Prospects are researching quietly. Is your marketing helping?

A successful prospect journey starts before you even know they exist

by Kristen Chapin, Account Manager

When it came time to find care for his own parent, our own team member Lance Morgan understood just how challenging the process can be. Even though we know this journey well, watching Lance experience it firsthand was a powerful reminder that many decisions begin long before a prospect ever reaches out. It reinforced the importance of having marketing efforts that focus on the quiet researchers.

A phone call, a form fill, an event RSVP, a scheduled tour or walk-in are often the first interactions with the marketing team. But that is not where the journey begins.

Many prospects and their adult children, like Lance, start their search online. Yes, you heard me right, prospects too—according to Pew Research, 75% of U.S. adults ages 65 and older use the internet. They are visiting websites, reading reviews, comparing locations, scanning care options, looking at photos, watching videos, and forming impressions long (or in some cases shortly) before the sales team even knows they exist.

This shift in mindset is important for marketing and sales teams.

In a world of instant gratification, so many communities are only focused on building conversion opportunities that show success right away. But, if your marketing is only built to capture the hand-raiser, it may be missing the stage where trust is actually formed. Focused adjustments to your digital presence over time can make some of the largest impacts to a prospect’s journey and how they convert, often resulting in a higher-quality conversion.

Research before reaching out

In senior living, decisions are practical, yet emotional, and rarely made quickly. Even in health-related circumstances where decisions are need-based and seem swift, the research is being pored over to make sure the right decision is made. In most cases, people are doing their research online well before they spark a conversation.

People want to learn on their own terms before entering a sales conversation. Often, they’re not avoiding contact. They’re simply trying to feel more prepared for it. By the time someone calls or fills out a form, they may already have spent considerable time narrowing options, involving family members, and deciding which communities feel worth exploring further.

Quiet research is not passive

It is easy to think of anonymous website visits, digital ad clicks, Google searches or large language model (LLM) searches as casual browsing. In reality, many of those visits are actively evaluating if you are the right community for them.

When Lance began searching for communities for his dad, he wanted to know a few key things. At first, it was about comparing his dad’s needs with the care provided by each community. In his research, he determined:

• The difference between skilled nursing and inpatient rehab.
• How the therapies/treatments were different.
• What insurance would cover.

Those are not small questions. They are questions that shape whether someone moves forward, keeps looking, or quietly rules a community out.

And if a community’s marketing does not help answer them, prospects will still form conclusions. They just might not be the conclusions that you’d hope for.

Every digital touchpoint now plays a role

Once he had his questions answered, he dug down in his research, validating the communities and how they looked/felt by reviewing: 

• Their website
• Google Business Page
• Social media pages
• ChatGPT
• Online reviews

At first, he actually picked a community that the hospital social workers recommended, but after reading the reviews, he began to explore other options. He finally chose the option that he felt best represented what his dad needed, one that took his insurance and provided high-quality care based on what others were saying in their reviews.

Each touchpoint adds to the bigger picture.

A community’s digital presence is no longer just one or two things. It is a bunch of smaller things that play a critical role in shaping the early decision journey and should be treated as such. Your website matters. Reviews matter. Photography matters. Search visibility matters. Blog content matters. Downloadable resources matter. Even what’s missing matters.

These things are building an overall picture for the consumer, and if they aren’t finding that it resonates, they will disengage as quietly as they started. And that is what makes this stage so easy to underestimate.

Prospects at this stage won’t show up as leads in your CRM. But they are still evaluating.

That’s why it’s important for communities to think beyond lead capture alone. The goal is not just to generate inquiries. It’s to support the research process that leads to those inquiries.

Meeting the quiet researcher where they are

The communities that support quiet research well tend to do a few things differently. They focus on where prospects are researching and optimize accordingly.

These tools give prospects the opportunity to explore and build confidence before asking for the commitment of sharing their information that will ultimately lead to a sales call.  

An inquiry is not the beginning. It’s the moment the journey becomes visible. 

And as I mentioned before, it’s not a quick fix that will instantly lead to leads. This is a process of building trust, which takes a steady approach and time.

By the time they’ve submitted their interest, the prospect may have already formed impressions about the traits of the community. They may already have a shortlist built. They may already have questions or concerns they are ready to address. They may already be leaning in or even leaning away. That is why marketing has such an important role to play before contact ever happens.

When marketing helps people research well, it does more than create awareness. It reduces uncertainty, answering questions and building credibility. It creates momentum.

And in senior living, momentum matters.