Case Study: Fox Meadow Assisted Living Facility

Members of the health care industry are beginning to understand that the mass-market approach is no longer viable and that service providers are moving from a product orientation to a marketing orientation. Mary Jane Martin, CEO of Fox Meadow Assisted Living Facility is concerned about the facilities occupancy rate. While at one time, the assisted living facility enjoyed a dominant position in the area, its occupancy rate has declined to 70 % from 90% three years earlier. This erosion is at the hands of other local competitors. Their key market are the Baby Boomers. The Baby Boomers are those individuals born during the post-World War II euphoria of 1946 to 1964. The aging of this group has opened numerous opportunities for assisted living marketers. The segment numbers almost 80 million Americans and accounts for close to 30% of the U.S. population. Mary Jane has directed Tomas Rodriguez, her Marketing Director to institute a promotional campaign directed specifically toward this segment. Tomas’ advertising objective was to increase requests for information about the facility by 30 % in three months. The goal was to use print advertisements that were meaningful, believable, and distinctive. The execution style for the message was to take a “slice of life” approach. With a promotional print budget of $8000, Tomas ran a ½ page ad in the local weekly free newspaper in 4 communities surrounding their facility. The ad provided contact information about the facility and pictured a 75 year old grandmother type sitting in a comfortable rocking chair, doing needlepoint in front of a wood burning fireplace. The caption stated “Rest and Relax, your time has come!” Following multiple iterations of this ad, the Marketing Director received a negligible increase in telephone inquiries. He said “What happened? We did the research?” Did this ad clearly target this generation of people? Why or why not?

1) Did this ad clearly target this generation of people? Why or why not?

They key target group “Baby Boomers” is not a good choice. The Baby Boomers are living longer and are more active than before. Because of new technology and medicine, there are less “baby boomers” that need assisted living. So if the company wants to focus on the older individual’s that need assisted living, the company should be targeting the daughters of these elderly individuals (aka current mothers/daughters). In addition to mothers you should also target families of people with specific diseases as well as local hospitals, doctors and health care facilities When talking about assisted living facilities, people want a relationship with an organization that they can trust. They’re not buying the facility, they’re buying a relationship. They want to know that you are taking care of their loved one with the utmost care and making their last few years easy and enjoyable.
Proper staffing, Neglect, loving caring lively atmosphere are the usual concerns of many people.

Why target moms? Mothers are the ones that usually making the decision of whether or not to put their mother an assisted living facility. In addition, they are the ones who are searching for a facility to see which one is a good fit.
- how to target moms: can be reached using TV, radio, print and social media
Moms are Online 1 ← 89% of household moms use the Internet at least twice a day. ← 86% rely on search engines to find Web information. ← 70% use search engines to research an online purchase. (Source: Searcher Moms: A Search Behavior and User Study, DoubleClick, 2007 )
Moms & Social Media 2 ← Moms favor social media sites including blogs, message boards and product fan pages to research products and get firsthand product reviews and recommendations. ← The biggest gap was 44% of moms who visit blogs versus 33% of adults. (2. Source: Consumer Electronics Assoc., Influencing CE Purchases, December )2010
Word-of-Mouth Has The Greatest Effect on Moms ← 63% believe word-of-mouth received is credible. ← 56% are likely to pass along to others. ← 55% are more likely to purchase suggested product. ← 39% are likely to seek out information. (Source: Keller Fay study, September 2010)
Consider also targeting the families of people with specific diseases for example, Alzheimer's by giving fliers to support groups and activity centers. By letting the families know how your facility provides the necessary dietary, health care and social support for Alzheimer's patients, you can let them know that assisted living is another option.

In addition, the company should also get in touch with local hospitals, doctors and health care facilities and request that the company should be added to their list of assisted-living facilities. They can provide them with info about their facility that doctors can hand out to their patients They can even invite health care staff to tour your assisted-living location so that they will be able to speak personally to patients about the benefits and the features.