Industry: Assisted living Content: In–depth blog posts, news articles, social media promotion Highlights:  80% lower bounce rate year over year, conversions up 130% When people discuss care options for seniors […]

Industry: Assisted living
Content: Indepth blog posts, news articles, social media promotion
Highlights:  80% lower bounce rate year over year, conversions up 130%

When people discuss care options for seniors (whether for themselves or their loved ones), they do extensive research online before stepping foot into a residential facility for a tour. Our client in the assisted living space knows this because they saw a significant amount of search traffic hit their site, presumably from seniors and their caregivers.

The first piece of the puzzle, getting people to their website, was working efficiently. The challenge for Brafton’s creative teams was to create an online environment that would foster engagement.

Problem:

  • Traffic was good, but visitors weren’t sticking around on the site.
  • Not enough in-house resource to keep up with content creation.

Strategy:

  • Populate a blog with SEO-friendly articles that answer questions seniors and their children are asking to entice more relevant traffic (think assisted living options, dementia and memory care, news surrounding government aid for seniors)
  • Include strong call-to-actions within articles and through buttons that give users a variety of options to request more information.

Brafton Content:

  • 8-10 blog posts or news articles per week
  • Quarterly infographics
  • Social media promotions on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+

Results:

  • Blog sees 80% lower bounce rate year over year
  • Conversions from the blog are up 130% since 2014

3 Reasons why this blog is seeing more success than ever

We set the right style & tone for audiences

Mastering your brand’s style and tone is a necessary first-step in content marketing, because when done successfully, it’s how you distinguish yourself online.

Brafton Senior Writer Alice Pinero

Brafton Senior Writer Alice Pinero

Brafton’s Senior Writer Alice Pinero says commanding the right tone has played a large role in not only getting viewers to return to the site to read future articles but also to want to read through the whole story.

“I’ve been writing for this client for over a year, and I’ve really come to know exactly what its target audiences are looking for,” Alice said. “This includes everything from the topics that interest them most to the way they want to be addressed in each article. In this case, it is speaking to them as if they’re in the room.”

It’s important to think about the different audiences on your website when creating content – and in this case we’re not limiting audience demographics to “the senior” and “the caregiver”. Not everyone who comes to your page is ready to move into an assisted living tomorrow. Your various demographics are all in different stages of the sales cycle – you need content that will cater to all of these segments.

Strategist Wilfred Hirst shares how to create content for different audiences in our recent Content & Coffee. Watch here.

We made simple blog tweaks to improve UX

76 percent of brands have a corporate blog, and as content marketing efforts mature, readers have come to expect a level of sophistication that isn’t limited to quality writing. People are 10 times more likely to notice visuals than text, and a blog post that is a simple block of text doesn’t cut it anymore. 

Including more images, like quotes and embedded Tweets, can significantly boost the amount of time a person spends on a page.

If you think a small addition like a pull quote or an inline image won’t have a huge impact, you’ll want to check out examples of how this has worked for our clients:

We added clear calls-to-action

A strong call to action will entice, persuade or invite a site visitor to take a specific action. In this client’s case, calls to action on the blog include:

  • Using the residence location-finder tool
  • Asking for an expert’s advice
  • Signing up for the blog newsletter
  • Liking the company’s Facebook page

While these calls to action are static on the page and implemented by the UX team, Writer Alice also includes a branded strap lineat the bottom of the articles. Straplines link to more promotional, lower-funnel pieces. Elements_Fuschia_Arrow7

The average blog sees a bounce rate of about 40 percent. When this company’s corporate blog lowered its bounce rate to 11 percent, it was a clear testament that the most successful blog approach combines three elements: strong UX, audience-focused topics and a clear path for readers.

Molly Buccini is Brafton's community manager. She joined the team with a background in digital journalism and social media. She's a theatre nerd, pop culture junkie and lover of summertime.