4 ways to connect with technology

Are you a Facebook addict yet? Notice I added “yet” to the question? Even my 76 year old mom has decided she’s got to get onto Facebook – all her grandkids, nieces, nephews, cousins and other relatives keep telling her, “I put my pictures on Facebook!”

I joined a year or so ago, after I realized it was the only way I’d be able to keep up with my kids. They travel the globe and, way before they email their mom, they post their pictures and their adventures on Facebook for all their friends to see.

So now I’m an avid Facebook user, with 82 “friends” that include my relative, my kids’ friends and several grade and high-school friends I’m only now reconnecting with (that’s fun!).

Technology can be a ton of fun when it fills a need we have. In case of Facebook, technology helps us fill a social need to stay connected – or get re-connected.

In business, it seems to me that we’ve used technology begrudgingly rather than with the excitement of your first Facebook page.

Maybe we’ve been off the mark. Maybe it’s time to look for ways to use technology to increase our business and social connectedness – and have some fun while we’re at it! Consider these ideas:

Your website. Does your website increase your connectedness with the public? Do you tell your story and offer ways for people to contact you? Many company websites today avoid publishing email addresses to keep out unwanted emails, but that’s a barrier to connectedness. Like Facebook, your website should be updated often, changing content and images to keep it interesting and alive. It should also connect real people (you and your team) with real people (your clients and prospects).

Email. Are you using email to stay connected with others? If you’re reading this via email, you see one of the tools we use to keep in touch with our clients and prospects: subscription emailing through Constant Contact, one of the leading providers of this service (scroll down to the bottom to set up your own free trial). It’s easy to use, and very affordable. It doesn’t allow you to spam people, but it does give you a very user-friendly tool for staying in touch with a large group of individuals (Clients? Prospects? You decide).

Technology in Operations. Are you using technology to help you manage operations? To track employee hours related to client needs, and to keep care plans and assignments updated? Companies like HealthMEDX (a new partner of ours), Vigilan, and ALWizard are excellent resources. Used correctly, they can not only help you get a detailed picture of your operations but can actually enhance your revenue as you track service needs and staffing more closely. Rather than costing you money, they can actually make you money – something to consider closely right now.

e-Training. I’m guessing you already knew where we’d end up. Technology in training can allow you to train your team consistently and effectively in important compliance topics. You’ll still want to gather your team for regular staff meetings, but you can focus on team-building and your company culture, rather than boring repetitive compliance inservices.

Well, I’m logging back in to Facebook now. I’ve got an early morning meeting tomorrow I’m setting up with my exercise buddy – gotta run!

3 ideas for creative, low-cost marketing

I know I usually talk about training and building your team in these newsletters, but today I want to talk about marketing. Interested? Let’s talk!

Marketing is the global term we use to mean growing our business. Often, we’re content (and, let’s be honest, a little relieved) to let the marketing people worry about marketing. It’s their job, and, if they’re good at it, it happens without a lot of your sweat and focus.

In this economy, however, marketing is probably moving to front and center stage in your organization. And that affects everyone.

It affects you, when you don’t have the revenue to cover the expenses.

It affects your team, when hours are cut or positions eliminated.

It affects your clients, as they see a few less people on the team to serve them, and maybe even feel the stress you and your team are feeling.

That’s the problem – what’s the solution?

Experts from every corner agree: a bad economy is NOT the time to stop marketing. In fact, it’s vital that during this economy, marketing gets even more of your focus. You’ve got to really focus on what will do you the most good, in the short term as you keep your head above water, and in the longer term, as you strengthen your foundation to grow and thrive once the economy turns around.

How can you creatively grow your marketing program without spending a dime?

• Focus on Customer Service. We’ve heard from many of our clients that customer service is one of their primary focus areas for this year. Making sure that every employee understands that he or she is a part of the marketing team by providing excellent customer service is an essential part of your marketing plan – and it doesn’t need to be a costly part, either. Spend time every week focusing on developing your team’s skills in this area, and you’ll see results. For our part, we’re developing a series of 5 courses on customer service for your staff. Those enrolled in the full subscription program will get access to these courses, hopefully within a few weeks, at no additional charge. Others on select programs can add these for a very small fee, or purchase them separately as you need them. (Watch for upcoming announcements.)
• Provide a service to caregiving families in your community. Many families are turning to their own family members to provide care, especially in areas with high unemployment. You can help, and establish yourself as the expert in caregiving at the same time (the one they’ll turn to when they need help). Offer classes in caregiving, a telephone advice line or articles for publication in your local paper. Provide a support group with guest speakers each month, and publicize it widely in the newspapers and on local radio (all free as public service announcements). It won’t cost much more than your time, and can give you big returns.
• Look for new revenue sources. One idea a client of ours is using is to provide caregiver training for individuals in her community. This training could be offered to family caregivers or to individuals looking to become caregivers, as well as home care agencies or assisted living facilities. Use our online Caregiver Certification course (soon to be re-released as the enhanced Personal Care Aide Certification course), add a two to six hour skills training class, and you’ll be able to provide a comprehensive program to prepare others to provide care – while you build relationships and your reputation. Bundle it carefully and you can even gain a new revenue source to help tide you over (ask us for details).

Be brave, be bold. Get out there and market your business for success!

Send me your creative marketing ideas and I’ll pass them on – sharon@aquiretraining.com.

A conversation about turnover

I had a great conversation last week with Tris Legacy, the Administrator of Regency Park Place at Corvallis. Tris is a relatively new assisted living Administrator, and he’s frequently frustrated with a problem that often seems to be accepted as fact in senior care: caregiver turnover.

Tris points out that many times caregivers don’t leave to go to another type of job – they simply move from one caregiving job to another; from one facility to another. Sometimes, it’s because they’ll get an extra quarter per hour in pay. Many administrators, it seems, accept a certain level of turnover as normal and don’t really do much about it.

Tris believe that we can – and should – do better. I agree.

Turnover is not only a pain in the hiring/staffing department, it causes serious problems in delivering a superior level of quality care. When a caregiver who truly knows your clients leaves, that knowledge leaves, too. The relationship – the “people part” of what we do – is gone, both for the client and for the family.

Many of you are experiencing census problems recently. If you remember back to “Marketing 101” what’s the most important element that will lead to “getting the sale?” It’s the relationship.

With our clients and their families, building relationships is one of our strongest tools to build word-of-mouth referrals in the community at large. When a family member sees, month after month, year after year, the same group of caregivers, they WILL be impressed and they WILL tell others.

Many of you know that fighting – and winning – the battle of turnover means looking closely at wages and benefits. You also know that this can be a hard sell to management. But sometime, especially if you’re talking about filling those units or increasing the number of clients, the investment begins to look more appealing to management; the payoff a little clearer.

What else helps reduce turnover? One of the most significant things that a recent survey found, next to money, was that people who stay feel their boss – the person they perceive as their immediate supervisor – listens to them and cares about them. What else? Giving every employee the opportunity to learn and grow in his or her job.

What have you found to be effective in reducing the turnover of your staff? Share your thoughts, your questions or concerns – I’ll pass them on. Maybe we’ll even discover a new approach or two that can make a meaningful difference in this most challenging problem.

Marketing in tough times

Is your client count down? Do you have vacancies or a lower census than you’d like?

We’ve been hearing from a number of clients that, with the high unemployment rate, families are stepping in to provide care, or are deferring the decision for outside care due to financial concerns.

If you’re looking for creative ways to enhance your marketing efforts, you’re not alone. You may be getting pressure from partners, owners or others to increase revenue; you certainly don’t want to cut staff or services.

Here are some ideas we’ve discovered that might spark some creativity – and results:

Get out the door. If your phone isn’t ringing off the hook with prospective new clients, use this time to get out and get networking. Does your community have networking groups of senior providers? Join in and attend. Go introduce yourself to anyone and everyone in your community that might be referral sources – and be creative. Pharmacists, medical equipment providers, area support groups – these are all potential referral sources.

Publish articles in the local newspaper. Let’s face it – news today is a tough business. However, if many of your prospective clients are being cared for by family members, they may be in need of information and tips on caregiving. Can you write brief articles and send them to your local neighborhood paper or senior newspaper? Call the editor and ask. If you need help with the content, email me. We have a number of articles, ready for publication, which we’d be happy to send to you. You can add some information about your company and note that you’re sponsoring the series of articles, and get a little free publicity. Being known as the local expert in senior care is a great marketing tool. You may not see the benefits immediately, but over the long haul, you’ll reap rich rewards.

Be creative with pricing. Can you offer any aspect of your service at an introductory price? How about free? We’re trying a new Pilot Program offering individual communities a chance to try our online staff training program absolutely free for 90 days.* We want people to try our product, love our product and then determine that they simply can’t live without our product. We’re willing to go out on a limb to make that happen, because we know that money is a very tight commodity right now. Can you do something similar with your product?

Educate yourself. Watch your local newspaper for free training courses on marketing in tough times. Many communities are offering courses or networking groups to support businesses that are struggling. Don’t be shy – sign up. If time is tight, consider online classes in marketing, too, including ours.

Educate your team. This is not the time to cut into your services. You can’t afford to jeopardize your reputation by providing anything less than exceptional customer service. That means everyone on your team needs to be sharp. Take this time to train them, reward them, and repeat the process. Get everyone on your team working smarter and avoid the common pitfalls of a reduced staff.

Keep your chin up. In a tough economy, especially if you’d have to lay off some employees, other staff members might be feeling anxious or threatened. They may be experiencing outside stressors, too, that this economy has brought to their home or family. A good leader promotes a positive attitude even when times are the bleakest. Save your own anxieties for times outside of work; don’t share them even with your closest employees. Your job as a leader is to stand up tall and say to the world, “We’re here to provide a service people need, and to do it in a way no one else can do.” Even during tough times people need your services. Stay focused and positive!

It’s tough, but you can still grow your business and stay positive even during hard economic times. Use this time to strengthen your base and watch your business absolutely boom when the economy turns, too.

Catch ‘em, reward ‘em and build your team

You’ve heard it before: if you want to increase a specific behavior, reward it.

This principle of human behavior actually has its roots in good old doggy behavior, demonstrated by the scientist Ivan Pavlov. Professor Pavlov’s dogs began salivating upon the stimulus that, experience told them, led to delivery of their food.

Behavioral scientists have discovered that people, too, repeat behavior that is rewarded. Rewards work best if they are immediate. Surprisingly, rewards that are random work even better than those that happen every single time – it appears that we’ll keep trying with a randomly rewarded behavior, not knowing which time it will actually yield the results we want (lottery tickets, anyone?).

Good news for managers: rewards don’t need to be big or expensive. In fact, some of the best rewards are those that relate to our social standing. Reward someone by calling him to the front of an entire staff gathering and giving him a clear, verbal “atta-boy” and he’s likely to remember it much longer than a $10 gift card given to him in passing, with no one looking on.

What behavior makes your team stronger? Perhaps you’ve chosen to focus on improving customer service this year. What specific behaviors are you looking for? Are you modeling those behaviors within view of your team? Are you looking – hard – for people who repeat those behaviors, and then rewarding them?

Be careful, too, about too much time in team meetings spent on what NOT to do. Focus instead of what team members SHOULD do – let good behaviors gradually reduce or eliminate undesired behaviors.

Rewards? Public praise and attention, a genuine pat on the back, a meaningful gift card. These will go farther to increasing the behaviors you want than employee of the month programs ever dreamed of achieving.

Behavior that is reinforced is behavior that is repeated.

Behavior that is rewarded is behavior that is repeated.

It really is that simple.

Looking for a quick, affordable gift card solution? Order aQuire gift cards and give your team the gift of improving their skills and knowledge while you reinforce behaviors you want to see repeated!