by: Larry Parker
Finding what works for the cremation customer is rapidly becoming a necessity for success in the funeral business. Picture your business as a coin. Your firm is the side and your customers are the other side. The two are bound inextricably to one another. Now, take this picture to the next level. Is your business the heads side or the tails side of the coin? And, consider the more important question. What is it that bonds customers to a business so tightly like the inextricable two sides of a coin? Answer those two questions and both you and your business will grow.
Look at a simple occurrence in funeral homes while keeping those questions in mind. A phone call is received. It is a Mrs. Jones who says, My husband is in hospice and I would like to know how much you charge for cremation? Many times the hospice part is left out and the usual question is How much do you charge for cremation? Most funeral business managers coach and train staff to handle these calls. Many are quite skillful at engaging Mrs. Jones with a few questions and weaving in rapport building as the conversation progresses. Assume you are the manager of a business with increasing cremation sales. That scenario is played out almost universally in funeral businesses today. Your staff either begins the bond establishment with Mrs. Jones or they lose her. Where do you go from here, or more importantly, on what path is Mrs. Jones placed if she is still there?
Preneed with cremation at an increasing volume is a serious concern for a funeral business wishing to be successful in the future. What is your definition of a preneed case in terms of at need versus preneed and also, in terms of unfunded versus funded? At this point, I need to tell you about half of my bright ideas over the past 35 years were mistakes. The United States Marine Corps has one of its strong unwritten rules, Do Something Even If It Turns Out Wrong! Winners act quickly, take chances and then make corrections quickly when wrong. OK, lets boldly step out and define preneed broadly as planning for anyone of any age who is alive. It can be funded or unfunded.
Now, back to Mrs. Jones. Under the definition , she is channeled to preneed. All imminent persons are under the purview of preneed due to that broad definition. Most at need staffs are ill equipped and not motivated to give priority to the needs of the living when their training and main mission is to care for the family of the deceased person. Preneed always gets second priority if a death is to be handled. Motivation is a funny thing. Suppose you contract with a professional preneed operation which defines preneed only as funded sales on non-imminent individuals below a certain age – 90 perhaps. That arrangement would be hazardous to the future success of your cremation business. Why? Because the majority of cremation customers who approach your organization are either imminent or want unfunded planning in the beginning.
Commission driven operations are partially successful in marketing to potential preneed cremation customers. Some provision of incentive or compensation for handling persons with negative oncology diagnoses, hospice patients and older 80`s and 90`s groups needs to be used. Without that provision, you are simply driving a steady stream of potential cremation customers to your competition. Experienced managers see the ready willingness of cremation customers to move on to another firm as one of the differences between todays cremation family and the burial family.
In seeking solutions we start with the step of defining the problem or situation. If you want your eyes opened regarding your business, try this. Follow every phone call, email, letter or walk-in for a short period of time, a week or two perhaps. Track that person through preneed, at need, sales call process, personal call handling or any other post-contact action or inaction by your staff. Keep tracking after the collection period ends. With the preneed contacts, it can go on for weeks.
Obviously, the entire staff gets involved in this process. What path was each person placed on, who decided on that path and why? You want to know every step taken with each contact. When were potential customers lost or intentionally dropped? What staff action resulted in the customer taking the next step-thus moving toward that inextricable bond with the firm? What was the satisfaction level of each customer? What caused each terminated relationship? All this takes some real digging. Some firms start with one hour or several hours of contacts just to coach staff on how to collect and track whats happening.
There is a principle in planning that says there is value gained in going through the process in addition to the value in the plan itself. The same is true with your tracking of contacts. Staff members sharpen their customer service skills as they participate in this process. At the back end of the process, you have the findings which can be used for comparison with customer feedback, restructuring of policies and procedures, and training of staff.
A customer feedback system using the internet gives todays manager a powerful edge in strengthening the bond with customers. Cremation.com starts customer feedback in the preneed and at need arrangement conference with a short verbal explanation and take-home illustrative sheet. All feedback is channeled via the internet to the managers business intelligence dashboard. The results measure customer satisfaction levels with each funeral director or preneed salesperson and with the firm itself. For comparison, the average figures for the relevant state and country-United States or Canada are given.
The process is very customer friendly. Just one question in the form of a rating, On a scale of 1-10 how satisfied are you with your recent arrangement at the Smith Funeral Home and Crematory? It is followed by an opportunity to make any desired comment in an open-ended fashion. Managers use the feedback information to prepare staff training programs, to take personnel actions and to adjust policies of the firm.
The economics of advertising in the typical cremation marketplace is causing a shift from print and yellow pages to the internet. Strengthening customer relations by improving employee skills in this area makes sense and brings in more money. The sharp manager can benefit by finding and delivering what works for the cremation customer.
Contact tracking and customer feedback strengthen the relationship between a firm and its customer base. That strengthened relationship provides fertile grounds for identifying referral ambassadors Most of those will be family members who have experienced a cremation with your firm and are motivated to continually refer future customers to you. Recognition and stroking are essential and can be accomplished easily with todays email. Two pertinent questions to be answered by a location manager are; Who is your Referral Ambassador Coordinator? and, Who are your Key Referral Ambassadors?
Tracking, feedback, recruitment of ambassadors are all actions of an internal nature, within the firm. For the next bold step in acquiring new customers, consider market expansion, an external approach. The typical burial market extends out for 10-20 miles from a location. Cremation markets go farther, about 50 miles. Thats limited by removal times. Complaints by families start to come in when the removal time extends beyond an hour or so. Lets assume you choose to subscribe to Cremation.com and list your cremation oriented website in all the significant towns or cities in a fifty mile radius. An increase from 20 to 50 miles increases your cremation market area from 1,257 square miles to 7,854 square miles, more than a six fold increase. The entire cost to do this amounts to around a dollar per day. Customer firms see an increase in cremation sales. Some are experiencing phenomenal results when they combine Market Expansion with Contact Tracking, Customer Feedback and Ambassador Referral.
The internet is reshaping marketing and the greatest news is that it is costing less. Yellow pages and newspapers are gradually slipping where advertising is concerned. Internet surpasses all media in content delivery. Furthermore, the delivery is at customer demand on a 24/7 basis. Funeral home managers and owners are gaining back the ability to accomplish in a 50 mile radius what their grandfathers did in a small town, village or community of yesteryear.
Larry Parker is President of Cremation Marketing Systems, Inc.-Cremation.com. He has owned and operated recently sold funeral establishments for thirty years, managed the sale of $millions in cremation preneed and a greater amount in unfunded plans. His background includes graduation from the Funeral Director Program at Fayetteville Technical Community College, Masters of Science in Health Administration at UNC, Chapel Hill, NC, seven years as an officer in the United States Marine Corps and ten years elected to the North Carolina Crematory Authority, a part of the States Board of Funeral Service.
Link to find local funeral homes
http://www.cremation.com