As a home care agency, your main goal is to generate more calls for new service. In order to achieve that, you have to incorporate an overall online marketing strategy that includes an active a presence on social media, one that incorporates home care marketing on Facebook. It’s no longer enough to just have a killer web design; you need to expand your reach to include social media.
When you consider how much time people are spending on social media sites like Facebook, you’ll realize quickly that failing to address this area of marketing would be foolish.
After all, 1.18 billion people log onto Facebook every single day. The CDC says about five million patients receive and end home health care in any given year. That’s a lot of people who need services like yours. Connect the two and you’re golden. However, there are benefits and drawbacks to any strategy, so let’s take a look.
Pros of Home Care Marketing on Facebook
Don’t make the mistake thinking that Facebook users are all kids. In fact, the fastest growing segment of this platform is the over-55 set. This is the demographic you want to target anyway — older adults approaching retirement age who are starting to think about taking care of their aging parents.
Here are some benefits of home care marketing on Facebook:
Build relationships: Facebook is light, it’s interactive, it’s engaging. It’s not a place for the hard sell; rather, it’s a chance for your users to get to know the real you: what you offer and what your area of expertise is yet framed in a no-pressure environment. This is your chance to build a bond with your users and boost your brand loyalty through related links, memes, and status updates that invite interaction with others.
Go viral: You likely already know how valuable word of mouth recommendations are in your line of work. Nowhere is there a better platform for growing viral marketing than Facebook. Let your customers work FOR you by posting shareable content.
Inject personality into your brand: Using a familiar and conversational tone of voice and style, post daily updates that show you are approachable and care about your business to boost people’s perception of your brand’s personality quickly, according to Social Media Today.
Get feedback: Facebook is the perfect medium for obtaining immediate feedback from your users. Ask a question, get answers. Post a poll, get results. The feedback you get is invaluable in structuring your future product and service improvements.
Gain insight into your audience: Statistics can only tell you so much. Facebook allows you to listen to your customers, participate in their online conversations and find out what they like and don’t like.
Keep costs low: Not only is Facebook marketing cheap (actually it’s free!), it’s easy to set up and quick to post daily updates.
Handle customer service: Who calls anyone on the phone anymore? Use your Facebook page as a website page or local directory listing where customers can get answers to their most pressing questions: what you do, what your hours are, where you’re located, etc. without being inconvenienced.
Damage control: If a client is unhappy with their service and rants about it on your page, website or other medium, you can quickly and easily address the problem, make it right, and diffuse the situation before it gets worse. Get your apologies out fast with Facebook rather than wait to put out a press release (by then, the damage will have been done) or try to keep it quiet (the worst thing you can do).
Cons of Home Care Marketing on Facebook
On the flip side, there are some drawbacks to using home care marketing on Facebook. Here are some key points:
It’s time consuming: While it’s relatively quick and easy to set up, the daily task of posting, updating, monitoring comments, dealing with customer feedback, etc. can take up a lot of your time and energy each day. You could outsource this to a writer specializing in social media work, of course, thereby saving you time and hassle.
It takes a while to experience ROI: In our society of instant gratification, Facebook marketing isn’t going to give you the WOW factor you may get with PPC, for example. It may take months or years to see any kind of boost in customer loyalty, sales and commitments.
You risk negative comments: Whether you’re on Facebook or not won’t mitigate your risk for unhappy clients, but simply offering such a highly visible platform can encourage users to vent their frustrations without thinking twice. Then, you’re on damage control and have to spend time putting out fires that you wouldn’t necessarily have had to deal with before.
Loss of control over reputation: This could end up being a marketing nightmare if even one bad comment and endless rant session makes it onto your page. You can’t exactly sweep it all under the rug!
Of course, even with all those potential negatives, we here at A Servant’s Heart believe Facebook and other social media platforms absolutely have a place in your online marketing strategy. Call us at (760) 227-2720 today to get started on this untapped potential for your home health care business.
