Each month, Home Care Pulse conducts thousands of interviews with home care clients across the country. During these interviews, Home Care Pulse associates ask clients, “Why did you select your provider over others?” Their answers to this question were recorded and analyzed for the recently published 2016 Home Care Benchmarking Study. Here are the five most common responses:
You may notice that none of these reasons includes a list of specific services, locations, or even costs. The top reasons consumers select a home care provider revolve around the reputation and outside perceptions of the company by others. Now more than ever, clients are turning to friends, professionals, and the web to help them select a home care provider, and their decisions are based on more than the provider’s list of costs or services.
As providers look to increase client acquisitions, they should start by evaluating their performance in these five areas. As they gauge perceptions of their business in relation to these categories, they’ll be able to take more action to improve. Providers can then focus their efforts on improving their areas of weakness and utilizing their strengths.
Read How to Match Home Care Clients With the Perfect Caregiver
As part of this process, providers can better organize their resources, especially in relation to referrals, by creating a client referral program, improving SEO, or strengthening relationships with professional referral sources. One of the best ways to do this is through the Home Care Pulse Satisfaction Management program. As part of the program, Home Care Pulse associates contact a portion of your clients and caregivers each month to get detailed feedback on their satisfaction. These interviews not only provide you with detailed feedback on how you can improve, they also show you which clients would be willing to offer referrals.
Improving acquisitions requires active engagement with clients and caregivers. The more you invest in improving not only client perceptions of your care but also the real-life quality of that care, the greater your reputation will be and the more clients will be drawn to your company.
Very interesting to see how people are making their decision of home care provider, and how it’s changed over the years. It can be good for home care providers to know how they’re getting people referred to them.
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In closing, the reason why clients are deciding not to work with you is simply because they don t want to. They do not see the value in doing business with you.
Love the study and great article. It’s interesting seeing how we are steadying headed more into a digital age and consumer marketing online but it shows a decrease in consumers choosing a certain provider from this source. I think there’s a big void to be filled here to get the trend going upwards again.
Great read, just goes to show how crucial it is for home care providers to create and rigorously implement a client referral program. And with regards to consumer marketing, there’s a lot of opportunity there for companies to make a difference and gain a competitive edge.
Thank you for the information and top reasons clients choose a home care provider. I think sometimes recommendations are the best way to finally choose or decide to choose a home health care provider. That being said, you still want to be sure you are comfortable with the provider and comfortable putting your loved one in their care. I will pass this along to a friend who is planning on hiring a home health care provider for his dad.
I do like that your article points out the importance of active engagement when it comes to choosing in-home care providers. After all, you need to actively speak with your aging loved ones about what kind of help they need around the house. That way you can find a caregiver that will just as actively help them with what they cannot do on their own anymore.
You made a good point when you said that the top reason consumers choose a home care agency is based on their reputation and cost of services. My husband and I want to find a home care agency for his 88-year old father who has been suffering from restricted mobility due to a stroke. We wanted to have peace of mind that he would get the best care possible, so we will surely choose a provider that has good reviews.
Hi Dana,
Thank you for sharing your current circumstances. There are a lot of factors that go into the home care decision-making process, and reviews/reputation are a huge piece of that. You’re looking for a provider to care for your father-in-law, and want to make sure that you pick the best that he can get. We wish you all the luck in your search, and this article should point you in the right direction.
It was interesting when you pointed out how the reputation of a home care provider has been the number one reason why clients choose a specific health care service provider. My best friend is planning to find a home care agency that she can hire for her 72-year old father. She said that he has been suffering from hypertension and diabetes, and she wants to ensure that he is being assisted when taking medicines for her peace of mind.
It was interesting when you said that the top reason why people choose a home health care provider is their reputation. This might help my husband find a home health care agency for his 62-year old mother. She suffered from a stroke around two weeks ago, and he wants her to be able to recover well in the comfort of her home.
Thank you so much for reading, Shammy! Wishing you all the best as you go through this difficult time.
It was fascinating to learn that consumers chose a certain supplier of healthcare services mostly based on the reputation of the home care agency. For her father, who is 72 years old, my closest friend wants to employ a home care provider. She said that for her own piece of mind, she wants to make sure that he is supported when taking medications because he has been dealing with diabetes and hypertension.
It’s good you said that your reputation will grow and more customers will be drawn to your business the more you engage in enhancing both client impressions of your care and the actual quality of that care. With my dad’s retirement, he’s been thinking about aging in place, and the idea of a personal home care service has started to make a lot of sense for him. Now, he’s actively exploring options to ensure he can maintain his independence and receive the necessary assistance as he gets older.