How to Win Move-Ins When You're NOT the Cheapest (Or the Biggest) Day 19

Think bigger communities always win because they have the movie theater, bigger budgets, fancy amenities, and lower pricing? Not so fast...

I want to tell you about an industry insider who moved her mom out of a corporate senior living community charging $6,000/month…

…and into an 8-bed residential assisted living home charging $11,000/month.

Yes. Nearly double. Why? Because families are not always buying amenities.

They’re buying trust, responsiveness, peace of mind and the confidence that someone will actually know their loved one.

And if you’re a smaller operator? That may be your greatest competitive advantage.

In this episode, I break down what I call the S.M.A.L.L. Advantage Framework.  A practical positioning strategy to help independent owners and residential assisted living operators compete against larger communities without racing to the bottom on price.

If you’ve ever said: "I can’t compete with the big communities…"

This episode is for you. Because the truth? You are not losing because you’re smaller.  You may be losing because you haven’t learned how to position your difference.

Free Resource

COMING SOON: Competitive Positioning Worksheet for Small Operators

This practical worksheet will help you define:

✔ Your unique value proposition
✔ Your “Why Small Wins” messaging
✔ Your competitive differentiators
✔ Your family-facing positioning statements
✔ Your boutique vs big-box comparison framework

Want access when it drops? Email: tiffany@startwithoccupancy.com

What’s Next-Day 20: If You’re Full Today, Here’s How to Stay Full Tomorrow

Because occupancy is one thing but sustainable occupancy requires a pipeline.

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Transcript

Tiffany Updated voice 0:00

She was frustrated, disillusioned, tired. The lack of transparency, accountability, and follow-up, quite frankly, was disheartening, especially since her professional career was working inside senior living. Let me tell you about the day an industry insider chose a residential assisted living fifty minutes away from her home to care for her mom after moving her out of a big box corporate community that was just ten minutes away. The big community had everything, you name it: a movie theater, a salon, a fitness center, a full-time activities director, a chef, a marketing department. It had all the stuff. They offered a multi-product service from independent living to AL to memory care designed to help families along the care journey and had a hundred and twenty beds. They had everything that you would imagine a big community would have. Their rate at the big box was six thousand dollars. That's what she was paying. She decided to move her mom to a residential assisted living that was owned by a nurse. The new community was fairly new, had only eight beds, available for residents. One common living area, of course, because it was in a home, it was a home kitchen. Staff led the activities and the care. There was no movie theater or salon or no fancy amenities, and their rate was eleven thousand dollars. Now, granted, this particular residential community cared for higher acuity memory care clientele. That was her specialty, which is important, which we'll talk about later. But the deal was that it's five thousand dollars more expensive than what my contact within the industry was paying for the big box community with a fraction of the amenities and not the traditional programming of memory care. And she said this to me, which was really important, and kind of highlighted something. She said,"We're choosing to do this, and here's why. When I ask a staff member questions and they're like,'I don't know. I'm new here.'" She said the staff in and of themselves was good, but her complaint for the most part was the management And the response of the management, the communication from the management, the follow through with the management. She was like, Because of the constant turnover, because of the management, that even though they would visit, they didn't know her mom is or, there was just new people there." she wanted to be somewhere where they would know her mom, and that was important to her. And it was important to her because she is an industry insider, and she knows the expectations from the corporate level, and she was experiencing what it was like in the community level. And the thing that I would like to point out is that this person was not just a little industry insider. She was big industry insider. She said,"When I asked a question after moving my mom in about medication management, she didn't get a let me check with someone or not getting a response. The person knew the answer because they were the owner. they knew what was happening." Now, eventually, down the line, because of the newness and because the owner was still figuring her way out, she-- they were leaning on each other. But she felt comfortable that this owner had the best of intentions with her mom and also was very communicative with what was going on with her mom. And one of the things that I remember her saying to me is that she didn't want her mom to be room number XYZ in a big community. She said she wanted her mom to be in a home where everyone knew her name and knew her story and knew what makes her happy. And for her, that was worth the difference. And this is what we're talking about today, how to win the move in when you're not the cheapest or the biggest. How to turn your small size community into your biggest competitive advantage. How to position yourself as the boutique, personalized, family-owned alternative to the big box corporate-owned communities. Because here's the truth. You're not competing on price. You're not competing on size. But what you are competing on is the heart of the matter, and that is, will you care for my loved one as much as I do? And when you learn how to communicate that, you'll gain move-ins that you never thought you could. And for that, my friend, we're going to discuss today. Hi, I'm Tiffany Hill-Allen, and welcome to day nineteen of our twenty-one days all things senior living marketing series. Are you ready to dive in? Let's go.

Tiffany 5:05

Uh huh. Welcome to Start With Occupancy, the podcast for senior living owners, operators, and sales professionals./Hi, I'm Tiffany, marketing strategist and former corporate baddie who got tired of producing results for wall street and wanted to make a change on main street./I provide quick tips, idea nuggets, and case studies to help you with proven sales, marketing, and business development strategies along with leadership concepts so that you can inspire change, impact lives, and improve outcomes for the aging, their families and your teams./I'm committed to equipping you with the tools, the knowledge and resources that you need to excel in your business./With experience working inside senior living companies, large and small, I've developed a deep passion for advocating for the aging adult and those who care for them, all while driving business growth./So whether you're already in the senior care industry or maybe you would like to be, if your mission is to serve them, my mission is to serve you./Join me as we unravel the strategies and tactics that drive success in your business while making a difference in someone's life./The goal is to touch, guide, and impact the lives of 10 families per month!/Are you with me? It's time to be inspired, gain practical tips and own your future.

Tiffany Updated voice 6:36

Here's what I hear from small operators all the time."I can't compete with," you name whatever big community is down the street."They have a movie theater, and I don't," or,"They're one thousand cheaper than me. How am I supposed to win?" Or,"How am I supposed to get residents when they have all the amenities and I do not, and they're less money?" They have a huge marketing budget," I hear. Or,"I only have, five hundred dollars a month or three hundred dollars a month. Families keep choosing them over me, and I don't know what to do, and I don't know why." And I hear that so often. And here's what I tell them. I look at them in the eye if I'm on Zoom, or I'm on the phone with them talking them through this, and I tell them all the time,"Stop trying to compete on their terms. Start competing on your terms." The bigger box communities compete with each other on price and amenities and service offerings or programs. That's how they play the game. And fifteen years in this, I've seen it over and over again. The stories I could tell about how they compete with those things is ridiculous, but that's for another time. What I wanna do is tell you that because, that's where they seem to have the advantage, especially with the economies of scale over food cost and, and sometimes choices, right? They have the corporate budgets for staff. They have intellectual capital by way of money and people to develop innovative programs. They even have some of the fanciest buildings. I will agree with that. And one of the other things that many of them have is experience because they've been operating and doing this longer. But you know what they don't have? The ability to develop a deep personal relationship with every single resident. That ability to make decisions in twelve hours or less instead of three, five, seven days or even weeks. An owner who knows every resident's name, every story, their favorite meal, their grandchildren's name a family-owned community whose heart cares more about the people than the profit. That is your competitive advantage. And today, I'm going to show you how to use it. I call it the SMALL Advantage. And SMALL, of course, is an acronym to help you remember what we're gonna go over today. It is the framework that helps small operators just like you win against big box communities, even when you're more expensive. So since it's an acronym, we'll go through each letter. S is for size. Size equals true personalized care, not institutional. And I don't want to even portray that the bigger box communities are institutionalized because a lot of times they don't feel institution. They're not. They're just cookie cutter, right? And that's not just a soundbite because if you look at everybody's website on the bigger box, they talk about personalization of care. But how is that in practice? And this is where you will win as a small operator The M is mobility. Mobility equals faster decisions, more flexibility, and that, my friend, is what you have as a small operator. A is attention. Every resident is known by their name. Communication and feedback to the families are immediate. They're very personalized. And there's more collaboration, or I would say an opportunity for collaboration. The L is for local, and that means that you as a smaller community are embedded deeply into the community. And I mean the community, meaning the greater community at large. And then the second L is for love. You being a smaller operator, typically are family-owned. Even if you're an independently larger community, you still have an opportunity to have the heart of what you're doing versus the corporate profit m- model, where most bigger communities are owned by private equity firms, and they actually have a management company that is managing the business. And those management companies usually flip every 18 m- months to three years. And believe it or not, the corporate ownership sometimes flips every two to five years. With that constant turnover, the culture can change within a community pretty often. So let's deep dive through the Small Advantage Framework. The first S is for size. And this is where most small operators get intimidated. They think that their size is a disadvantage. Some of you guys out there even apologize for it. You say things like,"I know we're small, but..." I want to stop right here and say, please stop. Don't do that. Your small size is your biggest advantage. Here's what I want you to think about. Families don't want their loved one to be known as room number twenty-one or one twenty-one in a hundred and twenty person community. They want personalized care for the most part, cause there's people for each type of business. So I'm not downing the big communities'cause I think there's a place for them. However, I want you to rise up and understand your value and your worth in this, and how do you communicate that when you're talking to referral sources as well as to family members. And I'm saying that a lot of family members in my years of working with probably, I don't know, thousands of families, they're wanting personalized care. Even when there's family dynamics involved, they still want to know that person is at least cared for. And they want them to be known by who they are, not just another number. Now, in most bigger communities, the staff actually does this. But when you're having to talk to m- people who are operating and the things that family wanna talk more deeply about, unfortunately, the director of nursing or wellness director does not always have the staff member that is caring and know the mom personally in those meetings. So there's a little bit of a disconnect. One is looking at reports or what was written or what was known or what was done on a ten or fifteen minute visit, as opposed to who is there every single day for hours at a time. Again, this is your superpower. Residents can get lost in a bigger box community, depending on its size, in terms of how they are communicated with or observed, and it also depends on the particular management style of that community. And so that's where executive directors are crucial. Sometimes the executive director is very much, hands-on and have a culture, of care, where every single person touch residents. Other Executive directors stay in their office, and the people operate, and they're task-oriented. And that's where a lot of people see the complaints that come through,'cause the quality of a community is the quality of their executive director. And for you in a small community, it's the same thing. The quality of your community is the quality of your standards, what you hold your team accountable for. It's your processes. And that, my friend, is what makes you different. And when you're able to connect with the residents and not allow them to be lost in the shuffle, where again, in the bigger communities, quite literally, they may not be lost physically, even though that does happen every so often, but emotionally and mentally, where they can stay isolated in their room, where they may not have any, conversations, you know, except for the, the task that's being done. So mentally, there's an, there's a cost to that. And not everybody wants all that mental stimulation, anyway. But for families, it's important. And it's like I say, the difference of going to a mega church and one that has only less than, let's say, 100 members. In a mega church, you're there, you're worshiping, you're saying hello, you're meeting people, but are you getting a deeper connection with the people that you meet? Where if you're in a church with less than 100 members or less than 200 members, do you really get to know the people in your church? Do you fellowship differently? So this allows your difference to be instead of a resident being,"Oh, the lady in room 247 wants her coffee," to then be,"Oh, Mrs. Johnson, um, wants her coffee with two creamers, one sugar, and I put it on her night table in her room." Now, this is again dependent on the size of the community and the executive director, but I will tell you, that personalization, doesn't happen not to that level in a bigger community I will say this too. The more the corporate entity demands in constant reports from the executive director, meetings, deadlines, trackers, management of staff, the less the executive director has time to develop the personalized culture within their community without sacrificing their own family and personal time. But in your community, everyone knows everyone. Your staff knows Mrs. Johnson's favorite meal. Your staff knows what she likes, in her coffee. They knows when she gets anxious in the evenings and need extra reassurance. They know her favorite holiday and her favorite game show. So if someone is out for the day in your community, there's no small detail about this resident is missed just because of the sheer size of your community, everyone knows who this resident is. You can't get that type of personalization of care in a big hundred and twenty apartment size community. You just can't. Now, here's how to communicate this to families. And this is a script that you could think about or add to so that it can be personalized to you. Here we go. I know you're looking at, insert big community down the street. Our model of care allows us to create an environment for our twelve residents that is uniquely personalized in a way that we know all of the intricate nuances of our residents, which means your mom won't be in room one forty-seven. She will be Mrs. Johnson, and every single person on our staff will not only just know her name, but will also know her story, what makes her happy, all the things. And it will be as simple as waking her up to take her meds, getting her to eat at her normal eating time at home, and having a caregiver who greets her in the morning that says,"Good morning, Mrs. Johnson. Did you sleep well? I know you love your coffee with two sugars. I already made it for you, and here it is by your recliner when you're ready for it." That's the difference between a twelve-home person community and a hundred-twenty-person community. The key for you is you're not apologizing for your size, but positioning it as a benefit for the family. The second M is for mobility, and this is about your ability to make decisions fast. And here's the truth. in the bigger communities, you have corporate bureaucracy. Depending on the company, whether it's the management company or the ownership company, there is, a lot of levels with that bureaucracy, even if the levels, which for a smaller company seems shorter, there are risk factors that is always factored into decisions. Sometimes that mean you have to get approval from regional managers, corporate offices, either compliance departments, it could be attorneys. And sometimes it can take up to days or weeks for a decision to be made. Because also you have to remember, there's follow-up and follow-through. But you, you're the owner, right? You can make a decision today. And why this matters for families is that most families need flexibility. When things pop off, a lot of times they want their solutions, and they want things to be done faster. And the younger the families are, the more expectations that solutions and their problems solved faster. And so you're able to move a lot faster than some of the larger communities. So what does this look like and why this matters is that means if a family has an emergency, they need to move Mom in more immediate, maybe on the weekend. Well, if that's the case, you're able to arrange your staff and your schedule that Mom can move in this week, or Mom can move in on Saturday. Or if they need a payment plan, you're the owner. You can be flexible with them, uh, for their deposit or community fee. Maybe they need special accommodations for Mom because she has dietary restrictions, like maybe a renal diet or a vegan diet or a gluten-free diet. You can charge up for those things, right, if there's something that's special. But the other thing is that you can deliver them. And, I will tell you a lot of the bigger communities cannot guarantee those things, where you can as a smaller community. So typically, the answer in a bigger community is either,"No, we don't do that," or,"Let me check with corporate, and I'll get back to you." In your community, the answer is,"Let me think about that," or,"Let me figure out how we can make this work for you and your mom. Uh, can I call you back in an hour?" That's mobility, and families value that. And here's a way that when you're in that selling zone process, talking to a family, that you can communicate it. One thing I want you to know about working with a family-owned community like ours is that we can make decisions fast. If you need to move your mom in this week on a Saturday or a Sunday or after four PM, we can make that happen. If your mom has special dietary needs or medication requirements, I can work with you to accommodate that. I don't have to wait for approval because we're family-owned, we're small, and we're personalized. That is the benefit of working with us. We're nimble, we're flexible, and we can move as fast as you need us. That, my friends, is a winner. The key is to position your small size as speed and flexibility, not as a limitation. The third is A for our framework, is for attention, and is about the level of care and attention that your residents receive. In the big corporate owner-managed community, staff turnover, I will admit, is pretty high. Literally, I had a community whose staff turn, turnover within a six-month period was over a hundred and sixty percent. No lie. That means it turned over, over one and a half times in a six-month period. And so that was a big discussion at one of our meetings, um, because then they start looking at the executive director like,"What's going on with you, and how are you managing your staff?" But I will say this: caregivers are stretched very thin. Sometimes depending on the community, they're caring for fifteen to twenty residents at a time, typically, in an assisted living. If it's a memory care, it's typically between a one to eight to ten ratio. Many of the staff members themselves are great with residents. the things that these people do for their residents are amazing, even in the bigger communities. But they still feel stretched. A lot of times they feel underappreciated, and they are very task-oriented So it's hard to build meaningful relationships with residents when you're carrying that type of load. For many of these caregivers in a bigger community, if they could just take care of their people and not have to deal with some of the other stuff that goes on there, they would love their job so much more, and also if they're being compensated for the amount of work that they're doing. So that is another way that you can be more nimble and you can explain your pricing a little bit in terms of how you compensate your staff. But in your community, your staff to ratio is going to be better. I have a client now who has eight residents max, and while she's obviously wanting to make a profit, and she does, but for her it's more important that her families and her residents feel supported. So she runs two caregivers from seven AM to eleven PM every single day, and from eleven PM to seven AM, one at night. even on the weekends. You see, her caregivers have time to sit with the residents, have conversations, learn their stories, learn their preferences, know what they like. And why this matters to families is because families, again, want to know that their loved one won't be overlooked. So in her community, it is amazing. And her care staff has been there, six out of the nine that she has, has been there over six years. One has been there twelve years. That says a lot. Many families want to know if their mom is having a bad day, someone will notice If Mom's behavior changes, someone will catch it. They want to know someone will laugh with their mom, create new memories, and enjoy her company. And I'm using mom, but it could be dad, it could be uncle, it could be grandma. In a big box community, that does not always happen. But in your community, it does. Every single day. And here's what you could say to families. Here we go. Let me tell you what happened last week. One of our residents wasn't her usually chatty self. She didn't finish her coffee. Samantha, our caregiver, noticed. And she sat down with her and just started talking to her. She mentioned to her, you seem a little quiet today. Are you feeling okay? Are you okay? Something bothering you?" It turns out our resident had a headache, a simple headache, but didn't wanna bother anyone because sometimes that's how our residents are. But our caregiver got her some Tylenol, helped her back to the room, and checked on her every hour for the rest of the day. That's the level of attention your mom will get here. Our staff has time to notice when something is off. They have time to sit with the residents, and have real conversations. In a big community, that particular resident might have gone all day without anyone noticing, but here we notice because we know our residents." You see, the key is you're showing families that your small size means better attention, not less care. So think about the last time a family chose a big box community over you. Did you apologize for your size, or did you position it as a advantage? The fourth letter is L for local, and this is about your connection to the community at large. I call it the larger neighborhood. Most corporate-owned communities are part of a national chain, right? Or they're managed by a national company. They have standardized policies, standardized menus, standardized activities. But you, you're local. You're embedded within your local community. You know the local restaurants, the local churches, the... all the local events that's going on. You're not just a business in a community. You're a neighbor within the community. And why this matters is that families want their loved one to stay connected to the community they have lived in for decades. They don't want mom or dad or grandma or grandpa to feel out of touch. They want her or him to feel that they are still part of- Of the neighborhood. And here you can actually say to families, and here we go, One thing that makes us different from the big corporate communities is that we're family-owned, and we've been in this neighborhood for three years. That means we know the community. We take residents to the local farmer's markets on Saturdays. For instance, we go to the local church on Sundays if they want to. We order from the local bakery for special occasions. And because we're small, we can do things like this. Last month, one of our residents mentioned that she used to go to, Metro Diner every Friday for breakfast. So we took her and a couple of other residents. And she got to sit in her favorite booth when she used to go there. And she got to talk to her waitress who's been there for so many years. You know, you can't do that with a larger hundred and twenty person community, but you can do that here with us because we're not just a senior living community. We're part of this neighborhood You see the difference? You're positioning your local roots as a benefit, not as a lack of corporate resources. You're able to do all these extras, and so sometimes those extras can cost money, and that might be why you might be higher. The fifth letter is L, and that is for love. And this is about the why you do what you do. As mentioned, most big box communities are owned by investors, private equity firms. Don't get me started on that soapbox. So they're focused on profit margins, occupancy rates, and shareholder returns for the most part, and also for all stakeholders involved. That is a, a buzzword, right? And don't get me started with my corporate speak, right? Now, you know, that is definitely, uh, something. It's just business and has a place in our society, and there is a need for those type of communities, I will say that. So by no means am I bashing corporate communities or corporately owned communities, because at the end of the day, the difference between them is how it's run on the local level. It is totally a difference based on the executive director that is in that community. It can feel like a small community if the executive director makes it feel like that. However, at the end of the day, that executive director, has to answer to the revenue numbers, the NOI, the expenses, the staffing, all of that, and they're pressed to produce a certain number in profit margins. So my heart goes out to them as well, and those who do what they need to do and do it well are real superheroes in all of this. I believe both of you guys have your place in this industry And can serve people well when the community is well-managed. And this is on both sides. I know there are crappy communities on the big side, but I know a lot of crappy communities on the small side, too. So let's not pit one against the other. I'm just trying to tell you what the advantage is that you have over the others. And being family-owned or being smaller, you're in this because typically you care. For many of you, you're not trying to maximize the most profits. You want to live comfortably. You want to be able to pay your bills. You want to make extra money because this is your business. You're wanting, and not only extra like side money, obviously, but I mean, you want to live well, but you're not trying to squeeze every single penny out of someone. You're actually trying to make a difference, providing the best care possible while providing a comfortable living for you and your family, and that's the difference. You don't have the mandate of three percent revenue growth quarter over quarter. You don't have to answer to every expense that is spent and, um, have a whole report about it. You don't have to answer to every, family that is late in their payment and, are they being charged all the extras. Like you don't have that. And why this matters is that families feel the difference. They can feel when a community is run by people who actually care versus people who are just doing their job or where profit looks or appears to be the goal. So how could you really communicate something or this messaging to families? I want to be honest with you about why I do this work. I didn't open this community to make a fortune. I opened it because my own grandmother lived in a community, and I felt if I ever decided to open one, I would take the lessons that I learned from observing where she was and do a better job. I always thought about this while visiting her, that there has to be a better way. So I opened this community, and every decision I make is based on one question: Would I want my grandmother to live here? That's the difference between me being a family-owned community and a big corporate one. In a corporate community, decisions are made by people who've never met your mom. In our community, decisions are made by me, and I'm here every day or every other day at least. I will know your mom, I will care for your mom, and I'll know all about her care. That's not something you can get in a big box community, and that's why a lot of families choose us even though we're more expensive." The key is that you're positioning your passion as your biggest competitive advantage. When I'm-- When working with my clients, I am always trying to find their unique selling proposition. I'm trying to figure out what is it about you that's going to make you different in your space. What is your special sauce? One of them was a nurse, and I asked her about her work history."Okay, you're a nurse. What kind of nursing did you do?" And she mainly worked with those with diabetes and kidney disease. So I said to her,"Wait a minute. Are you familiar with renal and diabetic diets?" And she's like,"Oh, most certainly." And she understood the disease process. She understood what, what happens to people, how to, prevent it or how to manage it, how to react to it. That was her specialty. And so I advised her, we need to lean into your specialty when talking to families and referral partners in your community that you could accommodate those things that I know bigger communities will not and cannot. So we did that, and it was a hit. When I started with her, I think within four months, she was completely full and she had none. She was actually thinking about going back to nursing job because she was like,"I can't afford to do this." I think, um, she had about six months of no residents. after opening, and so we leaned into h- her unique selling proposition, which is not only am I a nurse, but I'm a nurse who specializes in or has experience in dealing with people who have kidney disease and diabetes or struggle with diabetes, and I'm able to adjust my menus to be compliant with the state, but then also to be compliant with what they're needing. And that was her advantage. We leaned into each segment of the small advantage framework, and you can too. Here are some practical tips to help position your small size as your advantage. Tip number one is please stop apologizing for what you don't have. Every time you apologize, you're telling the family that you're thinking you're inferior. Instead, say,"We're small by design because we believe we can impact the lives of our twelve residents better than we can a hundred and twenty at a time." Tip number two, use contrast statements. Show families the difference between a bigger box community and yours. Something like,"In a big community, your mom will receive care. In our community, your mom is not only known, but her care addresses every part of her humanity, her mental, her m- emotional, her physical, her spiritual, not just as a program, but through human interactions as friends, not just caregivers." That makes a difference, right? Why this works is because you're not bashing the competition. You're just showing the difference. Never bash the competition. It never looks good for families, and I have seen it over and over again where people have done that, and it went south. Tip number three, tell stories that prove your point. Don't just say you provide personalized care. Show it with stories. This works. Stories are so much more powerful than claims. So explain in the stories of your past residents, and sometimes you have to borrow other people's stories, whether you hear stories here, with me on the podcast of things that happen, or through networking, know other people's stories, but share stories, that will relate to your family. Tip number four is reframe the expensive versus, investment, conversation. When families say you're more expensive than the big chain, don't defend your price. Reframe it. Just say,"You're right. We are more expensive, and here's why. We're not trying to be the cheapest option in town. We're trying to be the best option, and we're not willing to cut corners in our staffing, in our food quality, in our, options for your for your loved one because your mom, your loved one deserves the best care possible, and that costs a little more." Tip number five: position yourself as the boutique alternative to the bigger box communities. Again, who's like more of a hotel chain, right? Families can relate to that. And position yourself as a boutique bed and breakfast. And you might say to them, Think of it this way. They are like the Marriott. It's nice. It's clean. It's standardized. You know what you're getting. But we're like the boutique bed and breakfast. We're smaller. We're more personal. We're more flexible, and we care more about the experience than the bottom line. Some families want the Marriott, and that's okay. But if you want the boutique experience where your mom is treated like family and not like a guest, then that's what we offer." How powerful is that, right? Ah. I love that. So this is what I'd like for you to do this week. Create a"Why Small Is Better" one-pager. Think of what you do that's different and that makes you being small better in your area, in your community. Think of one story that you can share with visiting families. Pick one story that proves your point, whether it's something like a bakery story an outing that you did, someone that you had come locally into the community, not just a hired singer. Anything that you have done. Make it specific and emotional. Okay? The second is think of your unique value proposition. What makes your community different than any other community, large or small, in your area? This is where understanding your competitive advantage. And you can only do that by doing a competitive market survey, understanding your market and understanding who your competitors are. And then third, what is your story? Why did you open this community? What is your passion? What was your ultimate why? And that's it. One page. Write it out and give it to families during a visit. Watch how it changes the conversation. Include it with your brochure or your package that you're giving to them that has the rates, the services that you offer, and then you can have this as a one pager. Now, if you're thinking, Tiffany, I want the competitive positioning script that you just did, but I also want to understand how to do a competitive market analysis and survey and a full market analysis. And what words do I use with families that are looking at the big box communities? And how do I position myself where they're actually sending me some of their not only residents, but maybe the prospective families that they're talking to and not able to move into their community? If that is something that you're interested in, I provide that training in my Momentum Marketing Bootcamp. In the bootcamp, we talk about your positioning, your unique proposition in your area. We talk about how to communicate that to not only families, but to professional referral sources so that you can get more referrals to your community, which means more activity, more opportunities for residents, and then that leads to more move-ins. And what's included is case studies of small operators who were able to utilize their positioning get move-ins from the bigger box communities. So head over to startwithoccupancy.com/programs to learn more about our Momentum Marketing Bootcamp, which starts on June the 10th. But even if you don't join the bootcamp, create that one-pager this week. Stop apologizing for your size. Start positioning it as your biggest advantage. Today, we covered the S.M.A.L.L. Advantage, on how to win when you're not the cheapest or the biggest. In our next episode, we're gonna dive into day 20 of our series. We're almost done, you guys. Oh, God, this has been... You don't have no idea how much of a project this was, and I didn't know when I first started. I thought this was gonna be a lot easier. And I put so much thought into this, if you've been with me throughout, let me know, DM me, that you have listened to every episode. So, um, but tomorrow we're diving into day 20. If you're full today, here's how to stay full tomorrow. That is the title. You're going to want to hear this because occupancy isn't just about having a full community. It's also about staying full, and that requires, my friend, a pipeline. That requires a relationship, and so we're going to talk about that. Before I let you go, remember this You're not competing with big box communities on their terms. You're competing with them on yours. They may have the size, but you, my friend, have the heart. They may have the amenities, but you have the attention. They have all these corporate policies and procedures, but you have flexibility. And when you learn how to communicate that to families, you will get the move-ins that you never thought you could. So stop apologizing, stop trying to compete. They're not choosing you despite your size. They're choosing you because of it. Until next time, we're here to inspire change, impact lives, and improve outcomes. I'll see you in day twenty.