30+ Engagement Tips. For Social Funeral Directors. These tips are brought to you by Ashley Montroy, Marketing Manager at FrontRunner Professional.

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1 30+ Engagement Tips For Social Funeral Directors These tips are brought to you by Ashley Montroy, Marketing Manager at FrontRunner Professional. FrontRunner FRONTRUNNER Professional PROFESSIONAL // 30+ Engagement Tips VIRTUAL for Social LEARNING Funeral Directors CENTER RESOURCE 1

2 1. Post obits to Facebook/Twitter Put a link to the obit page for the deceased where they can get more information about the service from your website. FrontRunner clients, you can push your obits to Facebook automatically. 2. Attend community events And then your audience know what you ve been doing! Whenever anyone at your firm attends a special dinner, sporting or charity event, or supports the arts, take a camera. Then upload the pictures to Facebook as soon as possible, if not immediately (while you re still there, using your smartphone). 3. Funeral home events If your funeral home is hosting an information session or other event, let folks know about it! Maybe you re renovating your facility then post pictures, and keep your audience in the loop! Adding to your staff? Introduce them to your community using social media. Tonight s game has been brought to you by: 4. Sponsor community-wide events And then promote them wherever (and whenever) possible, including social media. NOW HIRING 2

3 5. Employment opportunities If your funeral home is hiring, use your social media sites to spread the word and attract potential employees. 6. Q&A Ask the director sessions With social media, it is common for businesses to have an Ask the Expert, Friday Session where the public can ask questions. A funeral home may want to have this every Friday or they may wish to encourage questions as often as they d like with reminders every few days. ASK THE EXPERT 3

4 7. Video tributes to YouTube/memorial tribute page With family permission of course, link video tributes to your social media pages where they can watch by clicking the link. FrontRunner clients, you can embed your video tributes right on the deceased s Book of Memories page show a link to the video tribute on the Book of Memories to make sure all online traffic is directed to your website, making your site more credible. 8. Quote of the day People on social media love to read inspirational quotes especially when there s a picture! Don t know of any? Head over to Google and enter inspirational quotes, or get specific, with inspirational quotes about (fill in the blank). Remember to tell the folks who said, or wrote it. 9. Funeral home tour Show the public the inside of your funeral home. Many have not been there and do not know what to expect from a funeral home. Often, the interior of a funeral home is beautiful and something a firm is proud of. Use social media as an opportunity to show pictures and videos of the inside, where people do not often see. 10. Changing face of funeral service Thanks to technology, funeral homes are now offering more advanced memorialization and services. Showcase your offerings such as webcasting, DVD, memorial tribute pages. Put a page up on your funeral home website where they can link to, to learn more. You could even compare funerals then to funerals today to show people what has changed. Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one s head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace. OSCAR WILDE 4

5 11. Aftercare information Your funeral home website should already have this. If you offer Aftercare programs, online or offline, this is a great opportunity to showcase this information. FrontRunner users, if you are offering the 365 days of grief or 52 Weekly Tip app on your website, be sure to tell your fans and followers about this so they can subscribe to these, keeping your funeral home name in front of them everyday right in their inbox. 12. Grief information Your funeral home website should have this information on it already. FrontRunner clients, you have over 50 pages with pre-written content on a number of topics that you can use for this purpose. Simply place the web page link into Facebook or Twitter and it will direct visitors to the website to read the full article or story. 5

6 13. Post image of merchandise or service ffferings Show your products and merchandise with a picture and a link to your funeral home website where they can learn more. If it is a smaller offering where you want them to stay on the Facebook page, then just write a small description of the product or service with a picture. 14. Did you know? postings You could have your social media pages feature a Did you know post every Wednesday morning, for example, to show the common myths and facts about funeral service. Don t forget to share interesting historical information too, about funerals and the evolution of the profession. A great website for fun facts is The National Museum of Funeral History. Or you can Google keyword phrases, like Ancient Roman funerals, funerals in ancient Egypt ; or early funerals in America. If it interests you; you can bet it will interest the historians in your audience too! 15. Local business discounts and other community links Your website should also list businesses in your community to help online visitors in booking accommodations, or purchasing flowers. Showcase these on your social sites to let people know that you work closely with your local businesses. 16. Staff announcements Your fans and followers want to know your company on a personal level. If there is an accomplishment on staff or a birthday or other event, let your online community know you are celebrating at the funeral home. Include pictures of these as well. 17. Testimonials Include testimonials from families on your social media sites. Many of these will come automatically from people commenting, but if you receive one in house, get their permission to post this online. 6

7 18. Benefit information articles There are a number of benefits to being informed. I recommend Funeral Homes create a series of Benefits to articles. Here your firm could talk about pre-planning, personalizing a service etc. You could even link these benefit statements to pages on your website to increase web traffic. 19. Cemetery regulations on new regulations. Give them information they will use, benefit from, and appreciate. New Regulations 7

8 20. Staff biographies A great place to start with Social Media is introducing the people on a personal level who work at the funeral home. I have seen many funeral homes do fun bios of people who work at the funeral home so the reader can get to know them on a personal level. 21. People that we do business with posts Here you can write a short description of the people/companies that you do business with. These can be local businesses or even associations/clubs that you belong to. 22. Association news Often times, associations will give your funeral home information that is general knowledge or new things that are happening in Funeral Service. When applicable, share this information with your online audience. 23. Funeral home jokes This will depend on your personality and what you are comfortable with. Some funeral homes use jokes on their social media pages to connect with their audience. 24. Information from seminars attended Many funeral firm owners and licensed employees attend annual conventions or seminars. Why not share this information or get opinions from people who use your services? For example, you could say: We were introduced to webcasting at the (name of convention). Would this be a valuable service for your family? 8

9 25. Diet or nutritional information Just because your page is about a funeral home does not mean everything you post has to be about death. Some funeral homes are adding fun ideas to their pages that include Undertaker Scott s favourite meal, for example, or favourite recipes of our staff. Again, this will depend on your personality and what you are comfortable with. 9

10 26. Working with financial planners information Education is powerful tool for your online visitors. Using social media to educate them on these types of areas will be helpful for them. If you can create articles with catchy titles that will make a person think about if they know about this or not, it will help them to click on the article. 10

11 27. Common funeral myths There are so many myths that exist today surrounding funeral service. Use this opportunity to educate your audience. It could be a fun game. For example, on Facebook you could say: Funerals today cost $10,000 or more fact or myth? Click like if you think this is a fact. Then use the comments area to explain why it is a myth with a link to the website (if you have something on your website addressing this). 28. Funeral home how-to articles Your Funeral Home can write a series of How-To Tips and link to pages on your funeral home website. Examples include: How to Pre-arrange with Ease, How to Plan a Celebration of Life. 29. Did you know that you could series Thanks to the Internet and Technology your website can now offer incredible services to your online visitors. FrontRunner clients, through the Book of Memories and your website, your visitors can order flowers, purchase a sympathy gift, make a donation by check or credit card, leave a condolence message, share a story, share a photo, light a candle, and more. These are just a few examples of Did You Know That You Could for you to use. 30. Tell story of your funeral home using the new timeline You can now add Milestones to your Facebook Timeline to include important dates for the funeral home. Examples include; opening of the business, offering of a new service, purchase of a new vehicle etc. Tell your online audience about these and include a picture when possible. 11

12 What If Social Media Marketing Bores You? Maybe boring is a strong word; but let s face it: you re already doing so much every single day, in support of your families in your community. How can you possibly squeeze in one more thing into your already busy days (and nights)? Hey, you may not even really want to get involved with social media at all. But since you ve been told so many times (and so convincingly) that you really must get your firm involved you ve decided to take the leap. But now you just don t know what comes after the commitment. You re confused about what you should do next; and how often you ll need to do it may be a complete mystery. Then Hire a professional. It won t cost as much as you might think to hire social media experts to tend to the details. Our experienced and talented partner, Disrupt Media Group, LLC, will work closely with you to design an affordable social media strategy, specific to your firm and audience. Their savvy social media maestros can then implement the strategy for you; or support your staff in carrying-out the accepted strategy in-house. Call Us That s all you ve got to do. If you re ready to dominate the market in your community by more effectively using social media to engage your audience, it s time to put your trust in a winning partnership: FrontRunner Professional, and Disrupt Media Group, LLC FrontRunner FRONTRUNNER Professional PROFESSIONAL // 30+ Engagement Tips VIRTUAL for Social LEARNING Funeral Directors CENTER RESOURCE 12

13 About The Author Ashley Montroy currently serves as FrontRunner Professional s Social Media and Marketing Manager. She graduated from University in 2010, joining the company shortly after her return to Kingston later that year. At 24, Ashley can be accurately labelled as a member of the Millennial generation and as such, she has long been comfortable with technology (after all, she has grown up using it), and social media in particular. Couple these generational characteristics with her natural inquisitiveness and inborn desire to not only know a subject inside and out, but to be highly skilled in using that knowledge and you ve got a young woman who is more than merely able to educate funeral service professionals on the successful use of social media; Ashley is able to inspire them. She helps them to clearly see the potential within social media: potential to grow their business by deepening their relationships using common social media channels like Facebook. If you d like to chat with Ashley one-on-one about the value of social media to your firm or if you just need a little advice in order to get moving in the right direction, she can be reached by at amontroy@frontrunner360.com, or by phone at FrontRunner FRONTRUNNER Professional PROFESSIONAL // 30+ Engagement Tips VIRTUAL for Social LEARNING Funeral Directors CENTER RESOURCE 13