Stop Chasing Occupancy and Start Building It

People don’t trust what you say. They trust what they experience.

In senior living, every interaction with residents, families, and team members is shaping your reputation in real time.

Stop Chasing Occupancy. Start Building It.

What if the reason your community isn’t full…
 has nothing to do with marketing?

In this episode, we’re shifting the conversation away from leads, pricing, and competition—and toward the one thing that actually drives sustainable occupancy:

👉 the experience inside your community

Because here’s the truth:

You cannot market your way out of a culture problem.

If what people experience inside your building doesn’t match what you’re promising outside, occupancy will always feel like an uphill battle.

💡 What You’ll Learn in This Episode

•  Why occupancy is not just a sales problem—it’s a leadership and culture problem 
•  The connection between trust, experience, and referrals
•  How your team dynamics directly impact move-ins and retention
•  Why your residents are your most powerful marketing strategy
•  The mindset shift from chasing results → building environments where results follow 
•  What it actually means to operate like 100% is inevitable

A Few Questions to Reflect On

•  What are people actually experiencing when they walk into your community? 
•  Would your team describe your culture the same way you would? 
•  Are your residents creating referrals—or resistance? 
•  Are you trying to fix occupancy… or build something that naturally drives it?

Learn more about the 100% Leader here 

New ED's Playbook to Creating and IMpactful Community Cultrue

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Transcript

1:05

Welcome back to another episode of Aspire For More with me, Erin Thompson. We're going to talk about something that may be sensitive to talk about for you, and that is why your community isn't full right now. Why isn't it full folks? It's probably a question that you get asked, or maybe you don't. I mean, maybe the, the numbers are rising, maybe it's not fast enough. Whatever the problems that you're facing from an occupancy standpoint, the question is why are you facing them? And we're probably looking at a lot of different things like pricing your marketing competition. Those things are important. I want to get you to look at something else, right? And it may be hard to hear, but this is what this entire episode is going to talk about and to show you that it might not be any of those things, pricing, marketing, uh, your competition. It could be something much more simpler. Yet more complex at the same time. So stick with me. We're gonna figure out why your occupancy isn't as high as you want it to be. We all leaders inside senior living are trying to solve this occupancy puzzle. All these consultants, all these experts, everybody on LinkedIn, they're talking to you about all the things that you can do. To grow your occupancy, to help your occupancy rise, and all of them are great, but there's something else that no one's talking about that you can do. The real problem is probably how you are thinking about the occupancy problem. Don't roll your eyes at me. I promise. Mindset matters, and I'm looking at everything through the mindset lens. Look, we understand that a lot of pressure comes from ownership. They want a higher increase. They want the NOI. They want the return on their investment check, get it, understand it. Then we have the emotional burnout of sales leaders. The constant change, that's what that pressure is doing. The unrelenting pressure is causing a lot of emotional burnout. Disconnection between departments, which are the silos that everybody's talking about. Your culinary departments not working with your marketing department, your maintenance departments not working with your sales department, memory cares, not working with assisted living. There's all these different silos or verticals of, of departments inside of a community. And then we have this phrase, I'm doing everything I can and nothing is working, and I'm here to tell you. You cannot market and tactic and do these seven things your way out of a culture problem. It's just not possible. So the main reason as to why your occupancy is not growing the way that you want it to is because you don't have a culture that sells, period. A culture that sells is a culture that is working together and understanding that the outcomes of the residents, the families, and every action that we take should help the whole, not just one department. That's it. It your occupancy is not where it needs to be because you don't have a superstar enough of a salesperson. A team will out deliver market results. More than a superstar will, period. I have a lot of proof in that area inside of my community. So I wanna talk about the lies and the truth Of success inside of a community. The industry has taught all of us that a hundred percent is a metric. My truth, the truth as I understand it today is that a hundred percent is an identity more than it ever is a metric. It certainly is a goal. It certainly is an outcome, but a hundred percent occupancy does not guarantee you success. It does not guarantee you, safety in your job. It doesn't guarantee you any of that. But to me a hundred percent leadership identity is an identity and an operational perspective. The metrics that we are measured by create pressure. They just do. And I'm not saying that that pressure is entirely wrong, I'm just saying it's applying a lot of energy in a negative way. If we aren't taught how to absorb it in a neutral way, the reason why I believe a hundred percent is that identity is because identity will create behavior. I had a lot of confidence problems, but there is one thing that I knew that I was a leader with a hundred percent identity. I mean, that was something that was etched into me. I knew what it takes. I knew that I had to do, and I didn't do half of what people are telling me that I should have done. To become a hundred percent at three of the four communities that I managed, but all four of them, I was able to bring occupancy from as low as 55% to a hundred percent or 95% in 18 months or less. It's a pattern, and I did use our KPIs like the sales metrics. I did meet those numbers, but more than anything, I had the identity that I could turn any community around in record time. And so if my identity, which was a hundred percent leader creates a behavior my actions are gonna create the outcomes, it's because I thought of myself as a hundred percent leader. I knew I was a hundred percent leader, and so I worked as if I knew what a hundred percent leader was. You don't hit 100% occupancy. You operate like 100% is inevitable, period. What does a hundred percent leader do in this scenario? That is the question that we always wanna ask ourselves. If a resident is moving out, what would a hundred percent leader do? We would make sure that we guide that resident through the next step. We would offer support and a very uncertain situation. We would say sentences like, based on my experience, here's what you can expect and some choices that you can prepare to make. All of these are a hundred percent leadership identity behaviors that create positive outcomes, maybe not directly but indirectly, which will eventually tip the momentum point for you. One of the core teachings that I teach inside my a hundred percent leader and my coaching, and really just my life, is that sales is service. That's it. Sales is not persuasion. Sales is not manipulation. Sales is service and solutions. I literally want to offer clarity. To the people who in front of me, I'm going to give them my a hundred percent presence and all of my social and emotional intelligence. I'm going to listen to them and I'm going to help them become aware of where they are in a situation and offer solutions. My service being one of them, right? I want to make sure that how I show up and how I represent my community. Is going to be what they see when they tour the community and experience everything that we have to offer. I'm the representative, and the more clarity that we have that sales is service, not manipulation, not persuasion, the more influence you're going to have because the most clear leader in the room is the most influential. Here's what I know about my community. Here's what I know about the outcomes my residents and families have. Here's what our strengths are, sounds like to me, you could use this kind of partnership, this type of language, this type of awareness, this type of identity influences people to say, I want what they have. This is why influence is so important because, I'll take that back. This is why sales is service is so important and the opposite of that belief is that leadership is influence right Now, obviously sales being a service is gonna influence people towards a certain outcome, but leadership is sales, is that you want people to climb aboard the wagon, right? Get on the bus. Of, we have a culture that sells here because we care. You can't love, respect and like people enough to change them. We, I cannot change people. I used to think I could, but I cannot change people. But, and I have begun to understand. I can influence them enough to want to change for themselves, right? Sales is literally not convincing people that they want this change, especially inside Senior Living Sales is about influencing their awareness of why they want it, why they need it. How you can be a solution for them. And if you're not the right solution due to price, location, or just the right timing for the loved one, then you can solve some of their smaller problems. Because the more problems you solve, the more seeds you sow. The more seeds you sow, the bigger the crop you're going to reap. That is. My main focus when I talk about that sales is service. Because truly, and we're gonna get to this later in the episode, and this is a really important note to get. That means servicing your current residents is still sales relationships require service. And that's an important fact to understand. You don't just move a resident in and then expect them to just always be happy. You have to listen. You have to change, you have to adapt. You have to be what they need you to be in the moment that they tell you they need it. Another core belief that I have inside why your occupancy may not be as high as you want it to be, and they need it to be is that your culture inside the community, your residents happiness is really the best sales strategy you have. We can do a lot of showing off our amenities. The pretty chandeliers, the pretty activity rooms, the theater, the bowling alley, whatever it is you have. But if you cannot show a community with happy residents, engaged residents, involved residents, then you don't have the best sales strategy. If you're not getting enough leads, sure there may be an ad spend or some other type of digital, problem that you can get solved. I wanna say to you, you might want to start taking better care of your residents. I have had many podcast episodes about this. I made a LinkedIn post about it this week, uh, the first full week in April. And I'm here just to tell you. That the residents and their families, how they feel the last time they walk out your door, how you guide them through the transitions inside of your community. That is your culture. That is your leadership legacy, and that is your referral base. Unless you are a new community, you have more people, more referral pool of past residents and family members than you do current. And I'm gonna say that again. You have more referral opportunities from past residents and families than you do currently, and as time we start thinking about that. If people aren't walking through your doors and an enough and an amount that makes you happy, and that you can influence them and and, and guide them to move into your community, let's start looking at the way that you're treating the people inside of your community. Can we improve that? Can we do that? The biggest influence on sales is the culture inside of your your community, and is it selling? And if it is selling, if your culture is selling, and if you're honoring your current residents and bringing in new residents or new potential residents or family members who are interested in what you have to offer, are you showing them the culture? You should be showing off your engagement director, your activities director, the resident ambassadors, you should be showing off every outcome that you are able to give to a resident. we think that sales is about convincing people how great we are and to some extent that's correct. But more importantly, to attract the people who want what you have to offer, which is your people, to attract your people. You want to show them what you have to offer, and you want your entire team to be involved in that. And if your entire team is not involved in your tour, on the tour path, making the experience a true experience, we have a problem. And if you're an executive director, you should be telling your teams. We want you to speak to people who are interested in walking through our communities. We want you to look them in the eye. We want you to tell them why you love working here and what your favorite part of the community is, and how long you've been here. Your a vital, important piece to this and you introducing yourself to strangers is important. Tell the story of your community because if you tell the story of your community through the lens of strength and positive outcomes and the type of residents and the culture we have, your people are going to find you. And when you can attract your people, it will attract more people just like them. So we don't wanna just show off our amenities, we don't wanna just talk about all the different awards we won and all these things. All that's important. But you wanna be able to back up what you say in that discovery room on the phone with the experience throughout the touring process, because trust is the metric that matters. and people may not always trust what you say. And I think for a lot of reasons we may have earned that they are going to trust what they experience with you inside the community and what other residents or caregivers or culinary, uh, leaders or directors or servers are going to say. So show them off. Show them off. It's really important to do so. Now, in the previous episodes, in my content and a lot of the work that I've done, I really do my best to talk about how senior living sits at the intersection of relationship business or real estate business and a regulatory business. These three lenses are all integrated into what I believe senior living is. And so if they are not working together, then they're a big friction point inside of your community. And I'll ask you a question to think about inside of your community today, what is the loudest, biggest lens that is drawing all the attention? Is it the regulatory piece? Is it the real estate piece, like your occupancy isn't where you want it to be, or is it the relationship piece because your customers and your key stakeholders aren't happy? Or is it all three been there? When you look at your community through those lenses, where are the, the scales tilted, unbalanced real estate relationships or regulatory, then we can start looking at. Okay, well, what's getting in the way? What's getting in the way of them being as balanced as they can be? there are three shifts that we can focus on. That will help balance both the real estate, the regulatory and the relationship piece of senior living to where they're all working in unison together. And these are my three shifts. I believe questions are an underutilized power and every leadership department role inside of the community, one of the biggest questions that you can ask and you can ask in every department inside the community, every sales opportunity, every one-on-one, whatever it is, you can ask what matters in the next 90 days. One of the ways to serve, whether it's in sales and operations, is to serve with questions. Too many times we use statements. Too many times we tell people what they need to do. I don't know if you have teenagers, but when I tell people or tell my teenager what to do, it's always a no. People will resist change. It's not that they resist change. They resist to be changed. So questions become an influential point with what matters to you right now, what matters in the next 90 days. And then you could flip that and you could say, here's what matters to me in the next 90 days, right? Here's areas that I want you to focus on. What would be getting in the way of you being able to focus on these areas? And here's why. What is getting in the way? Is a really important question to ask when we understand that questions are a way to serve questions are a way to listen and not to speak. Because every good leader knows that when you listen, you will actually hear and help people become aware of the problems that they need to be solved, and sometimes they'll solve their own problems. Shift number two is to serve with consistency. Every team member has to be aligned. If we're talking about growing our occupancy and having a 100% leader mindset, which equals an inevitable 100% occupancy, every team member has to be aligned, every single one of them. So it has to be consistent. I'm a hundred percent leader, which means that you are a hundred percent leader, which means that a hundred percent leaders do this every day. We have standup every day, and we talk about the tours. We talk about who's in the hospital. We talk about how we can help each other, how we can serve each other, and making sure that we have a culture that sells. Sales is not just a sales department responsibility. Sales is a community responsibility, and here's why. Because sales is the only department that generates the majority of the revenue. Yes. Culinary is gonna generate some revenue. Yes. nursing department will generate some revenue activities, may generate some revenue, but the majority of the revenue is gonna come from sales. And there is not one department that can get people to move in the way a sales department can because that's the entire focus of that person, that department is to get new people In. salespeople, you don't have a product to sell without your operations team. Operations team, You do not have people to serve without a sales department. So whether you're in regulatory, whether you're in real estate, or you are in the portion of the business that focuses on relationships, you all need each other because you're not going to function without one circle or the other period. It's about building trust. It's about understanding that you cannot be successful without the other. Now, some of us feel like we could be successful without those state regs. That's a whole nother discussion. But we have them, so we have to be successful with them and they have to work together. And the third shift is to serve with presence. If you're a sales director or you're a director of nursing. Any type of director inside of a community, and you have that moment where you are talking to a family member or you're talking to a resident and you understand and you feel emotions like fear and guilt and overwhelm and sadness, or you feel moments of happiness and joy and pleasure and connectedness. You have to be able to be comfortable of standing in those moments because you have to serve with presence. You have to understand that your energy in every room is the most important aspect of your leadership, period. Other people are gonna feed off of your energy. So who is causing your energy to be negative? What is not allowing you to be fully present in the moment? And if you are feeling uncomfortable in those very vulnerable moments of fear, guilt, overwhelm, happiness, joy, connectedness. Recognize your own comfort and stay in it because you can grow to appreciate those moments. People want your input, your guidance, your presence do not negate power that you have. It's very important for you to step in to what people believe you are, which is a leader wanting to guide people. Through the complexity of senior care, that's who you are. And it doesn't matter what position you are inside of the community, that's who you are. To be able to use that in the way that we can serve with questions, be consistent in our efforts that are aligned to the values and the goals of the community, and to be present no matter what emotion is going on. These are the elements of success of a culture that sells of an occupancy that's on the rise. Growing into these mindset shifts, understanding that 100% leadership is an identity. Stay with me here. This is the secret sauce. This is stuff that people don't tell you. They give you a lot of tactics. They give you a lot of things to do, but if you don't understand the why behind them or the mindset shifts that are required for success, then you're not gonna be successful. That's why it's important for you to understand this type of work. When you are starting to get told all the tactical, logistical things to work, so senior living, this is the big part I want you to understand, is not just a real estate company, it's not just a relationship business. It's the ability it's, and it's not just a regulatory business. Senior living leadership is about having the ability to lead all three at the same time. Because like I said before, the most influential leader in the room is the one with the most clarity, the most alignment, and the ability to show the outcomes, as well as talk about the outcomes that your community offers to the residents and the families who choose to commit to living there. I'll say this. Through all of my experiences, successes, failures, you learn very quickly if you allow yourself to see it. That the communities that can connect, the problems that people come to you to solve, and the solutions and the outcomes that your community can do for them, when you connect that, that's how you're going to get the sale. That's how you're gonna create a culture that sells because family members can get an envelope or a folder with floor plans and prices and menus and activity calendars. I mean, that's great. Even some of them, even some communities are stopping doing that and telling them just to go to the website. But the more friction that you can take away from the families and the more understanding and awareness and support you can give them. Is the more you'll have families choosing you. That's the a hundred percent leader mindset. That's the sales leadership way that's an aligned community full of a hundred percent leaders. And remember, the last time that a resident or a family member leaves your community is the way that they will remember your community. It's how you made them feel when they didn't know what to do, what decisions to make or what was the next step. All that uncertainty is so vital for us to be aware of because that last impression, that's your legacy, that's your brand, and that is how, in my opinion, the truth as I sit here today. I was able to grow occupancy the way that I did. Because I understood that the end is maybe, and now this is very controversial, more important than the beginning. I mean, Stephen Covey is the one that told us to think with the end in mind, right? To create that win-win quadrant for people. And there's a win-win quadrant for a hundred percent. Leaders who understand the more I navigate. The transitions, the better my leadership will be, the better the quality of life my residents will have, and the better closing of the chapter that my entire team will have. And yeah, maybe. Maybe there's more work to that on the front end if you're not used to it. But it closes so much and will eliminate so much drama and negative energy. By just being aware and understanding the guidance. These are the areas that if you focus on these may be why your occupancy is not as high as you want it to be. So making these shifts will help your occupancy rises, and it just requires you to grow and lead. I want to say this, if this episode has challenged the way that you think, that's exactly what I wanted this to do, and to be able to tie in, of course, my a hundred percent leader program, because it's exactly what this program is designed to do. It is built for leaders who are ready to stop chasing occupancy and start building it on purpose. People who want to run their comp, their community in a very head and heart way, very actionable. And registration is now open. We're gonna start a new cohort in May. So if you're tired of doing more and hearing all the things and it's not making a difference, and you're ready to lead differently, one-on-one coaching with Aspire for more with Aaron or the 100% leader program is truly your next step, investing in yourself. It is truly the only guarantee that you have that tomorrow is going to be better than today. Thank you for listening. I appreciate your time. I know it's valuable, and until the next time, have a great day.