The tortoise wins in our Boomer Newsletter Program

A newsletter for your Baby Boomer clients

Have you ever had a great idea, only to have it shot down by someone you know?

Recently I developed a printed newsletter that I believe will help home care owners immensely. We write the newsletter and then the home care owner prints and mails it to their clients and prospects. The key marketing element is that the newsletter asks for referrals for their home care service.

But one agency owner was not impressed.

“This is a newsletter that I send only to my clients?” she said.

“Yes. It will form a closer bond with them, and then they will be more likely to refer new clients to you,” I said.

There was an awkward silence. It was as if I had just told her that the earth was flat. She was apparently expecting that a list of new prospects would be provided by us.

Now, reader, I know what you’re thinking….

• What good is the regular mail any more?
• If you’re looking for new clients, why reach out to the old ones?
• Has this method been used successfully?

But when there are real signs that something will fly, it’s time to twirl the propeller and get out of the way.

Newsletters Can Capture Referrals

Our new program, called the Boomer Newsletter Program, involves several crucial points:

• A monthly printed newsletter, sent through the regular mail.
• A column from you that is written by us.
• It’s designed to endear your readers to you.
• It will attract new clients and retain current ones.

A monthly newsletter will form a bond with your clients and prospects.

The newsletter is called the Boomer Newsletter, and it is attractive, interesting, and branded to your home care company with your logo and contact info.

But the best feature of it is that it contains a personal column, authored by you, which is actually written by us. We contact you each month, suggest a topic, and make the letter very personal. Your column will contain your story, interests and heart-felt beliefs. And all of this will create a bond with your clients that will make them remember you and refer family and friends to you.

“Show Me the Money”

Are you looking for evidence that this system will work? We know of one home care owner in the Chicago area who has been putting out a monthly newsletter to his clients since 2007. He has no paid ads, no billboards, and no endless talks to community groups. That newsletter, as well as his home-grown networking group of professionals, has generated enough business to keep his homecare business active and profitable for years on end.

And he deals exclusively with live-in clients — the cream of the crop when it comes to in-home client services.

A printed newsletter is subtle, it’s personal, and it works quietly in the background.

I’d like to let you in on a little secret — there is a group of small business owners who have followed the advice of direct marketing guru Dan Kennedy, who pushes the importance of direct marketing (using the post office) to higher-end clients. His system has quietly produced millionaires and multi-millionaires.

Dan gives seminars around the country to enthusiastic followers who have caught on to his principles.

Our Boomer Newsletter Program takes Dan’s approach seriously. We here at Savvy Senior Marketing want to take the best of what Dan and other experts teach, as well as our own experience, and make you successful with it.

Are you ready to work with us and make it happen?

Then take the 12-question survey and find out if this system would work for you at SavvySeniorMarketing.com/cr.

Paid vs. Mailed

Let’s take it a step further. You might have tried online paid ads.

How do paid internet ads line up with direct mail letters? Certain advantages tend to line up on one side of the scrimmage line. It’s the tortoise vs. the hare.

Paid Ads vs. Printed Newsletters — What’s the Best?

See What Sticks?

Is your marketing tanking these days?

If you’re like many small business owners, you try one method after another — throw it at the wall and see what sticks. Paid ads on the internet, newspaper ads, billboards, you name it. Any of these methods might work, if you spend enough money and time. But what is the most effective?

You’ve probably considered, or paid for, internet ads. But do they work for a costly service like home care? Do people choose home care like they choose a plumber or pizza delivery? Hardly.

Paid ads are sometimes like shiny objects. There is a certain glamour in casting your net far and wide to the entire world. “I want to catch the big fish in all the seas,” you might be saying.

But the selection of your audience — and at best, a narrow audience at that — is the real point of the arrow of any good marketing campaign. Why not select those whom you already know and do business with and ask for referrals?

This “Mad Man” Knew It

Much of the attention about marketing is given to creativity. But what about the selection of an audience?

David Ogilvy, the advertising genius of the 50’s and 60’s whose identity became one of the characters on the TV show “Mad Men,” downplayed the creative aspect of his ads. He admitted that although he was most credited for his creativity, it was his skill in audience selection that was the key to his success.

And Dan Kennedy, mentioned before, said that the selection of your list is at least half or even more of the formula for the success of selling a product or service.

As one department store manager said long ago, “I know that half my advertising is wasted. I just don’t know which half.”

So, why not select the half that’s in your office?

Look in your own backyard.

Dad Didn’t Know Sports, But…

My dad was not a sports fan. A college English teacher, he probably didn’t know the difference between a line of scrimmage and a line drive. But he enjoyed reading the sports column of a certain writer in the local paper.

He said, “The mark of a good writer is that his writing is interesting even if you’re not a fan of his topic.”

Gold in Your List?

You like it when one of your clients refers a friend or family member to your home care agency, right? You find that your current client favors you enough to refer their friends. You might find that the new client is much like the old one. But what happens when you get a client out of the blue? You know nothing about them. They are like a mysterious stranger knocking at the door.

Thus, why not ask your clients to refer their friends to you? Sometimes all it takes is to ask.

And why not make the request via a printed newsletter sent through the post office? A printed newsletter is tangible, it stays for a while, and it can be passed along to others.

What if you could send a short newsletter that contained a brief message from you, and other entertaining news, as well as humor and tidbits? Voilà! You have our Boomer Newsletter.

Do You Keep Up With Current Clients?

There’s another benefit to our Boomer Newsletter. It strengthens the connection you have with your ongoing clients.

How thoroughly do you keep in touch with your current clients? Yes, you might call them now and then to tell them of a schedule shift, or a new caregiver. But do you have the time to talk with each one at length? To chit chat for a while? To stay in touch with both the client and adult child if they are making the decisions?

Most likely not.

Each month, when you send your customized Boomer Newsletter, your clients will be entertained and informed. It’s only two pages, and you can fit it on one sheet of paper if you print it on both sides. But it’s as long as it needs to be.

When Will I See Results?

The Boomer Newsletter will help you build relationships. So it might be three or six months before readers send you referrals. Why? They must get to know you better first.

Your referrals — and the success of our program — will also depend upon the quality of service you provide. If your clients are excited about your service, they are more likely to tell their friends. Another success factor of course is the number of people on your list. It works best with thirty or more contacts.

Since we at Savvy Senior Marketing are not in control of some of these factors, we cannot guarantee results. But remember, for every positive response or email you get from the newsletter, there are ten more people who felt the same way, and didn’t respond.

Here’s what others say after I’ve worked with them:

• “You are a heck of a writer,” — John Trompeter, Owner/Operator, ComForCare Home Care of Central DuPage, IL.
• “I think your copywriting skill would be great for any business or industry,” — Kurt Hjelle, President, Safe at Home Health Care.
• “You, I do trust. You work at a good consistent pace….You are helping me stay in control.” — K. F., Home care owner
• “I have been utilizing this service to get my agency in front of referral sources who are difficult to get time with. Kevin has done a great job writing personalized letters for our office and has been a pleasure to work with!” — Caleb Johnson, Owner, FirstLight Home Care of Deerfield/Lake Forest.

How We Work

Once you sign up, you will be given a schedule with the deadlines each month, including when your customized newsletter will be sent to you.

For each issue of our Boomer Newsletter we ghost write a column for you. We put up your photo and tell a story about an experience you had, how you got into the home care service, or what your family did on the last holiday, and so on.

Your column might even digress into the time you struggled to teach your son how to drive. Or the time your family vacation was almost ruined.

Readers love this stuff. The agency owner mentioned above told me that people tell him that, of all the articles he wrote, they remember the story that he told about a family member or event. His readers make the connection because their own life experiences are similar. If you were sitting at a table getting to know your client, isn’t this what you would talk about?

In each issue of the Boomer Newsletter we have a box that asks for referrals. Not only that, but when they refer a friend, they will get a free eBook written by me: Aging Upstream — Mirth and Memoirs for the Silver Years, which is also available on Amazon.

Here’s how we work each issue of the Boomer Newsletter.

• We customize the newsletter, putting your logo on the masthead.
• Each month, we contact you with an idea for the column, and write the article. Upon your approval, we send you the PDF of the newsletter.
• You copy and mail it to your list of clients and prospects. (Contact us if you’d like us to do the printing and mailing.)

What Will My Investment Be?

Your investment in this is well worth it. We have set the cost so that if you win one paid referral every other month it will pay for itself.

The Boomer Newsletter Program is not suited for every home care agency. It’s best to fill out our 12-question Registration Interest Form to find out. After you take it, we will evaluate your responses and get back to you as to whether we think the program will be a good fit. We want to make sure you will likely get a good ROI. 

To fill out the form, simply contact us with any of these methods:

Go to SavvySeniorMarketing.com/cr or scan the code at right. Fill out the form and we’ll be in touch.

That’s it! We are looking forward to helping your home care agency grow!