Quantity and quality: your sales leads will need plenty of both to get the job done. (Assisted Living).

FILLING A NEW ASSISTED LIVING COMMUNITY OR JUMP-STARTING a stalled one requires a vital resource that is frequently over looked -- acquiring a sufficient number of qualified leads. The actual number of qualified leads required to fill an assisted living community frequently surprises even the more experienced and seasoned professionals.

In the best case scenario, it takes 15 leads to achieve one move-in. In the worst case scenario, it takes 25 leads to achieve one move-in. Stated another way, your community's sales team will typically convert from 4 to 7 percent of your qualified leads to actual move-ins. For example, at a 5 percent conversion rate, it will take 20 leads to achieve one move-in. Considering that turnover will continue while you are registering residents, you could need approximately 1,520 leads to initially fill 60 assisted living units to a stabilized occupancy rate of 93 percent.

Each community will have its own lead conversion profile due to a particular market size, level of competition, and overall attractiveness of your community. Each community will also have its own lead classification system. Here's one that might work for you:

Hot: a potential decision within 30 days,

Warm: prospect or their family may decide in 31 to 90 days,

Active: a decision is probably three to six months out in time,

Cold/Inactive: "I'm not ready yet," but there may be good reason to continue tracking this prospect,

Unclassified: not yet classified,

Dead: a lost prospect.

The lost prospect category should not be totally written off until some form of a lost prospect survey is conducted. This will tell your team specifically why that prospect either failed to decide to move into assisted living or rejected you for a competitor.

So, is it really reasonable to assume that you will have enough qualified leads in your primary market area to get the job done? First, define your primary market area. It's typically the geographical area where you expect to capture 70 to 80 percent of your residents. Identify a group of contiguous zip codes that are contained within that geographical area. Pull household demographics by each of those zip codes from a reputable data source. This analysis should focus on two very important groups: Seniors age 75 and older with incomes of approximately $30,000 or more and adult children or decision influencers age 45 to 64 with incomes of typically $75,000 or more. The adult children are very important. They often influence decisions and frequently are the decision makers.

Properly summarizing this information answers three strategic questions.

* Is your qualified lead base large enough to get the job done?

* What are the demographically hot zip codes?

* Are at least some of those hot zip codes in close proximity to your community?

Now, contact leading senior market mailing list suppliers and ask each one how many age- and income-qualified names they have for each of your identified primary market area zip codes. The age and income screens are important and it is also recommended that you obtain the list with phone numbers. Expect to pay approximately $60 for a list containing 1,000 names screened for age and income that includes phone numbers. You won't get a direct match between suppliers, but some should come close to your demographic numbers. It's also useful to compare this analysis with leads that already exist in your database, and then compare the total leads available with the number it will take to successfully market your project.

By using this type of analysis, you can usually determine whether or not you have enough resources to get the job done. You can also make more efficient use of your valuable leads by properly classifying them and evaluating sales performance zip code by zip code. Keep in mind, after you have reached stabilized occupancy, the job is not over. Many sponsors and owner operators are experiencing 50 percent or higher average annual turnover-so ongoing marketing will continue to consume leads.

HOW TO FILL YOUR COMMUNITY

THREE SCENARIOS                     SCENARIO 1  SCENARIO 2  SCENARIO 3

Vacant assisted living units            35          60          90
Stabilized occupancy at 93 percent      32          56          84
Initial annual turnover at 35
percent                                 11          20          29
Total gross units to sell               43          76         113
Total required leads with a lead
conversion rate at 5 percent to
achieve 93 percent stabilized
occupancy                              860        1,520       2,260

SOURCE: MOORE DIVERSIFIED SERVICES, INC.

Jim Moore is president of Moore Diversified Services, a Fort Worth, Texas-based national senior housing and health care consulting firm. He is author of Assisted Living 2000 and, most recently, Assisted Living Strategies for Changing Markets.