Will use dating profile approach to pair personalities of seniors and senior living communities at no cost to the consumer
With more than 10,000 Baby Boomers achieving retirement age every day in America, the demand for senior and assisted living communities is facing a strong growth period for those with solutions anticipating a step ahead on the innovation curve,” says Lesley Durkan, president and CEO of the newly launched Referah, LLC. The online service provides solutions for those seeking a senior living community and for the operators.
“Our focus at Referah is to serve both of those groups with a far higher degree of efficiency, compatibility, and ease-of-use than what’s currently in the market. The entire industry is facing compression from every aspect of their operation. Consumers of senior living services are facing the same pressures at home. These are the times that produce the most creative and innovative solutions. A resource that affords every community in the addressable market the opportunity for growth, increased margin, and improved service levels for all is crucial. Frankly, our timing is perfect.”
Officially launched today, the new Chicago-based Referah online senior living referral service www.Referah.com has been crafted and engineered to not just generate leads, but to create relationships. The goal is to cut away the confusion and clutter of senior living searches by employing more and better input by including social interests, health, finances and other factors in a manner that in some ways mimic dating apps by matching the personalities of communities with prospective residents. Those seeking information on senior living communities incur no charges for the services.
Durkan’s decades in the senior living community sector, from community operator to senior vice president in both public and private organizations, gave her the guidance for what was most valuable—and what was a terrible time waster—for both the operators of communities and those seeking guidance for family members. She then went about assembling a team of similarly experienced professionals in the field to assist in helping those seeking their next new home.
People inquiring about senior living will be able to have a live conversation with a Referah Family Connection Agent (FCA). During the conversation, FCAs will gather data on the social interests, health, finances, geographic location, special needs and services of the individual seeking accommodations. Then Referah will match them with the senior living communities that best fit the individual. Instead of an onslaught of messaging from many communities, those working with Referah will only receive communication from the top three most suitable matches.
“With 20,000+ communities spanning the United States, we want to cut through the noise and deliver the ‘h’ in Referah: Health, Home and Happiness to those we serve,” said Durkan. “We must leverage better tech architecture and user experience, improved communication flow, a deeper understanding of what makes a good match, and constructive partnerships to move from the old model where prospective residents and community teams are alienated with unnecessary work and so inundated by the process, they quickly develop resentment. No one enjoys that.”
By partnering with digital marketing and internet giant AmericanEagle.com, Referah harnesses the power of tomorrow’s technology and is poised to transform the senior living referral process. Close to two years of intentional design, planning, and engineering went into creating the technology, resulting in a sleek, one-stop-one-click process that will ease the anxiety of those seeking advice and counsel for the first time.
Referah’s initial roll out is nationwide, using a combined membership-based fee model structure and drastically reduced move-in fee, with impressive pre-launch subscribership that continues to rapidly grow. In addition to communities saving on the move-in fees other services employ for placement referrals, Referah’s speed-to-lead is under two minutes for communities under contract via live person outreach by phone, text, or video chat. Referah is absolutely committed to understanding what a resident is looking for and really what a senior living community needs as well.