting clients signed up.
Referral sources are countingon you.
This is a big piece that tookme a really long time to
(17:09):
understand.
When a referral source,especially a social worker,
knows they need to have a safedischarge, this person needs to
go home and not readmit.
They're going to give thisclient to someone they trust yes
, and someone they know who hasa good company, is capable.
They're also going to give itto someone who can get this
client to agree to sign up,because it's not going to be a
(17:30):
safe discharge If you go inthere and the client goes nope,
I don't want the services notgoing to talk to you and you
just leave.
I'm not saying you need to bepushy and awful, but you need to
be able to get past thatgracefully and get them to sign
up and understand they have todo this to get home safely.
So they're counting on you tohave the hard conversations and
to guide families towardsaccepting the care they need.
(17:52):
Referral sources need that safedischarge.
If they know you're going toget them to sign, they'll refer
to you more often.
And it has to happen becauseyou care about them, not because
of the money or because you'rebeing pushy.
It's basically, mr Smith,you're in the sniff because you
fell in the shower.
We don't want that to happenagain and you're going to be
weaker when you leave here thanwhen you fell in the shower
(18:13):
three weeks ago.
It's really not safe for you togo home without somebody
assisting you in the shower.
You need a shower chair, youneed a shower hose like getting
into all of that.
That's a piece of it is beingable to convert them into
clients.
Retention, keeping referralsources engaged over the
long-term.
Consistency and reliability arekey there.
(18:34):
Going back over and over again,bringing the really fun
leave-behinds that Lisa makes.
They look forward to you coming.
They love the creativity andjust being reliable when they
text you on a Friday at fouro'clock that they can reach you
and you're going to followthrough and do what you've told
them you were going to do allalong Automating and tracking
the sales process.
This is where the CRM comes in.
(18:55):
Use a CRM software to trackoutreach, follow-ups and
referrals.
So 40 to 50 stops a week withthe theme each week is hard to
remember.
So you must track what'shappening.
If it's social worker month,like it has been in March, it's
social worker month and I'mbringing around those stickers.
We had a client that broughtaround a flowering can.
Am I going to remember, out ofall 50 stops, who got what Am I
(19:17):
going to?
I've done this myself.
I pulled up into a parking lotand thought did I bring them a
pumpkin?
I can't remember.
And you're going to come inwith another pumpkin.
I guess you can, but they'regoing to think you lost your
mind if you've already broughtthem one.
So the CRM can help with that.
It's going to help you trackyour stops.
It's going to there'sautomations where it'll set a
task so you make sure that yougo back next time.
(19:38):
You don't forget to go back.
And it also helps you toze whathappened.
So I did drop by with Mary,face to face.
Drop by, boom, got a referral.
What was it?
Did that happen with fivereferrals where I had a face to
face and the next week I got areferral?
Is that what it is?
Is it the face to face, is itthe lunch?
And learn.
What was it that not?
(19:59):
Did I bring a lead behind?
That was really fun.
Did I get more time with her?
What caused her to refer?
You will start seeing trendsand patterns if you're using a
CRM and tracking the results andanalyzing them.
Set up a system for automatedreminders to stay in touch with
referral sources.
This could be done through aCRM that prompts follow-ups.
(20:19):
It sends check-in emails toyour clients and referral
sources.
It schedules the visits for youto keep relationships active
and consistent so you rememberto keep going back.
Train the team to loginteractions consistently so
that no relationship gets lost.
So there used to be a rule inhome care for well sky clear
care, and I know Lisa agreedwith me, probably Annette too.
(20:41):
If you didn't put it in thesystem as a note, it didn't
happen, it doesn't exist.
It didn't exist, it neverhappened.
You talked to the caregiver andshe told you that she, that
so-and-so, took her meds.
No, you didn't.
It's not in the system, didn'thappen.
So it should be the same waywith marketing and your CRM.
If it's not in there, it didn'thappen.
(21:03):
So it's going to be reallyimportant that the whole team is
logging in.
Every call, every visit, everytouch point with the referral
sources should all be documentedin your CRM or tracking system.
However you're doing it.
This ensures seamless handoffs,avoid duplicated efforts.
It helps you identify whichrelationships are thriving and
which need more attention Overtime.
(21:24):
This data also reveals trendsthat can guide your strategy
moving forward.
Review reports regularly andrespond strategically.
Use the data from your CRM toidentify patterns who's
referring, who's gone quiet,where is your time spent best?
Look at both short-term andlong-term trends and any shifts
that have happened, and thenadjust your outreach plan
(21:45):
accordingly.
When all of this information isentered in there and you can
pull out analytics that guideyou in a certain direction, it's
just there's nothing better.
So this is going to be reallyimportant.
And then training andaccountability.
Even experienced marketers needongoing training and coaching.
(22:06):
While home care marketing maynot change drastically, there's
always room to grow.
Even for the most seasonedprofessionals, a single new
approach or idea can be the keyto landing a handful of
high-value clients.
Ongoing training helpsmarketers sharpen their skills,
stay fresh and pick up small butimpactful tactics.
It's not about overhaulingtheir style.
(22:28):
It's about refining it, stayingfocused and continue to improve
outcomes.
I know in my marketing meetings.
We would sit down and oneperson would say a little.
She felt stuck, I'm stuck withthis referral source, I just
don't know what to do.
We'd start talking about it andwithin seconds minutes we would
have a solution.
For oh, I didn't think aboutthat.
It's not because she doesn'thave the sales ability or
(22:50):
whatever.
Her brain just didn't go there.
It's important to talk thesethings through and to do ongoing
training.
Just a little tweak in somethingcan make a world of difference,
and I know it can be hardsometimes to hold people
accountable, especially amarketer who's doing really well
.
She's making it done, but maybeshe could be doing a little bit
more.
Or maybe with a little tweakshe could get more things, more
(23:11):
clients signed.
Maybe she's getting referralsbut she's not signing.
A little bit of ongoingtraining or a little bit of time
together could make a world ofdifference.
So without accountability,sales efforts become
inconsistent and ineffective.
Without a system of check-insand expectations, even the best
marketers can start to drift,missing follow-ups, prioritizing
(23:32):
the wrong context or losingmomentum.
Accountability ensuresconsistency, whether it's a
weekly one-on-one pipelinereviews or daily activity log.
These touch points createstructure, increase transparency
and keep everyone focused onresults.
I had a marketer that would sayhey, dawn, did you run the
report yet from last week?
Yeah, who'd I miss?
Who'd I miss?
(23:52):
I feel like I missed somebody.
That's terrible, right, wedon't want her missing anybody,
but she was counting on myreporting to make sure that
everyone got seen last week.
And it's because when you missthem, they quit referring and
you don't want to get to thatplace where they've quit
referring to realize, oh gosh, Ihaven't seen Mary in five weeks
.
You don't want to get to theplace because now you got to go
(24:12):
back in and break back in.
Somebody else has gotten infront of Mary and she's now
referring to somebody else.
You can't allow a visit to bemissed because then the
referrals stop and once thathappens you have to go back and
dig back in.
So it's much better to just notmiss in the first place, and
accountability helps with that.
The best agencies reviewperformance metrics regularly.
(24:35):
You can't improve what youdon't measure.
Top performing agencies look atnumbers consistently how many
contacts were made?
Which sources are referring?
How quickly leads areconverting?
Where are things falling off?
Reviewing this data on aregular basis helps you adjust
strategies in real time,recognize team strengths.
It helps you address problemareas before they grow.
(24:55):
It also reinforces culture ofperformance and results.
So structuring initial andongoing sales training.
Initial sales training is anabsolute must.
It does not matter if they'vebeen a salesperson their whole
entire life.
If they're new to home care,they need sales training.
It doesn't matter if they'vebeen in home care their entire
life.
If they are new to the salesrole, they need training.
(25:17):
And someone with no home careor sales experience absolutely
needs training.
This is a very unique industry.
Every referral source type isdifferent.
No home care or salesexperience absolutely needs
training.
This is a very unique industry.
Every referral source type isdifferent.
The language, your approach,your leave behinds they're all
different.
Having a clear understanding ofwhat to do will set your team
up for continued success.
Weekly sales meetings forstrategy discussions these
(25:38):
sessions keep the team aligned,allow space to address
roadblocks and help reinforcepriorities.
You do need to have a meetingweekly.
It doesn't need to be more thanan hour, but you need that time
together to talk about.
What's the game plan this week?
What's the theme this week?
Did we get to everybody lastweek?
Are there some we need to goback to?
(25:58):
What are we struggling withRole-playing?
We did a lot of role-playing inour meetings real-world referral
scenarios to sharpen yourskills.
Annette does a ton ofrole-playing in their sales
training.
The role-playing is reallyimportant because it builds your
confidence.
Someone like Annette, who'sbeen doing this for years and
years.
She can pretend to be a socialworker and she can say things to
(26:20):
you that no one on your teamwould know a social worker would
say.
So it really can sharpen yourskill.
It gets you ready for thoseobjections they're going to
throw your way.
Oh, that sounds expensive.
What do you say to that?
Right, and so the salestraining is really important.
And the role playing isimportant because it gets you
ready to overcome thoseobjections.
(26:40):
It gets you ready for toughconversations.
It ensures, too, that you havea consistent message across your
team.
If you're all role-playingtogether, you wouldn't believe
that oh, I didn't know we did itthat way, or I know that's how
we did that.
You won't believe the thingsthat the team will say because
they don't know.
And it comes out in theserole-playing sessions or in your
sales meeting and training.
(27:02):
Bringing an industry expert forperiodic training sessions.
I would bring in hospiceagencies.
I would bring in home healthagencies.
I would have them present theirservices, but they would also
talk to us a little bit abouthow hospice works.
Or they would talk to us alittle bit about home health and
bathing Like, how long does thebathing go on?
Because I used to see them as acompetitor.
(27:22):
I used to think we do bathing,they do bathing.
Why am I going to want to workwith a home health agency if
they're also doing bathing?
They can educate your teamabout how that works and, yes,
when the bathing is no longergoing well in the home health,
we will pick up the bathing.
So bringing in those industryexperts is really helpful and
your team will really like thattoo.
They want to learn more aboutthat.
(27:43):
Fresh insights from outsidevoices can reinvigorate your
team and introduce strategiesproven to work in other markets.
Do we have any questions?
I've just been going on and onEverybody, okay.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
We just Tess said that she uses the tracking sheet
that we gave her during salestraining and it's been working
great for her.
She changed it to fit her needsand when she goes back to the
office she logs all herdrop-offs.
And she also learned that shethanks every follow-up.
Just like you said, dawn,making sure everybody.
(28:15):
Yeah, oh good.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
That's right.
Okay, we've got any questions atall, please, please, let me
know.
All right, holding the salesteam accountable.
So we're going to need to setclear performance goals, clear
expectations, give your teamdirection, create accountability
and help everyone understandwhat success looks like.
This is industry standard stuffhere 40 to 50 stops a week,
(28:38):
full-time marketer.
Out of those 40 to 50 stops, 15to 20 of them are face-to-face.
The number of referrals youwill eventually get from these
efforts is five to seven a week.
So you're doing all thesethings every single week.
Eventually, you're going to getfive to seven referrals.
They don't all turn into jobs,right, but a lot of them do.
When you take a service inquiryof the phones, it might be an
(28:59):
agingcarecom, it might be asocial worker, it might be a
social worker, it might be afamily member, adult daughter.
70% of those should be booked.
So if you've taken 10, sevenshould be booked.
All the assessments should goout on 90% signing ratio, so
nine out of 10 should sign.
So when you get through all ofthese things, at the end of the
week you should have three tofour signed jobs a week
(29:21):
Eventually.
It's not going to happenovernight.
You've got to have reallystrong relationships out there,
be consistent and do all thethings Track progress in a CRM
and review your metrics monthly.
This helps identify trends,uncover gaps in outreach and
ensures accountability bycomparing goals with actual
results.
And then you want to recognizeand reward success, to keep
(29:42):
motivation high.
Celebrate the wins, big orsmall.
Encourage healthy competition.
This boosts morale andreinforces behaviors that drive
growth.
So talk about those 24s thatgot signed.
Talk about okay, this weekwe're all going after 24s, let's
see what we can do.
Whoever gets the most 24s thisweek, this is what they're going
to get.
Have some fun things like thatgoing on in the office.
(30:05):
I think it really helps tobuild morale.
Lisa, did you have something toadd?
Speaker 1 (30:09):
I was just going to say high fives, go through and
high five each other and be eachother's biggest cheerleaders.
Yeah, sure, definitely.
Speaker 3 (30:18):
Everyone motivated.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
You need the motivation.
You're out there a lone wolfsometimes you are and sometimes
need the motivation out there.
You're out there alone, lonewolf, sometimes you are and
sometimes you feel beat up.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
I would call my boss and say I've been beat up all in
the first one.
I called you what I meant.
No one wants to talk to me.
I'm starting to think I havebad breath.
Something's bad today, like Iknow one one, and it feels like
that sticks to you.
Like the first two places yougo, you feel defeated and beat
up.
And so then the next place yougo, you're just wearing that, I
(30:46):
think, and they can sense it.
You got to get rid of it.
So you do.
You are out there alone andit's hard to smile all day and
be a cheerleader all day long.
So, yes, it's great to motivateyour team, be there for them,
and I would announce wins.
Even in a group chat, youwouldn't believe this.
And I would announce wins evenin a group chat.
You wouldn't believe this.
So-and-so went to.
She got in.
You guys, she's been trying forthree months.
(31:06):
She got in.
She got past the gatekeeper.
She has a lunch and learnscheduled oh my gosh.
So that's going to be reallyimportant too, because it's not
an easy job.
It can be tough.
Some days are really wonderfuland exciting and some can be a
challenge.
So, all of that being said, wedo have a home care sales
(31:27):
training.
It is 12 weeks of live Zoomtraining with Annette.
She does a great job.
By week six most of ourattendees are getting referrals
from skilled nursing facilities.
We only have a few spots leftin our April 15th and April 30th
classes.
So if you want more informationabout that, you will get the
slide link so you can go intohere to get the registration
link.
But if you want any moreinformation about that, you will
get the slide link so you cango into here to get the
registration link.
But if you want any moreinformation about the sales
(31:49):
train, you can ask now or we canget with you after it's been
going really well.
We've had I think April 30 isour 30th class in it.
Wow, I know.
Wow, that's crazy, crazy.
We've had over 100 people gothrough the class and it's just
going gangbusters, gangbusters.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yay, marie, marie's starting next week.
We're so excited for you, marie, and you're gonna just love it.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
I just it just goes really well.
You get your leave behind, youget.
I had an owner say to me theother day I didn't know you were
spoon feeding my marketers andI said, yeah, you gave them the
words to say and I go yes, thatthat's the whole point.
We want them to be successfuland I think the reason this
works over some other one anddone bootcamps like come to our
(32:34):
bootcamp this week or come tothis weekend, where it's not a
one and done it takes 90 days.
Because it takes 90 days, wegive you the.
This is what you do with asniff Go do it, come back, let's
talk about it.
This is what you do withindependent living Go do it,
come back, let's talk about it.
And I think that's why it worksso well is because you're
getting that feedback.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
And I was going to say Dawn, you were just talking
about celebrating the wins.
We're together 12 weeks forthis class and it's just so
exciting.
I had somebody yesterday.
He was totally new to marketingand he got his first referral
and he was so excited, and it'syou have to, we had to give him
a call.
I said, hey, oh my gosh, youdid this and it's you have to
(33:16):
celebrate the wins because it'shard.
He was going to, you could begoing 50 places, 10 places a day
, and they're just closing thedoor on you.
Then you get that referral.
You did it, you did it.
And what I told them was if youdidn't walk in there, they
would have never known you andyou would have never.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
And you have to know, like, when to push and when to
you always have to go back.
It's never going to be.
Oh, they were rude to me, Ican't go back there.
That's not a thing you have to.
You got to figure it out andthat's what's so great about the
class is that for 12 weeks youhave somebody that's going to
help you strategize and figurethat out.
(33:53):
Whatever comes up, you're notalone at all.
And you do get 12 hours ofvideo sales training.
Maria is saying that Donnastarted the 12 hours of the
video training and is alreadylearning so much from the video
training.
So the 12 hours of videotraining, you take that at your
own pace.
You can take it while you'retaking the class or before you
take the class, and that's goingto give you a lot of
(34:13):
information already.
And then you start andsomeone's asking for the link.
So I'm going to give them thelink to the actual sales
training real quick so they canread more about it.
And then the registrationwhoops, okay.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
I think the registration's on the slide.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
I think, yeah, the registration link is on this
slide, but here is the link sothat you can read more about it.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
What I like about this, too, is that you can see
after each class we ask maybefor a testimonial or whatever,
and the people that are notcamera shy give that and you can
see those testimonials on thelink or on the page and those
are just really just a greattestament to what's happening
Everyone getting their referrals.
It's great.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Yes, I'm going to put the registration link in here
too, just so you guys haveeverything you need.
Okay, and so this is theregister link.
All right, so we're going tomove on and again, if you.
Okay, and so this is theregister link.
All right, so we're going tomove on.
And again, if you and joinedlater.
If you want to be in thedrawing for free june, leave
behinds.
Please type yes in the chat.
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com