By Steve Moran

Nearly every day, my LinkedIn feed is flooded with victorious posts celebrating communities boasting a full house with 100% occupancy. Each post warms the cockles of my heart. Why?

I know they are making a huge difference in the lives of older people, they have removed a substantial caregiver burden from families, and they have team members who are passionate about the work they do and how they are changing the world. 

However, not every rose is without its thorns. An alarming number of communities are wrestling with staying afloat amidst dishearteningly low occupancy.

The Blame Game

When occupancy is low, the sales personnel become the proverbial scapegoats — promptly shown the door, replaced … and the cycle nauseatingly continues. It’s effortless to pin the blame on sales. Sometimes it may be a sales issue, but often, it’s a symptom of a larger problem.

Operations Are All That Matter

Yep, I know you are going to argue otherwise, and in some sense, you are technically right. But the honest truth is that even in the toughest of markets, there is one community that is crushing it. They almost certainly have good salespeople, but that is ultimately not why they are crushing it (no disrespect to all of you great, passionate salespeople).

They are crushing it because the leadership of that community, the operating leadership of that community, is creating great living experiences for residents and their family members. 

When they create great living experiences, the job of selling senior living becomes a lot easier, a lot better, and a lot more fun. Here is what happens:

  • Family members and residents tell stories about how their lives were changed. This attracts new prospects and gives the sales team more ammunition in the form of changed-lives stories.
  • Residents simply live longer because they are having great life experiences.
  • Residents don’t move out, either back home or to another community.
  • Residents and family members don’t say bad things about your community to others in the local marketplace. This is so critical to communities. People are a lot more likely to talk about negative experiences than positive ones. They will overplay the negative and tell more people.

    And you will never, ever hear about it. 

If your occupancy is struggling, start with your operations. It will pay bigger dividends than you can imagine.