How to build relationships with families BEFORE a family has an immediate need for funeral home services. Nobody thinks of a funeral home unless there is an urgent need. Here’s a way to build relationships with the living prior to the need for your services.
Ask yourself this question; In your funeral home business, what percentage of your clients do you meet for the first time upon the death of a loved one? Even when a family is referred to you, generally you are meeting new families at the time of someone’s passing. Yes, there are families that may have used your services more than once, but the truth is the percentage of families you meet for the first time is very high. This pretty much is how it’s been for centuries and it makes sense in our business, as our business is an urgent need business, nobody thinks about a funeral home until the time of urgent need.
The public perception of a funeral home and funeral home services is that they assist in burying the dead. That is true, but you deal, collaborate, bond and do business with the living.
In step by step format, here is how to develop relationships with the living so that the chances increase dramatically that you are the funeral home of choice in their time of need.
We do facebook advertising here at Funeral Marketing Services. In fact, we are experts in targeting funeral directors and sharing ideas that benefit them financially. You can do a similar campaign for your targeted market, offering your funeral services to the residents in all the towns and communities you want to do business in.
Why facebook? Because if facebook were a country, it would be the 3rd largest country on the planet. As of last count, Facebook has 1.3 billion users & 75% of facebook users log on daily. That’s quite a lot of people,Taking a much closer look at FB; we found FB can be very valuable and powerful because you get more targeting options than any other type of advertising available today.
No other type of advertising platform or marketing channel allows you to drill down and target the exact type of people that have the means and motivation to purchase from you. FB has a network of data partners that allow facebook to really monitor user behavior and profile FB users. And while it does seem a little big brother to us as FB users, this couldn’t be more advantageous to funeral homes. It means we have access to data that allows us to get our message in front of our ideal audience. It means we can laser target our clients and get the most out of every dime we are spending. Our best opportunity for generating new customers and produce more services per month is when our targeting is specific and dialed in.
So why not target families in your demographic or zip code that are facing an end of life situation?
Yes! We can be very specific and dialed in to make sure we are getting the most for every dime we are spending. We can target seniors over a certain age. (great for pre-planning) How about families that have someone in hospice care or hold power of attorney? How about targeting families caring for someone with a terminal illness or in Palliative Care? Once we know our exact target, it’s time to develop an eye catching, attention getting ad for our targeted audience. Here are a few examples;
Now here is the cool part. The ad is placed on our targeted families facebook feed page. This is the page they check each and every day, sometimes multiple times a day and spend hours interacting with videos, comments and friends. Since we are only targeting families facing an end of life situation or retiring “baby boomers,” we can expect interested families clicking through on the ad. Once the ad is clicked, they are taken to a special landing page that is completely relevant to your advertisement. For example, take the last ad above, Meaningful Memorialization
Here’s the headline above the ad;
The benefits of Pre-Planning – One of life’s most difficult decisions need not be made at a time of deep grief and confusion.”
To drive home my point, in this country, at any given time, there are thousands of families facing an end of life situation. If your targeting is right, what family in your demographic won’t click through on this ad? Once they click through, they will be directed to a special landing page like this;
Click here for actual page – Funeral Marketing Landing Page
Be sensitive to the fact that most people are not IMPULSE BUYERS. That’s why so many campaigns fail. Advertisers expect people to take action immediately. Even when people want a product or more information, they generally don’t act impulsively. You need to give them good choices.
In this campaign, we provide a number for families to call a funeral director immediately for information, but we know most people won’t do that. Here’s the secret. Give something away for free in exchange for the families email address. But give something away that is of value. In this case we are providing the family a FREE downloadable guide to planning a meaningful memorial for themselves or for a loved one. They can also call the funeral home directly, but they don’t have too. They have a choice.
By providing their email address we can now begin develop a database of living families we can market to and educate on the Amazing Benefits of Funeral Pre- Planning, or any funeral home topic for that matter.
We are in a position to build relationships with the living! How many funeral homes do you know that do something like this? Probably not many and certainly not in your demographic.
No family wants to think about death especially arranging their own funeral. It’s not something people will naturally think about and never had we the platform in which to bring the topic up in such a favorable way.
When you have an interested family engaged, you can educate that family while you have their attention. Responsible people facing an end of life situation will get it and appreciate the information no one else is providing.
Passing is a guaranteed event. You can’t avoid it. You can’t predict it. Death is a fact of life that’s going to happen to everyone. Pre-Planning is responsible and takes so much pressure off the people you care deeply about and who you love most. (I don’t have to sell you, but you’ll now have the ability to sell them without worry of competition!) You will want to personalize your message while making it educational….. and finally we have the platform to do it right.
Get in touch with us…. We will provide you with the right message or run your campaign for you.
Right now, we are seeing the birth of social media in the funeral industry. Having a plan to capitalize on this platform will help develop deeper relationships with a whole generation of people that have been brought up on Facebook. By getting involved with this platform, you are effectively building a relationship with an active generation of people that will become familiar with you and your business and naturally and in most cases, use your services at their time of need.
I can bet a high percentage of families in your demographic and in all the nearby towns, communities and cities you want to do business in have and uses facebook. This is another opportunity in a series of “how to” videos and quality content to lay down the foundation for a multi-million dollar funeral home business.