How many times have you looked at your phone today? Checked your email? Surfed the net? Scrolled through TikTok? That time adds up, and thanks to our devices’ nifty ability to send us our weekly screen time averages, we now see just how many hours we’ve spent down our various rabbit holes.
What if you used that time — even a sliver of it — to do something that could make that phone ring and give you more occasions to use it to talk to families?
DISRUPT Media’s, CEO, Ryan Thogmartin has a recommendation for something you can do the next time you have 60 free seconds: Put the phone down and ask yourself three quick — yet incredibly important — questions.
'If I keep making the same marketing decisions and don’t reevaluate my marketing initiatives …
- What has that already cost me?
- What is it doing for me now?
- What will it cost me in the future if I don’t make a change?”
Those are easy questions to ask, right? After all, it only took Ryan about one minute to pose them in this video.
Answering them honestly may take a bit longer, but it could be absolutely transformative for your organization. Let’s break down each question to see why.
3. What has your marketing plan done for me in the past?
Most people have a love/hate relationship with the phrase, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.” On one hand, traditions are precious and should be respected (especially in deathcare); on the other hand, if you don’t keep up with what consumers are looking for, you’re going to miss out on more and more opportunities.
It’s time to take a critical look at how your marketing efforts have been performing. Did they produce the same number of calls last month as they did when you launched them five years ago? How many times have your competitors done something new or different with their marketing in that same time frame? And here’s the question that should provide the biggest reality-check moment: How much business have I lost in the past because I haven’t switched things up while other firms have progressed?
2. What are my marketing initiatives producing for me right now?
Think about the most recent conversations you’ve had with families — today, yesterday, or even last week. Did they say they chose you because of your interstate billboard or because they picked up a pen with your name on it at a restaurant? Or maybe it was that all-words advertisement in the free Daily Shopper newspaper.
One way or another, you will learn from the families you serve why they decided to call you to take your loved one into your care. If you haven’t reviewed and revamped your marketing efforts recently, chances are that you’re actively losing families to your competitors — those who are actually top of mind for the public because they’re marketing effectively right now.
3. How many more opportunities could I have in the future if I changed my marketing plan today?
As Ryan says, if you haven’t evolved, if you haven’t stepped forward, if you haven’t made changes in your marketing to match where your customers are today, you’re missing out on opportunities. Your marketing efforts are costing you more than the money you pay for a billboard or ad on the back of a restaurant menu; it’s costing you the chance to talk to families about why you’re different and what you can do for them and their loved ones.
Today’s families aren’t in the same place technologically and do not have the same mindset about deathcare as they did even in pre-pandemic times. By fully embracing social media and a paid Facebook marketing strategy, you can ensure a more successful future. You’ll meet your customers where they are, show them you’re progressing and not devolving, and let them learn about you in a way they’re comfortable with.
Change really is inevitable, but it doesn’t have to be painful. Now that you’ve answered those questions and realized it’s time to try something different than the way you’ve always done it, pick that phone up again and reach out to our team and let us create a personalized, targeted digital advertising strategy that you’ll be proud to promote.
