home-care-marketing-roll-of-moneyIt can be difficult to know which strategy will work best for attracting new clients to your home care business. Finding a strategy that works for you and your business is often a trial and error process, testing various strategies until you find one that works for you. Healthcare Success Strategies calls this important process “testing, tracking and adjusting.”

Read The Best Way to Market Your Home Care Business to Consumers: SEO

For example, a home care owner places an ad in the local newspaper to test whether or not the ad will attract new clients. Over a certain time period, she tracks how many new clients mention seeing the ad. Next, she weighs the profit they’ve made from those new clients versus the overall cost of running the ad. Was it worth it? Through this process she might also make adjustments to the ad, move the ad to a different section or have it print on a different day. She’ll again track the results and adjust if necessary. In the end, they’ve either discovered a successful marketing strategy for their business, and they continue on with it, or they’ve discovered it just doesn’t work, and they abandon that strategy and try something else.

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Depending on your marketing budget, this could be easier said than done. Make sure you have a realistic marketing budget, one that allows you—as much as possible—to aggressively market your business to consumers. Be aware of where your marketing dollars are being spent, and be diligent at tracking and adjusting your spending. If you determine that a certain strategy isn’t producing enough new income for your business, stop spending your marketing budget on it. Move on and try something new.When it comes to the money you spend on marketing, Forbes says, “Spending the right money in the right places can drive the success of your business.”

Where to Start: Home Care Marketing

Which places are the right places for a home care business to advertise? Here are some ideas, according to the “2014 Private Duty Benchmarking Study,” that many home care businesses use for consumer marketing:

  • Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
  • Corporate web leads (such as a franchisor website)
  • Company website
  • Listing in local telephone directory
  • Google Ad Words (pay per click)
  • Newspaper ads/local community paper/senior newspaper
  • Ads in senior directories
  • Flyers/brochures in public places
  • Public speaking/giving presentations (at churches, senior centers, etc.)
  • Sponsorships (sponsor a community/charity event)
  • Internet lead sites (such as BestofHomeCare.com)
  • Exhibiting at health fairs
  • Open houses
  • Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn
  • Email campaign to consumer
  • Postcards mailed to consumers
  • Local press releases

As you select a marketing strategy to test, think of the community you serve. What will people respond to? What will grab their attention and help them to remember your business?  With this in mind, become involved where you can and design a marketing strategy that you think will work best. Then test, track and adjust!

Read Marketing Your Home Care Business: The Difference Between Consumer and Referral Marketing

According to Businesstown.com, “Advertising is an art, not a science.” If you look at marketing from that perspective, you realize how certain strategies work for some businesses but not for others. Every situation is different. Every community is different. Think creatively and use your imagination. Be unique in your approach, and don’t just think about introducing your home care business to your community. Try to understand how your community will receive your company, based on your marketing efforts.

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9 Comments

  1. Sibo Ncube March 13, 2014 at 11:45 am - Reply

    Great article. I found it very informative.
    Thank you

  2. Elena Petrenko May 26, 2014 at 2:47 am - Reply

    I would also suggest to find another business-partner who would help you marketing and your business will market for them. I have partnered with Puzzle With Me company. The marketing person loves the Home Helpers and Direct Link companies and wanted us to market for each other. He has our marketing materials and I have his flyers,etc. We even wouldn’t mind to share a table price as vendors in expos. His puzzles are a great tool that matches our values for in-home care services. Please go to http://www.puzzlewithme.com and you too will be fascinated by his idea!
    I am a proud partner in business for marketing reasons and more. It feels great to help out to young entrepreneurs in health care. Many health care entities today are looking for a chance to becoming first on the market in many ways. Every day we both market miles away from each other however each has extra pair or eyes, ears, hands, and an opportunity.
    Thank you
    http://www.homecaregreenwich.com

    • Home Care Pulse June 16, 2014 at 12:47 pm - Reply

      Excellent idea. It sounds like you’ve formed a great working relationship with another company–and can help each other attract new business. It is a great idea to partner with other companies, especially those who work closely with the elderly.

  3. Beth June 12, 2014 at 10:29 pm - Reply

    We are very happy with our MOST marketing plan. They have really helped us reach our target audience. I would highly recommend MOST (http://mostforyourmarketing.com/what-is-it/how-it-works/) to other home agencies.

    • Home Care Pulse June 16, 2014 at 12:56 pm - Reply

      It is helpful to find a marketing company that is knowledgeable about the home care industry. MOST by corecubed is one of this year’s sponsors for the “2014 Private Duty Benchmarking Study.” We really appreciate their continued support of the study over the years.

  4. Ada E. January 13, 2015 at 12:34 pm - Reply

    Hi Beth… Is MOST expensive to work with?

  5. Gordon Platt March 10, 2016 at 1:02 pm - Reply

    I’d like to suggest that firms look into licensing the 1-800-HOMECARE number in their local area. It’s an easy to remember number that can be integrated with other marketing initiatives, and, importantly, it is affordable.
    We work directly with companies that come on board on how best to incorporate the number in their marketing plans. In the spirit of full disclosure we do work with them on licensing the number, and would be happy to speak with you about availability (which is exclusive within each region).

  6. Carmen June 15, 2016 at 5:15 pm - Reply

    Very insightful for anyone to use involved with services that are here to help our aging communities. I’m going to use this information to reach more of my target audience! I just started a transportation company designed to help home healthcare businesses get there patients to their appointments ,and to run their individual errands. Super excited to use this information! Here is a link http://www.lithoniafamilymedtrans.com.

  7. Christophe Adrien June 14, 2018 at 4:27 pm - Reply

    Home care marketing is a grey area because of the overlap of the term to signify private-duty care as well as home health care in certain areas. They are two very different fields, and so the article might have touched on specific strategies for each in separate sections.

    The first step for any home care agency (whether they are private duty or home health) is to start by making sure their business information is accurate and consistent across the web, from Google to Facebook to local search directories. Such citation links are an essential part of local SEO. Making sure those links lead to a properly optimized website with effective calls to action is a must.

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