Nobody likes high-pressure sales techniques. We most often associate them with used cars or timeshares, but the truth is that pushy salespeople are in just about every part of the business world.
Sadly, they’re part of the assisted living industry, too. It’s hard enough to imagine making the decision to put a loved one in an assisted living or memory care facility without the added stress of a high-pressure sales pitch.
Hilltop Of Greenville Memory Care, a standalone memory care community, does things differently. They have a sales approach that eschews the pressure in favor of genuine empathy.
“We like to go out into the community and be a part of the community,” says Nick Jasmon of American Healthcare Management Group, LP., the company that manages Hilltop Of Greenville. “We’re a memory care resource. We want to go to that barbecue place down the street and let the owners know, ‘Hey, we are right down the street. If you guys need anything, please give us a call. If you know anyone who’s going through any kind of memory care issues or if you have a family member who’s going through dementia or Alzheimer’s, let’s talk and see if we can help them.””
Jasmon says Hilltop’s salespeople don’t want to treat their clients like a number.
“We want to become part of their family,” he says. “We want to get invited to Thanksgiving. We want to make sure that we’re holding their hand and walking them through the whole process. We don’t want them to ever feel like they’re trying to buy a used car from us. We don’t ever want them to have that feeling when we’re communicating with them.”
That approach often means being patient and not expecting to make a sale right away.
“Traditionally, this process takes a long time,” Jasmon says. “There are leads that we could be working with for six months, a year, two years, just depending on whether a family member is ready. The whole point of that wanting to be a part of the community and wanting to be that resource and wanting to help people is that we want to be the first place people think of. We want people to say, ‘Go talk to Ashley at Hilltop. She’s there to help you.’”
Jasmon says the reason that Hilltop of Greenville’s sales staff takes a more empathetic approach is simple — the choice to put a loved one into a memory care facility is not an easy one.
“It’s an incredibly hard decision and not one that anyone expects to have to make,” he says. “So the reality is we’re not selling them a THING, we’re selling them peace of mind.”
