Senior Living Tips for Facebook Advertising

Senior Living Marketing Tips for Facebook Advertising

/in , , , /by

Facebook is the largest social media platform in the world today with over 1 billion active users. The platform is ideal advertising space for all types of businesses and organizations and senior living is no exception.

The following are useful tips on how to create strong Facebook advertising for Senior Living Marketing.

1. Develop Your Buyer Personas

A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers. Creating buyer personas is one of the keys to having an effective marketing campaign. It helps you to clearly define what message will resonate with your audience in your advertising. Know who your personas are and you will better understand how to talk to them. As a result, you will be able to attract the most valuable visitors, leads, and customers to your community.

To Understand More About Establishing Your Buyer Personas, See Our Article Why Buyer Personas Are So Important.

2. Target Your Advertising

Now that you have developed your buyer persona’s you can use that information to directly target those types of people within Facebook. Not only can you run ads targeted by location and demographics within Facebook, you can also target by Behavior and Interests. For example, if your community is next to a golf course, you can run ads towards seniors who are retired and are interested in golf. This way you can focus your messaging to meet the audience where they are at today.

3. Show Off Your Brand’s Personality

Make sure when you are advertising on Facebook that you stay true to your brand and show-off your brand’s personality. Is your community about the activity? Show your residents being active? Are you near a college? Highlight this fact in your posts. Think about what will resonate with your audience and how you can make them feel comfortable and excited to visit your community.

4. Have Good Calls to Action

The Call-To-Action is the Most Important Element of your Facebook Ad. It is how you convince people to take the next step towards learning about your community. If you have a good image, it will draw people’s attention, but the CTA is where people will make their decision to actually stop and click. You want to make sure your CTA’s are as strong as possible and test to see what resonates with your audience.

5. Change Your Ad By Device

Facebook ads look different depending on what device you are browsing Facebook on. You want to make sure that your ads look their best on any device. Desktop ads should have a longer copy and link descriptions. Mobile ads should be shorter. Be sure to change up your artwork to match the medium it is being delivered in.

Seniors are becoming savvier when it comes to social media. They are looking to understand more about your community and what you have to offer. By thinking about your audience and what they care about and combining it with your own brand’s personality, you will be sure to do well with your Facebook advertising.

Learn To Use Social Media To Find New Leads

Four Things You Can Learn About Real Estate Marketing From Bon Jovi

/in , , , /by

Being an exec in an advertising agency can sometimes be a curse. When you go home at night you can’t just “shut it off”… you see marketing and branding everywhere. But on the positive side, that means inspiration can come from just about anywhere at any time. I’m an avid music lover and concertgoer and as all my colleagues know, my favorite band is Bon Jovi. So out of professional curiosity and personal interest, I follow the band’s marketing efforts and they’re doing a lot of things right. Here are four things I learned from Bon Jovi that you can apply to your real estate marketing.

Know Your Target Audience

Early on, way back in the ‘80s, Bon Jovi realized it appealed more to women than the typical male dominated rock crowd. Jon’s good looks and power ballads made the ladies swoon. Fast forward to today and of the thousands of fans at a Bon Jovi concert, most are women. A smart marketer, Jon capitalized on his popularity with the female audience almost from the start. He knows his best…assets…and how to use them.

How is this relevant to real estate marketing? You need to know who your target audience is and how to connect with them. Like for Bon Jovi, the target audience for most homebuilders is women age 35 to 54. They tend to be the ones out looking for a new home initially. So ask yourself—are you advertising where they are? For instance, a significant percentage of “soccer moms” are on Facebook, bragging about their kids and sharing family photos. Buying paid advertising on this social medium gives you the opportunity to pinpoint exactly who you want to reach. And make sure your message resonates with your audience, as well. Talk about what is important and enticing to them, not what is important to you.

Embrace Technology

In the ‘80s at the start of Bon Jovi’s mega popularity, music videos were the new thing. The band embraced this visual medium, giving viewers at home a glimpse of their stage presence and highlighting Jon’s charisma. Being a staple on MTV contributed to the group’s early success. Now, you can follow Bon Jovi on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and see their videos on Tidal, YouTube and Vevo. You can even download the Bon Jovi app to stay up-to-date on all things Jovi related.

As a marketer, you have a variety of new technologies and media vehicles available to you that your ‘80s self couldn’t even imagine. Use them. Bring your homes to life with virtual reality. Showcase your models with 360-degree video. Capture the magnitude of your neighborhoods with drone footage. Post and share photos on Instagram. Pin decorating ideas on Pinterest boards. Be creative. Today’s real estate marketing tools go way beyond still shots of model homes and allow you to emotionally connect with home shoppers in ways you never could before.

Stay Relevant

Bon Jovi’s fans have aged along with the group. While the band still plays the classic hits in concert, they churn out new “albums” and songs that reflect the times and attitudes of today’s listeners. They rely what they know works but continue to change to stay current with what’s trending. Lyrics that related to teenagers in the ‘80s won’t resonate with middle-aged housewives now.

For real estate marketing, be open to new ideas and avenues to get your message out. Print media—newspapers, direct mail, inserts—still have a place but mobile and social are where you need to be to be seen. The online world brings creative challenges. You only have a few seconds to make an impact and viewers are bombarded with competing images all over the screen. Don’t try to give all the details in a small space. Entice the viewer to click to learn more. Then grab and keep their attention with an engaging, user-friendly website. Your home designs are different than they were 30 years ago. You’re advertising efforts should be, too.

Your Brand Has Value Beyond The Home

Bon Jovi branding now extends well beyond the music business. Several categories—from a male clothing line to pasta sauce, a football franchise to charity endeavors—have emerged that capitalize on the popularity of the group’s namesake and front man. They are not all directly tied to Bon Jovi the band’s brand, but they are indirectly associated with the Jovi name and therefore are recognizable with consumers in the target audience.

In real estate marketing, this often occurs with mortgage companies that are associated with national homebuilder and carry a similar moniker. It also can occur with sub categories of your company, such as remodeling or commercial arm. What’s most important to remember is that you want all branding associated with your core brand to portray the same level of quality and values.

As a Chicago-area advertising agency, Stevens & Tate consults with not only real estate companies but also businesses in a variety of industries to develop marketing strategies that can propel their growth. If you are considering an agency review, visit www.stevens-tate.com to view recent work or call (630) 627-5200 to see if Stevens & Tate is a fit for your new agency partner.

MAXIMIZING YOUR MARKETING BUDGET

benefits of seo

Benefits of SEO: How Optimizing Your Website Will Lead To Greater Results in 2017

/in , , , , , /by

By now, most marketers recognize that SEO is an important part of doing business online. To put it simply, if your website isn’t properly optimized, you are missing out. There are many reasons why you should start an SEO program if you haven’t already. SEO is a part of attraction marketing. Here are six of the top benefits of SEO.

More Website Traffic

Top positions in the search engines result pages lead to a lot more clicks, so ranking near the top can significantly increase the traffic coming to your website. According to research from Advanced Web Ranking, the top search result gets 30.1 percent of the clicks and over 50 percent of the clicks go to the top three results. Read more

generate more leads

Learn To Generate More Leads With Hubspot’s State of Inbound 2016 Report

/in , , /by

Converting visitors into leads is the biggest challenge for marketers, according to HubSpot’s State of Inbound 2016 report. With 78 percent of marketers saying generating leads is their top challenge, the competition is

Here are a few key lead generation strategies based on the data found in HubSpot’s State of Inbound 2016 report. Read more

Creating A Brand To Become President

/in , , /by

Whether you are a fan of politics or prefer to stay on the side lines, the race for the presidency has always been about strategy and timing. This election has broken many barriers, but one thing for certain is that both candidates have established a presidential brand. Read more

food packaging design

FDA Nutrition Label Changes Impact Food Packaging Design

/in , , , /by

On May 20th, 2016 the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued new rules for nutrition labels and packaged foods. So how does this affect private label packaging or food packaging design in general? It’s been 20 years since any major revision has been made and to my assessment, a much needed one.

The purpose of this blog is to discuss the design only and not the new laws that revolve around the change including new line items and removal of some items.

Read more

thank you pages

A Thank You Page Isn’t An End, But A Continuation

/in , , /by

A thank you page is where a website visitor is directed after downloading a content offer. The function of a thank you page (of course) is to thank that visitor for downloading the content from your landing page, but also to help them move through the Buyer’s Journey.

A thank you page shouldn’t just say “thanks for coming.” Saying thank you is important to be courteous and trustworthy, but you can use thank you pages to your advantage and lead visitors to discover more about your company. Here are some important practices to help make sure your thank you pages are as effective as possible.

Read more

competitive advantage examples

Strengthen Your Brand – Learn From These Competitive Advantage Examples

/in , /by

Listing the things you do well and considering them your competitive advantages is not enough these days. So many words like “value,” “innovation” or “trusted” have become passive to the marketplace. Prospects and customers want to know what you stand for, how you can improve their life and remove one of their frustrations. Your brand needs to connect on an emotional level.

To get to that emotion, a company must first uncover its core value, or inner layer. It’s the reason why you are in business. After that, you can develop the outer layer messaging to explain what you do and how you do it, while tying the message back to your core value. Read more

Brand Story

Story vs. Assertion: Which Is Better For Your Brand?

/in , , /by

One of the first things we do in our Business Storytelling Workshops is give respondents a mini-quiz to see if they can tell the difference between a story and an assertion. It is rare indeed when anyone gets all or even most of the answers correct. Albeit a common mistake, I’d like to show you why this mistake can have negative consequences for your company and, by extension, its brand.

First, and especially in a business setting, assertions and stories are tools used to make a point. The difference is in how the point gets made. An assertion makes the point through a statement of opinion or belief. A story makes the point through the description of an event that has already happened or will happen sometime in the future.

Consider these two examples:

First the assertion:

“Introducing New Coke was an egregious error in judgement made by negligent management. They should have taken into consideration that emotional bonds people have with brands can be very strong.”

Personally, upon hearing this at a meeting I once attended, I was turned off by the speaker. Based on my studying the New Coke failure, I thought that referring to the failure as “an egregious error in judgment” was an ill-informed oversimplification. Additionally, I didn’t like the insinuation that knowing about the strength of any brand’s emotional attachment should just be thought of as common sense.

You may disagree with the reasons for my strong reaction. That’s not the point. The point is that assertions always present the risk of disagreement. To assume that everyone is going to agree with you can backfire. Especially when the risk of disagreement is high, it is better to rely on a story leading up to your point.

Contrast the above assertion with this story used to make a point:

When Coke saw that New Coke performed better in taste tests than the current Coke, they confidently introduced it with a great deal of fanfare. Yet, Coke drinkers didn’t just reject New Coke. They revolted against it. They told Coke it was destroying something they had grown up with. Can you imagine how baffled Coke must have been when they found this out? Clearly, this points to the strength of the emotional bond that consumers can have with a brand.  It can be so strong that it outweighs rational considerations given to taste or other attributes.

And yes, it took a little longer to get to the point.

However, when the point is made about the emotional power of brands, it gets served up as an assertion that is inescapable.  This is one of the reasons it has been said that stories persuade without getting in their own way.

Learn How Story Branding Can Help Your Marketing Strategy

The challenge and how to meet it:

Again, the challenge is to become aware of whether you are asserting something or telling a story.  Stories come in a number of different forms. But if you were to take any story apart, you would generally find these elements:

Time markings:  Stories imply or directly state that something happened in time. eg. In 2001…,” “Just the other day” “Last Tuesday …” “When we last spoke to the CEO …” The archetypal time marking is, of course, “Once upon a time” but that’s not one you want to use in a business setting.

Place markings:  Just stories imply or state that something happened in time, the same is true for place. eg.“We were outside his office …” “At the basketball tournament…” However, sometimes the place is nondescript. “Our representative met with their President, ” could suggest that a meeting took place at the  President’s office or possibly by telephone.  Either way, the meeting occurred at a place.

Characters: Stories:  Stories feature a “personified it.” eg.  Besides being a person, the “personified it” could be a company, an animal – anything that performs an action. “The brand died an ignominious death.”, “The tree lost its leaves early this Fall.”.

Events:  The biggest signal that a story is being told is when an event is described as in all of the examples above.

Click here to learn all there is to know about telling your brand’s story.

Brand storytelling marketing

Brand Storytelling: Turning Your House Into A Home

/in , , /by

What makes your brand special?

If you answered by talking about your brand’s unique advantages and consumer benefits, you own a house, not a home.

Don’t feel lonely.  There are plenty of companies doing the same thing.  And they all have lessons to share.

Take Xerox for instance. At one time, having a  Xerox machine in the office had become a necessity.  Instead of asking, “Can I get a copy of that?” it was commonplace for people to ask, “Can you make me a Xerox?” Having achieved a great deal of success, the company decided to cultivate other ambitions. For one, Xerox wanted to get into computer technology and data processing. They spent many years and millions of dollars before finally throwing in the towel. Why? Because they couldn’t get buyers to believe that a copy machine company could make a good computer. In effect, Xerox found out that it was a house, not a home.

Chiquita is another example. Chiquita had to admit defeat after trying to convince us that they make a good frozen juice bar.  Country Time Lemonade was forced to stop trying to sell Country Time Apple Cider. Ponds barely got out of the starting gates with Ponds toothpaste before it quit. And Smith and Wesson (yes, the maker of guns) tried to sell a bicycle of all things. Thousands of stories like these exist.

But then many brands tell a different story. Apple has gone from selling computers to phones, to tablets to who knows what’s next. Nike started out selling waffle-soled running shoes but is now the leading brand of athletic equipment, gadgets, and apparel.  Perhaps a more extreme example is Virgin with its long list of unrelated products and services: phones, records, airplanes, casinos, satellites.  In case you’re sick and in jail, Virgin even provides a prison health service.  Add Harley Davidson, Disney, Starbucks, and anything that Oprah labels to the list.  See any similarities?  These are brands that grew by creating homes, not houses.

When we think of these brands, we don’t just think of a single products or service.   We think of the ideas, values and beliefs their names represent. To their buyers, they offer something more important than functional benefits.  They provide a sense of belonging.  In fact, their buyers aren’t really buyers. They are more like members of the same household who share similar beliefs. Virgin could sell mud flaps if it wanted to.  No doubt, they’d become the best selling mud flaps available. ( Hey Branson, you heard it here first!).

How do you build your brand story? Learn here! 

How To Turn Your House Into A Home

If you’re interested in turning your house into a home, here are 5 simple brand storytelling rules to follow:

  1. Check out your brand’s foundation:  Does it provide a solid base that will support any additions, or is will it only hold up your house as is?
  2. Improve its curb appeal:  When people see it from the outside, will they think ” Looks nice”  or will they think “This could become a good representation of me and what I stand for?”
  3. Get rid of the clutter:   Throw out everything that distracts away from the one simple but important truth that your home represents.
  4. Hire the right agent:  Anyone can help you find renters or even buyers.   Hire someone who can tell your story in a way that will attract followers.
  5. Conduct a permanent Open House:  Stay real, authentic and open to transparency.

Making a distinction between a house and a home has many advantages. Just remember, a house functions as a place to shelter you from the elements, provide you with ample closet space and a place to park your automotive status symbol.  Homes serve a very different purpose.  They provide belonging, and support for values you can identify with.

The extent to which your brand can offer customers a home instead of a house will determine the size of your family.