What if the key to growing senior living occupancy isn't simply improving sales or operations, but transforming the entire organization around the resident experience?

In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, host Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, welcomes Jami Van Gysel, Chief Operating Officer, and Jennifer Everding, Vice President of Sales and Marketing, of Christian Care / Fellowship Square, one of Arizona's leading nonprofit senior living providers.

Jami and Jennifer share how Christian Care has made a deliberate shift from a traditional operations-focused mindset to a resident experience culture, where every department, every team member, and every interaction contributes to resident satisfaction, engagement, and ultimately, occupancy growth.

This isn't just a philosophy on paper. Christian Care has invested in dedicated Directors of Resident Experience and created Resident Navigator positions to ensure residents feel seen, valued, connected, and supported throughout their entire journey.

The experience begins with the very first conversation with a sales director and continues long after move-in. It's not simply the responsibility of an activities director or any single department. It's an organization-wide commitment that requires intentional leadership, investment, and accountability.

Julie, Jami, and Jennifer explore how this approach:

• Bridges the gap between sales and operations by aligning everyone around a shared commitment to the resident experience.
• Creates meaningful connections through Resident Navigators who proactively engage with residents, identify changing needs, and help them thrive.
• Drives occupancy and revenue by increasing resident satisfaction, encouraging referrals, improving retention, and reducing dependence on costly lead generation.
• Helps established communities compete with new construction by emphasizing authentic relationships, experienced staff, personalized service, and a vibrant resident culture rather than relying solely on physical amenities.
• Turns philosophy into action through dedicated staffing, technology, training, and measurable investments in the resident experience.

Jami also shares a powerful leadership perspective: "Margin is not our mission, but margin protects the mission." It's a reminder that exceptional resident experiences and strong financial performance aren't competing priorities. When done well, they reinforce one another.

For senior living operators, executive directors, sales and marketing leaders, and anyone committed to sustainable occupancy growth, this conversation offers a compelling case for changing not just how we operate, but how we think about the business of senior living. Because resident experience isn't just part of the operation. It's the reason the operation exists.

#SeniorLiving #ResidentExperience #GrowYourOccupancy

Is senior living development poised for a comeback in 2027?

In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, host Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, welcomes Robert Wall, Managing Partner of Verdot Capital and founder of FindCandor, for a conversation about the future of senior living development, investment, occupancy, and the evolving relationship between senior living operators and consumers.

After several challenging years for new construction, Robert sees signs of a turning point. With occupancy improving, demand for quality senior housing growing, and institutional investors showing renewed interest in development, he explains why 2027 could be an important year for the industry.

Julie and Robert explore how changing demographics, consumer expectations, and market demand are shaping investment decisions across independent living, assisted living, and memory care. Robert also shares his perspective on the underserved middle market, the challenges of delivering affordable senior housing, and the importance of creating communities that emphasize wellness, nutrition, social connections, and resident experiences.

The conversation then turns to FindCandor, a senior living search platform Robert founded to challenge the traditional referral-fee model. Designed to give older adults and their families free access to senior living information, FindCandor uses conversational AI to help consumers research communities and connect directly with sales teams, without charging referral or move-in fees.

Whether you're a senior living owner, operator, investor, developer, or sales and marketing leader, this episode offers valuable perspectives on where the industry is headed and how innovation could reshape senior living growth.

Learn more:

Grow Your Occupancy: https://growyouroccupancy.com

FindCandor: https://findcandor.org

Verdot Capital: https://verdotcapital.com

Subscribe to The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast for more conversations with senior living leaders, innovators, and industry experts.

#SeniorLiving #SeniorHousing #GrowYourOccupancy

What does it take to build and maintain a senior living sales pipeline that produces results today while creating momentum for the future? In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, host Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, welcomes Allison Matthews, Vice President of Strategic Growth at Grow Your Occupancy, for a conversation about relationships, nurturing, outreach, and sustainable sales growth.

With more than two decades of experience in senior living, Allison has served in a variety of community, regional, and business development roles. She shares why one of the biggest opportunities for sales teams is learning how to effectively nurture prospects who may not be ready to make a decision today.

Julie and Allison discuss the balance between achieving short-term sales goals and staying committed to families throughout their individual journeys. They explore why curiosity, patience, personalization, and consistent follow-up are essential for building the trust that ultimately drives decisions.

They also look ahead to Q4 and the holiday season, including the importance of planning for sales coverage, maintaining activity when team members are away, and continuing to nurture prospects so communities enter the new year with momentum.

The conversation then turns to outreach and business development, where Allison shares an important principle: bring value before you ask for anything. Successful referral relationships require research, personalization, consistency, and a genuine understanding of what matters to the person or organization you hope to partner with.

In this episode, you’ll learn more about:

• Building a long-term prospect nurturing strategy
• Balancing immediate sales goals with relationship development
• Preparing your sales team for Q4 and holiday coverage
• Creating momentum heading into the new year
• Developing stronger referral-source relationships
• Personalizing business development outreach
• Building trust through consistent, value-driven communication

Whether you lead a senior living sales team, work directly with prospects and families, or are responsible for business development and referral relationships, this episode offers practical ideas for creating stronger relationships and a stronger pipeline.

Professional referral sources are one of the most fruitful sources of senior living leads. When things get busy at the community, though, external business development often gets pushed down the list of priorities.

In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, host Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, welcomes Jessi Weldon, Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Primrose Retirement Communities, and Amanda Daughters, Executive Vice President of Operations at Primrose Retirement Communities, for a candid conversation about building an outreach culture that produces measurable results.

Jessi and Amanda share how Primrose transformed external business development from an “if I have time” activity into a non-negotiable part of its sales strategy, and why alignment between sales, operations, executive directors, and regional leadership is essential to making it work.

Their conversation explores how Primrose establishes outreach expectations, measures face-to-face appointments and referred leads, coaches teams weekly, identifies the right referral partners for individual markets, and helps sales leaders build relationships beyond traditional hospital and healthcare sources.

They also discuss why successful outreach can do much more than generate leads, it can strengthen programming, create community partnerships, support current residents, and connect senior living communities more deeply with the markets they serve.

The results speak for themselves: referred leads represented about a quarter of Primrose’s leads last year, while nearly half of its move-ins came from referred sources. Julie and Jessi will continue the conversation at the 2026 SMASH Conference in Las Vegas in October during their educational session, “Beyond the Hospital: Diversifying Referral Sources for Sustainable Growth.”

For senior living sales leaders, executive directors, operators, and regional teams looking to generate more organic referrals and create a sustainable outreach strategy, this episode offers practical lessons from an organization that has made business development part of its culture.

What does great sales coaching really look like, and why is it so different from simply telling someone what to do?

In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, talks with Jeff Gronemeyer, a Regional Director of Sales & Marketing with Charter Senior Living, for a candid conversation about coaching, continuous learning, discovery, and the human side of senior living sales.

Jeff shares insights from nearly two decades in senior living, including why coaching should never feel punitive, how leaders can create a culture where learning and improvement are expected, and why the best coaches guide people toward finding answers rather than simply giving them instructions.

Julie and Jeff also explore one of the most important—and often misunderstood—sales skills: discovery. Great discovery isn't an interrogation or a checklist of questions to complete. It's an ongoing conversation built on curiosity, listening, connection, and a genuine desire to understand the person behind the prospect.

And if Jeff could wave a magic wand and eliminate one common senior living sales misstep? It would be ending an interaction without establishing a legitimate, meaningful next step.

From building trust to navigating difficult conversations, this episode is a reminder that becoming great at senior living sales isn't about reaching a finish line. It's about continuing to learn, practice, improve, and show up for the people we serve.

In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, host Julie Podewitz, CEO & Founder of Grow Your Occupancy, sits down with Matt Kelley, Regional Vice President of Operations and Business Development with Personic Health, for a wide-ranging conversation about senior living, sales fundamentals, innovation and helping older adults maintain their independence.

Matt shares lessons from a career that began in senior living and eventually expanded into home health and mobile wound care. He also recounts a recent eye-opening experience helping a friend’s mother search for an independent living community. She was qualified, ready to move and motivated, yet getting someone to answer the phone, return calls, provide information and consistently follow up proved surprisingly difficult.

Julie and Matt discuss why the fundamentals still matter: answering the phone, having backup systems in place, responding quickly, providing useful information and making prospective residents and families feel seen, heard and valued. In a competitive senior living market, great customer service can be one of a community’s most powerful differentiators.

The conversation also explores Matt’s work with Elevion Health and an innovative approach to medication adherence and wellness support. Through brief telehealth visits delivered through a resident’s television, clinicians can provide medication reminders, check in on residents, identify potential changes in condition and offer families an additional layer of reassurance and human connection.

For independent living operators, solutions like these may also provide another way to differentiate their communities, support residents who need a little extra help and potentially allow some residents to remain independent longer before transitioning to assisted living.

Whether you’re a senior living sales professional, executive director, operator or industry leader, this conversation is a reminder that innovation matters, but so do the basics.

Like, subscribe and share The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast for more conversations about senior living sales, marketing, operations and occupancy growth.

We're back with a new episode of Senior Living Sales Specialists Speak! – our most popular series in The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast.

In this practical, idea-packed episode, Julie Podewitz is joined by three accomplished senior living sales professionals: Sharon LaGaipa and Susan Eakin, Sales Specialists with Grow Your Occupancy, and Dan Covert, Sales Specialist at Mustang Creek Estates, for an engaging discussion on the sales strategies that are delivering measurable results right now.

Rather than focusing on theory, this episode is packed with actionable techniques that listeners can immediately implement to improve tours, conversions, and move-ins.

The panel shares real-world success stories, including generating 20 qualified tours from an existing database of fewer than 200 prospects, leasing a new expansion from 40% to 70% in just a few months, and achieving an impressive 38 move-ins in only 90 days.

Along the way, they discuss why meaningful discovery conversations outperform transactional selling, how responsive listening builds trust, why picking up the phone still beats relying on texts and email, and how thoughtful CRM notes and consistent follow-up can unlock hidden opportunities within your existing database.

Whether you're a senior living sales counselor, sales director, regional leader, or executive looking to improve occupancy, this episode delivers proven, immediately applicable ideas from professionals who are achieving outstanding results every day. If you're looking for practical takeaways that can help you convert more leads into move-ins, this is an episode you won't want to miss.

Summer doesn't have to mean slower sales. In this episode of The Grow Your Occupancy Podcast, Julie Podewitz shares practical, field-tested strategies to help senior living sales teams maintain momentum throughout the busiest vacation season of the year.

Julie discusses why consistent sales processes create stability, how purposeful home visits can strengthen relationships with prospective residents, and why now is the perfect time to re-engage cold leads hiding in your CRM.

She also explores the power of storytelling in marketing and outreach, offers ideas for creating seasonal outreach campaigns that referral partners will remember, and explains how adding temporary sales support can help communities maintain occupancy while team members are away.

Whether you're a sales director, executive director, regional sales leader, or marketing professional, you'll walk away with actionable ideas you can implement immediately to keep your pipeline active, your team focused, and your occupancy goals on track all summer long.