Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I`m thinking you might do better marketing to the children of those Boomers. You`re right that most people hear "assisted living" and think "out to pasture" or "off to the glue factory." :-)

Another approach entirely is to get away from the whole "assisted living" terminology, since it`s prejudicial. Why not build a campaign around the idea that people don`t have to do all the maintenance anymore on a house? Or perhaps they don`t have to shop or cook or whatever else is an annoying aspect of day-to-day living?

If you`re considering a name change, that`d work too. In terms of search engines, you can always use terms like nursing home, assisted living, old age home, and other such "not so great" terms in the meta tages, descriptive text, and so on.

For example, to cover the SEO you could say something like:
Right there, from a human perspective, you`ve got a positive intro toward some sort of new terminology. But from a search-engine perspective, you`ve got the terms people would search for, see?

So your company name could be "Elegant Senior Lifestyles" or something, and form a whole new impression. :-)

Most boomers probably wouldn`t be ready to look at assisted living for themselves but they would be for their aging parents.  In that respect I think your name is perfect.  My mom is 83 and lives in her own home and wants to stay their.   If she could no longer do that I would definitely be searching for "assisted living" 

Assisted living can be as much to "assist" the children in caring for their parents.  I ran into a friend who just put their mother into an assisted living housing.  The mother who is ninety four wishes often to be back in her home but the children are very happy that their mother is not living alone anymore.  They probably feel more assisted right now that their mother does.

Do many people contact you that want to move themselves into assisted living or is it mostly the younger generation that is looking for solutions for their parents?

Could you do a blog where you could write about all of the services that you offer.  All those articles could contain keywords and phrases that someone looking for assisted living would be searching for.   Have visitors sign up for a newsletter and then stay connected to them so you are building your own potential client and referral source.

All the best.



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Mary
24/7 Greeting Card Store
www.GreetingCardGoldmine.com

Mary`s got a great point. I was thinking of it only in terms of Boomers wanting or needing the service for themselves (typical boomer outlook LOL!). But yes, there`ll be a large number of us looking for some sort of help on "assisted living" for parents.

Ultimately, anything you try to market to boomers is going to have to be done on an idealistic level. That`s the hallmark the generation---idealism. As with all generations, 40 years into life at about the halfway point, they cross over into the opposite of that hallmark. So for Boomers, the secondary marketing channel would be cynicism. (You can`t be a cynic without first being an idealist.)

To that end, if you focus on government failure and how private and personal involvement likely is the way to go, that would strike a chord.

I just got a call from a local bank that offers senior trips.  They send out a newsletter and they were looking for businesses that would offer something free to their subscribers.  They would put my business information in the newsletter at no cost to me if I would provide a free gift. 

This gave me a thought for you that perhaps you could connect with banks or other organizations that  have newsletters that goes out to seniors and offer to barter for advertising by offering your own free gift.



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Mary
24/7 Greeting Card Store
www.GreetingCardGoldmine.com