[Music]

Mike Peacock: Well, hello there. Welcome back to Cosmic Soup. Thanks for joining us again. We’re going to pick up right where we left off last time and dig into Part 2 of our discussion about social media and digital marketing. Please welcome back to the show from 3rdThird Marketing Trish Mayer and Anna Rose Warren. Welcome back, ladies. Thanks for joining me again here.

Anna Rose Warren: Thank you.

Trish Mayer: Thanks. Glad to be here.

Mike: We just got done spending a lot of time talking about some crazy social media stuff and kind of the tie-in with digital marketing. That’s all really, really, really cool. I also wanted to, I guess, kind of bring up the fact that, unlike a lot of people in the industry, not only do you work in the digital realms but you both also do a lot of fieldwork by visiting communities all over the country. How has this helped you in developing programs that benefit communities?

Trish: Yeah, I think that’s a major differentiator at our agency is we actually send a lot of the team into the field, at least someone from every department because we think it’s important, especially as the industry is getting more competitive and as baby boomers are aging in. There are so many new communities coming online every year. We’re seeing that our clients have to compete so much more than they used to.

Going on those site visits is how we really figure out what is the differentiator about your community. Are you in the suburbs? Do you have a lot of grounds? Do you have gardens or are you more of an urban community and you have a high-rise and a roof deck? What do you have that the community down the street doesn’t have and what’s the vibe like? I feel like we can talk to people all we want but going into those communities is usually how I get those little nuggets of, like, what are we going to reflect on the website and in the digital campaigns?

Mike: Then how do you go about collecting those nuggets? Is it simply observation or are you having conversations?

Anna Rose: Certainly, we work on a lot of focus groups, so we will go in and actually interview current residents of four years, current residents of two years, the ones who just moved in, the prospects, the families. We’ll sit down and we’ll really talk to them for several days, all day long, and gather that information. Then, of course, we’re also doing interviews with the staff. We’re speaking with them.

To me, I feel very, very lucky to do that because I know there are a lot of people who work in digital who don’t have that opportunity to really go and sit down. I think we’re really able to pick up on the culture that way and on the common threads on what patterns we see in resident sentimentality, all those things of what they’re feeling.

For me, also, it’s not just the interviews. It’s photography and video for social media. That becomes a really cost-effective way for a lot of our clients’ communities to bring us in. We’re there for a week doing these interviews and we’re also shooting social media photography.

We pick up on all of those things I just mentioned about residents, but we’re also just documenting the vignettes of what the community looks like. Then that’s content we can produce and push out over the next quarter. If we do that several times a year, of course, that’s much more cost-effective than bringing in a big photoshoot team, doing a big video, but we can come and just kind of casually participate and be a part of the community, see what it’s like, and then be able to record and push out that message on all our channels.

Mike: That’s amazing.

Anna Rose: We love it.

[Laughter]

Anna Rose: It’s our favorite thing.

Trish: Truthfully, it really, really is.

Mike: I know that our company, I know that 3rdThird and Culinary Coach, we’re really big on the focus groups. I have been learning as I go that a lot of companies have not even gotten to the stage where they’ve identified that they might have some challenges but they haven’t even taken that route to do their own kind of focus groups or do their own surveys. What is the importance of that element to you?

Trish: I think sometimes when we’re coming in and doing the focus group, it brings a different level of authority because I know that some communities, they do resident surveys and they ask for feedback, suggestions, and all of that. I think you kind of get stuck in a rut of the same residents complaining about the same things or people don’t see change, so they stop complaining. I think it brings a new life to it when we come in because they’re like, “Wow, they’re finally doing – the community is bringing in people to listen to us.” I think it revives that conversation.

In my experience, we get a lot of new comments from the residents that the management might have been aware of but in different ways, or we’re hearing things that are totally new. I think that’s really where the value is added is having that third-party who is not – they’re seen as a neutral, right? There’s not going to be a repercussion from management for complaining about something, even if you think it’s anonymous, so that’s been valuable to us.

Anna Rose: People are so honest with us in a way that they wouldn’t feel comfortable being like, “Hi. You’re the COO of the company. I’m going to tell you all my problems,” and you’re always going to know me as the person who has those problems. That’s been really wonderful.

Trish: Mm-hmm.

Anna Rose: I’m sure Shawn has talked about this too. I think it’s also really important. I think we make a connection with the staff. Part of our role, from social, is to get photo/video, all this content from the staff. To really sit down with them and say, “Hey, what are the problems that you see in your day-to-day? What are the things that you love about your job? What do you want to highlight? I’m a human. You’re a human. Let’s work on this together. We’re here to really highlight the best of your community and help you solve those problems,” that just goes such a long way in terms of creating those connections because I know that there are a lot of places we go in and they’ve had all these other marketing people come through.

The marketing people just make pretty stuff and don’t check in with them. To say, “Hey, we really genuinely care what’s going on and we’re only here to highlight what’s going on. Talk to us about that. Let’s talk about operations, all those things.” I don’t know. It brings a great value, I think, to our lives and our jobs and also to those community folks.

Mike: Yeah. What is the next step after you go out in the field and you gather all of this absolutely epic information, survey results, focus group results, audio, video madness, you name it? When you gather all the stuff that you need then, how do you go about piecing that together into a coherent package that makes sense?

Anna Rose: I would say we have two magic people. That’s Cynthia, our principal, and Derek, our creative director. They take all of that information and boil it down into a messaging and a creative strategy.

I am not the best person to speak on that. Trish, do you have a solidified answer?

Trish: Yeah, that’s what I was going to say. It’s a lot of internal meetings to download and kind of share what we all heard. Then we rely on the creatives to start to synthesize that and see what those commonalities are. Then we continue meeting internally and see if we’re agreeing on those commonalities.

Mike: Okay.

Trish: That is how the brand is born.

Mike: Awesome.

Anna Rose: Brainworks.

[Laughter]

Mike: That’s how the brain works. Well, let’s pivot away from all of that and move towards the 500-pound gorilla in the room. I’m not talking about myself. Clearly, we’re going through perhaps our biggest social, financial, and health challenge of the modern era with this whole COVID-19, new Coronavirus outbreak. Trish, what’s different now with the new reality of COVID when it comes to online marketing?

Trish: I think the name of the game has been being flexible and quick to react online, which I think, for senior living, it depends on the community and the budget. Typically, you’re updating things more like monthly or quarterly. Right now, we switched to daily. We have to be ready to assist clients and get things live on their sites because things are changing every day in what they’re allowed to do and what they’re having happen in their community. That’s been really cool to see how communities have been able to be flexible.

I think it has implications how we’re going to go forward with digital marketing as well. I think right now is a really cool proving ground for digital marketing in senior living because I think we’re starting to lean on it a lot heavier because, if something happens in your community right now and you just need to stop marketing for a day, you need to wait and see what’s going to happen, you can just turn your digital marketing off if you need to go dark. Then you can pick it right back up in a few more days. I think, in traditional channels, you don’t have that freedom. I think we’ve been seeing clients wanting to shift budgets into some of those like paid search and website optimization channels.

Mike: Okay. AR, how has this changed the social landscape?

Anna Rose: I totally agree with Trish, of course, on the flexibility point that it’s not even hourly. I mean it’s not even daily. It’s hourly sometimes that we’ve got to update and there’s something that we want to make our full audience aware of publicly right away. “Hey, this newsletter has gone out. We want to make sure that everybody sees it. We’re not having people in the community right now,” and things like that.

We are able to pivot very quickly on that messaging and turn things off and on, change advertising and say we’re not going to do events right now, all of that stuff. But then also, just from the social standpoint, I think, of course, people are online now more than ever. But they’re also just hungry for good news and they’re hungry for, “Hey, what’s going on inside the community that I can’t get in?” It’s been really, really huge for us to start documenting any fun thing that’s happening like, “My family came and visited. Here they are out the window holding up a happy birthday sign.”

Mike: [Laughter]

Anna Rose: “Signing a song to me through the window,” all of those messages just pull all of our heartstrings because we’ve all been so affected by this situation. But I think, for the families, they are so desperate for that kind of good news that, “Hey, everyone is okay in here. We’re all doing everything we can. We’re taking every precaution. Here’s a picture of a bunch of smiles. Here’s a video of us walking down the hallway showing us Lysolling the walls.”

Mike: [Laughter]

Anna Rose: I think showing that you care, that your community is on top of it—I don’t know—it’s definitely been big these past few weeks and I think it’s just going to get even bigger when we start to fully realize what we can do with social media, how many people we can reach, how positive of a story we can tell in this time when there are very few positive stories.

Mike: Yeah. Yeah, positive stories and positivity, in general, I think, is a much-needed element to the doom and gloom that we’re so constantly getting crammed down our throats at this point. I love the positivity. I love to see pictures of people. “Hey, I cooked this awesome meal for dinner tonight,” or, “Hey, I hung out with my dog and watched a movie.” Just anything that says, I’m just making the best of what’s going on,” I think that that’s awesome and I support that 100%.

Anna Rose: I think whatever the situation is, too, I’m sure times are going to get harder. Things are going to get worse in some ways. To maintain that mentality that we do have some sweetness and some good in our lives, despite what’s going on, even when we do have to push out unfortunate messages or things that are scary, it’s just keeping the rest of that in mind that we will get through this. We will all—

Mike: Sure.

Anna Rose: Life goes on in the ways that we can. I think digital platforms are a great way to share that message.

Mike: Yeah. From both a digital marketing and a social standpoint then, how should communities be responding right now?

Trish: I think, from my side of things, they just have to be honest, which I think we’ve seen from all of our clients so far. Everyone has been very transparent and ready to put that press release up of, like, “We’re not allowing anyone into the communities.” Then if they start to have any COVID cases, they’re ready to with those press releases as well.

I think you have to be transparent. You have to be reacting quickly. Then I think Anna Rose has a lot more intel on how you can tie that into the positive, day-to-day happenings in the community as well.

Anna Rose: I think that’s totally right. The authenticity of, like, “Hey, this is what’s really going on,” and sometimes those are harsh things to write. How do we streamline this for families? I think we’re putting out press releases or we’re sharing newsletters that is just harsh kind of legal language.

On social, to me, that’s softening those words and making sure that families know how they can communicate with their loved ones like, “Hey, we are going to set up Skype facetime visits. Let us know how we can help you get a package to your mother that’s going to help all our residents during this time.” I think those are important, so we’re taking a message that, “Right now we can’t have anyone in,” or maybe, “We had this incident and here’s how we’re handling it.”

First and foremost, to let your audience members know exactly what’s going on and to be honest it about it. Then to say, “Here’s what we’re doing to make this a time when everyone in our community is not suffering. We are doing everything we can to carry on with positive engagement and social distancing activities,” and all the things that I think there are so many communities right now, there are so many staff members who are really just going so incredibly above and beyond to make that happen, to make the residents feel safe, joyful, and loved, and we want to showcase that any way we can.

Mike: Yeah. I think that’s, again, just awesome. I just love the, keep it positive but keep it real. Honesty, transparency, let people know what’s up, but let people know that it’s not a hopeless situation. There’s plenty that we can be doing in the meantime, for sure.

I’m curious then. If each of you owned your own community, what would your next step be right now to make a difference in an online marketing and social media campaign for a company?

Trish: I think that we do need to be setting ourselves up as well. If I owned a community, I think these baseline things that Anna Rose and I have talked about of being transparent and honest and then sharing the good news that you do have but then what’s that next step. How do you guarantee the longevity of your community? Of course, right now it might not be possible to continue marketing because you’re literally all hands on deck. You’re helping delivering meals. You’re just keeping the community going.

I think, in the next few weeks, as it starts to hopefully hit an apex and come down, there’s going to be this new need of, “Well, okay. How do we come through this?” Then we’re going to have to start marketing again. I think the reality is, we’re not going to want to bring people into the communities for a while, so setting yourselves up now in how you can start doing things virtually, I think, is where communities have to look. They have to look into what kind of webinars can they do, what kinds of online events can they host, what is the lead base like, and are they engaging and nurturing with them during this time?

I don’t think it has to be in a cheesy or salesy way. I think it can still continue to be genuine in terms of everyone is stuck in their home. Everyone is getting groceries delivered. You can just connect with people over happy hours or whatever it may be. I think the brands and the communities that do that are going to be the ones that really build with their lead list during that time. I think that’s where I would focus if I was running the ship.

Mike: Okay. Awesome. Anna Rose, how about you?

Anna Rose: Yeah, I totally get that. I think, right now, social media, any sort of marketing, in general, can feel like this extra thing when you’re in a crisis, like, “Why would I care to market?” or, “Why would I go this extra mile to have my engagement coordinator take a photo of the one fun thing we’ve done in a week?”

I think it is about looking forward. It’s about saying, “Okay, in a month, in three months, in a year, where are we going to be with our leads list? What is our marketing going to look like?”

It’s also about thinking about that existing audience or family members and your prospects who are already kind of following your page or looking at your site and saying, “What can we do to show that there are good things going on?” It is about, just like what we said, being honest but showcasing everything we can in terms of, that’s positive videos, that’s the webinar content we’re creating, like, “This is our live dance party. We’re all jiving in the halls.”

Mike: [Laughter]

Anna Rose: Things like that that really lift spirits among all people. It doesn’t have to have that salesy pitch either that we’re trying to bring you in. No, we’re just trying to lighten your spirit and we are trying to show that, despite what the media may be saying about senior communities, nursing homes, or what have you, we are safe. We can always pivot this message at any time if something happens but, for now, this is what’s going on. We’re doing the best we can for the circumstances.

Mike: Yeah. Well, and you kind of touched on it, too, on a couple of things. Thinking long-term, we’ve definitely talked about the short-term. We’re dealing with people more in a virtual kind of a space and still having engagement, though it’s via kind of remote work. Then I think, Trish, it was you that brought up the possibility of a kind of longer-term shift going from the very controversial concept of print, kind of shifting more into the digital realm. What is your guys’ take on that?

Trish: Yeah. I think we get heat for this even in the agency as the digital voices here. I think, in general, just in the marketing world, you see a shift from print and traditional channels to digital. I think that’s happening in so many industries. In senior living, we look a lot to the hospitality industry and looking at hotels and how they’re marketing because there are a lot of similarities.

We’ve seen, for a long time, that those trends are going digital. They’re really using that data, they’re homing in, and they’re personalizing those messages and building out these customer pathways to move people down the funnel and get them to book rooms. I think we can apply that to senior living a lot.

Then I see, in the future, using print then to support that. You’re using it at specific touchpoints instead of, it used to be mass marketing and you’re targeting the print but you’re really driving the campaign and finishing it off with digital. I really think things have shifted. I think, in the future, we’re going to see more of that happening.

You really just can’t compete with the amount of people we’re able to target at the prices we’re able to target. The data is getting so good that the costs really are coming down. The quality of those leads is rivaling what we can get in print. I think it’s just something that we have to all adjust to.

Mike: Print media being more supplemental and specific as opposed to kind of a general blast out to the universe. Do you think that that is more so now with the current situation or do you see that as just kind of being where things are organically hitting anyway?

Anna Rose: I think it’s a luxury and it’s expensive. In some ways, we’ve known that for a while, as we’ve entered the digital realm and we realized, wow, we really can target people this way. We can run ads like this without the cost of just logistically printing something and delivering it. That is, in some ways, so exorbitantly expensive when we compare it to what we’re able to do.

I think, going forward, it is going to look like, yes, that’s supplemental but it’s for luxury demographics. It’s saying, “We’ve hit you on all these other platforms. Now we’re going to send you this beautiful direct mail piece to really make sure that you come in as a lead for us.”

Mike: Yeah. I always find, for me, I’m that guy. I’m that dude that is, like, the last-minute holdout, like I didn’t want to get rid of my Blackberry because I loved the clicky buttons on my phone. I like to open up a magazine and see the pretty pictures. I still have CDs. I don’t listen to stuff on iTunes. While I see a lot of where things go digitally, still something that captivates me is I love that physical, tangible product in my hand.

Anna Rose: I think to answer your question, like right now, we can’t have it. We literally can’t. In some ways, we can’t print anything. We can’t deliver it. The printing presses have closed. I think, as workers get more comfortable with Zoom, with working from home, across all industries, we’ll really start to see, “Hey, this is possible. It’s possible to work from home,” or, “It’s possible to deliver these really flexible, digital advertising,” and focus on that and let that lead. We will start to see print take the passenger seat on things in a way that in some industries it has.

I think, Trish, we were looking up data on this a little bit ago. Recently, I think, in the past couple of years, we’ve started to see, from Ad Age, that digital spending is about 52% in terms of advertising, so we have really eclipsed. I say “we.” We, the digital team.

[Laughter]

Anna Rose: With the print world, in some ways, that we are finally starting to see, “Hey, we’re spending more in digital because of all these reasons.” Right now, with Corona, it’s going to enhance that even more. We’re going to see more and more and faster change, I would think.

Mike: It is true how we have this tendency to put up a barrier like, “Oh, my god. This is never going to happen,” or, “I can’t do this and this is just going to be a nightmare.” Then all of a sudden, you’re in the middle of it and you go, “Huh. That wasn’t so bad. This was fine.”

Anna Rose: We did it, but we had to do it.

Mike: Yeah.

Trish: We’re figuring it out.

Anna Rose: Yeah.

Mike: Yeah.

Anna Rose: It was forced change, like all change.

Mike: Yeah, well, I think everything just is a natural evolution. I think people are going to move in cycles. Business moves in cycles. This is currently the cycle we’re in. It’ll be interesting to see kind of where it goes, although, I have a feeling both of you are very right in the sense of where the marketing trends are going to go, for sure.

I also wanted to hit one last topic here, which is kind of a passion project for Cynthia. I know that she’s not here. I know that we’ve kind of touched on this in the past, but I think our company is a little different in a lot of ways. One of the ways is that not only is this company owned by a woman, our own amazing Cynthia Thurlow Cruver, but also that the marketing, branding, coding, and all that digital awesomeness in the entire company is also run by women, which is y’all. What is the reality of working around the stigma that this industry, particularly in your specialized areas, has always been kind of a good ol’ boys club?

Trish: I can dive in on this. I feel like it’s been an uphill battle a lot in this industry. It’s definitely been something where it’s a lot of just people who have been in the industry for a long time doing things how they’ve always done. I think what we’re seeing now, and I think Cynthia has been really great reacting to this, is that there are communities out there that want to appeal to other people. We’re becoming or we’re seeing communities that are more diverse. They need people and agencies who also have that perspective.

I think there’s been this cohort of companies that are just good ol’ boys clubs doing work for each other in the same way with templates for the same types of people for so long that that’s starting to get reflected now and people are starting to push back on that. I think, especially, too, when you think about baby boomers, they’re a diverse group. They’re aging into time for retirement. It’s just not going to work anymore to do that same thing all the time where you’re just appealing to that same group of people.

I think, especially, Anna Rose and I have talked about affordability in the industry, particularly in how these old setups just don’t work of building these luxury communities over and over again, marketing them the same way to these upper-income segments. I think we have to start reacting to that.

Mike: Okay. Anna Rose?

Anna Rose: Yeah, I think it’s funny in social media because, to me, that’s a female-dominated space that we see influencers or one of those very rare job roles along with, I would say, sex workers and I don’t know what, where women make more money on average than men. Social media is a big one, but in terms of actual agency work. Certainly, when I sit in a results meeting where I’m looking at the numbers, I do feel like that’s a male space, so I feel that.

I think Trish is totally on the mark, as usual, that as we start looking at clients who are intrigued by how do I diversify my lead base, how do I start reaching different people, they can see us as leaders in that because we are women, we are younger, or we do bring a different perspective to things. In some ways, it’s been an advantage.

Mike: Awesome. Well, I think that’s a pretty good insight. I think we’ve touched on a lot of topics today. I definitely, myself, feel like I’ve learned a lot about what you do and then also what’s going on out there in the industry. I appreciate all of your insights on that. Thank you very much.

Now, of course, we’ve got two questions that we ask everybody who comes on the show. These are Cynthia’s famous/infamous magic wand questions. Okay? I’m going to ask you to each answer this question.

Fast forward, all of a sudden, you’re 80 years old and, while you’re on a hike, you come across a magic lamp. Right? You rub the lamp and the senior living genie pops out and says, “I’m going to grant you a wish for your dream community for you to live in for the rest of your life. Nothing is off-limits. You can have anything you want.” What kind of a community would you have that genie create for you? Anna Rose, go.

Anna Rose: Something I can afford.

Mike: Okay.

[Laughter]

Anna Rose: I’m such a bummer. Everyone is like, Anna Rose is the negative one. It’s me here with the bummer answer. Obviously, like Trish just touched on, we are really seeing the huge wave of the boomers hitting this industry like, “Oh, my god. What are we going to do? How are they possibly going to be able to afford it? Everyone’s retirement savings just went out the window with this stock market crash.”

Mike: Okay.

Anna Rose: I don’t know. It’s an especially topical answer.

My geeky answer is, of course, I would like to see a bourbon fountain just overflowing. If that means that I can’t have my affordable community, then I don’t want it.

Mike: Nothing is off-limits. The genie is magically making all of this stuff appear for you free of charge.

Anna Rose: I love that. I love that. I think I don’t know if that’s going to be a government subsidy or how we start working towards a future where we’re actually supporting our seniors and not just the ones who, you know, have saved a bunch of money. It’s certainly something that I think my age group, a millennial or a Gen-Z will think about is how do we support these large amounts of people? Has the system supported them? I don’t know. That’s definitely my biggest one and it’s something I think we are forced to think about a lot in this industry doing the work that we do.

Mike: Okay. What about the features, though, of this community? You’ve got your bourbon fountain flowing freely in all of its awesome bourbon flavored glory. What else would you have in there? What kind of food would it be? What would it look like?

Anna Rose: Oh, I mean, obviously, I’m a coastal girl. I want all of those fresh, green juices. I want my salmon. I want my green beans. I want salt and pepper on it.

Mike: [Laughter]

Anna Rose: I know when you age, you don’t want all of those super spicy foods, but I want my spicy foods. I want things from all colors of the rainbow. Of course, like everyone said, culinary is a big one for me and activities, being able to go on hikes.

I don’t know. It’s cool to work in this and to be younger than obviously our target resident, but to start to see, wow, things are changing and that activities are prioritized, amenities are prioritized. Those are things that everyone wants at all ages.

Mike: Awesome. All right, Trish. Your turn. Magic genie time.

Trish: I actually love this. Anna Rose, I love your community. I definitely echo the idea for affordability. I think the industry knows it’s an issue, but I haven’t really seen anyone responding in a really interesting way yet, so I’m excited to see what happens.

If I had my own community, I’m picturing it’s outdoors. Okay? I really love the idea of tiny houses. It’s not super friendly if you are a senior and you don’t really want stairs anymore. I think it’s kind of a tiny house, but it’s a rebrand on a mobile home. A tiny house really is just a mobile home.

Mike: Sure.

Trish: I guess it’s a mobile home community and a big piece of it, I think, programming-wise. I’ve been talking with my grandparents and my grandma always says, “You know, Trish, I can’t sleep at night. I go to sleep. I wake up at 1:00 in the morning every time. That’s just what happens. That’s just what happens when you get older.”

I feel like these communities, I know it’s a constraint of staffing, but there is no one there at night for programming. What if there was? What if there was an astronomy class? What if there was a midnight insomnia club? What if there was something for those people who we know that they’re waking up at 1:00 in the morning and they can’t sleep for hours, or whatever it is? I want someone to address that in my community.

Anna Rose: So true. I also have to say I want community cats. I know there are some communities that are doing that.

Mike: [Laughter]

Anna Rose: I just think having the animal in the common space that you could go chill with at any time of the day, that’s a huge highlight for me – a huge win.

Trish: Just a lot of cats running around. No big deal.

Mike: Yeah, right.

Anna Rose: I love the outdoor. I think, Trish, that goes really well with the Seattle freeze. If you really don’t want to hang out with anyone, and they’re like, “What do you do in your community? I’m not down. I want to be by myself. But I might need services someday.” You can get your tiny mobile home house and participate in the cool activities but you don’t have to be, like, “I’m in a community,” with all that stigma that we know we’ve hatched.

Mike: Yeah. What about your version of the bourbon fountain and the food? What’s up your alley?

Trish: Oh, man. I love beer. I really want a brewery in a community. I’ve heard whisperings of it, but I haven’t seen anyone do it. But I think whoever opens up a brewery in this community first, I am coming to visit.

Anna Rose: Do the residents brew? Do they participate?

Trish: Yeah, as much as they can or they bartend because, you know, they’re just chatting with people. They’re hanging out in the café. They’re coming up with recipes. They’re writing the menus.

Mike: That sounds amazing. What is that one thing that you think communities could do today to make a difference in their online marketing and social media presence, just one thing?

Trish: Okay. Please, for the love of God, everyone needs to get a list of their credentials together. This is something I’ve talked about with Cynthia at length. So many times, communities come to us and they don’t know who owns their website, who has their hosting, what’s the login to the Google, business listings, who is the admin on the Facebook page.

It’s scary because I’ve never seen anything happen but when all of those things are spread out to the wind and they’re random ex-employees, ex-agencies, people move on from jobs, sometimes we can’t get them back or you open yourselves up for people to post whatever. What usually happens is someone posts a bad review on Google and then you’re not able to respond because you don’t have access.

That’s what I always tell communities that I meet is that, please, figure out where all of your stuff lives. Spend a little time. Make a list. Keep it up to date. That will give you so much peace of mind.

Mike: Oh, that is a fantastic call out.

Anna Rose: Trish is more pragmatic and tangible. Mine is very vague. It’s with every social media post to say, of course, you’re already doing it. You have a Facebook. Whatever is happening on it. With every post, think about who your audience is and think about the fact that it’s not just your prospective residents or their families, but it’s also your staff. It’s also any person. They’re an organization that they’ve visited once. They’re going to see that content and to tailor it for them in a little bit of what you do, in a little bit of what you think about when you’re doing that post.

Mike: Two awesome points to take with you today. Any final thoughts, ladies, for the day, before we close this out?

Anna Rose: I think this is a big thing. I think focusing on content marketing is going to be huge, like we just talked about, in our coming months and years of how do we transition to digital. One of the biggest ways is we focus on content marketing. If that’s communities creating their own podcasts or having blog articles, all of those things are what we’re going to be seeing online. I’m very stoked to be here and to be talking to you today.

Mike: Well, thank you both very much for hanging out today in the soup for our epic two-part episode with social and digital. This has been very insightful. I’ve learned a lot, like I said. This is really, really cool. I’m looking forward to seeing what the future holds for not only us but for the industry and for the world as a whole.

For all you out there in podcast land, please, if you like what we’re talking about, send us a comment. If you’ve got some questions, you want some clarification, you want Anna Rose and Trish to answer some very specific things geared just towards you, send us an email, cosmicsoup@3rd3rd.com. Of course, Anna Rose, where can they follow us in social media land?

Anna Rose: Yes, please. Find us on the social Internet. We are on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, @3rdThirdMarketing, and on Twitter, @3rdThird_Mktg.

Mike: Yes. Please follow us and we’ll talk to you real soon on Cosmic Soup.

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