Stories and seeing the path others have travelled that you’d like to travel can really help you see how you’re going to move forward on your journey as an entrepreneur. So I’ve invited some of my clients, past and present, to join me on the podcast to talk about some of the growth and changes they’ve gone through, so you can learn and be inspired by all they’ve done.
Amy Friesen, founder of Tea and Toast joins me on the podcast to discuss how her business grew, and some of the resistance she met on the way. We talk about why she knew she had to change things, and how change was the best thing for her business. Tea and Toast develops strategies for families who are looking to make a move into retirement living, and around retirement and long term care.
As Amy says, “You do things and they work really well. But then, as you keep growing, you need to start to be nimble and pivot and find new ways of doing things.“
Senior Living Advisors help families find retirement and long term residences for seniors. Their knowledge of the homes and understanding of the retirement industry makes them ideal to help families find the RIGHT homes to move in to. Senior Living Advisors are relatively new and so there is still a lot changing as everyone figures out how the industry should operate. Advising started as a complimentary service to those moving into the homes because many of the homes pay a finder’s fee to the advisor. But some homes choose not to work with outside advisors meaning that while Amy’s team was working to ensure their clients were in the right homes it did not always mean they would get paid.
Amy worked like this for a couple of years to build the brand and community relationships and to ensure people that her business was transparent, but as her company grew, it wasn’t sustainable to do as much work as they were doing without knowing they would be making money.
Making changes
In our time working together, Amy figured out that she should start looking into charging for certain levels of service and adding in consulting services as well. Tea and Toast still offers the same complimentary service but also added in paid services. The challenge was that others in this industry weren’t charging and so educating people about the change felt like a real challenge. Once Amy and her team explained it to people, most people understood and her team realized they could adapt pretty quickly and make sure people still got all the services they needed.
Working too much and not making enough money
When people work too much and are not making enough money a few things happen. Firstly, you start resenting the work you're doing. Secondly, it's hard to feel like you can hire a team to help you when you're responsible for helping make sure they get paid. And thirdly, you need to make sure you're well compensated for your time and not just working for no pay.
This was tough for Amy because there was an expectation that her industry didn’t charge the clients. Amy no longer uses the word free or complimentary because she knows her value and her teams value and understands that what they bring is invaluable for the families they help. And they hear it from every client and every family they work with.
Figure out why you do what you do
Amy has worked in the industry for 17 years and wanted to work with seniors and their families to make people's lives easier. And her clients feel that way as well. The process of choosing a retirement home for a loved one can be a very emotional journey and Amy knows the importance of her work.
When things weren’t working any more, Amy found ways to add additional services and options to make sure everyone could get the support they most were looking for. Most still choose and use the complimentary option but the team also does a lot of consulting and they also have a long term care navigation service as well. Those things didn't exist before because her business was wrapped up in the complimentary service, but Amy knew they needed something between deciding and moving into a home.
Each month, Amy and her team work with one or two consulting clients as well as one or two long term care navigation clients, a brand new service. Services like this allow them to work better with their clients to get what really they need. And they can make money because they’re charging for it. It's given Amy more revenue streams which makes the business stronger and more sustainable.
When people don’t understand the change
Change can be difficult for some and therefore not everyone will be understanding when your model changes, but that comes with any business. Amy remains true to who she is and what her business is and gives the families she works with as much information as she can. Amy has set up a privacy agreement and is the only consultants that have privacy agreements. These service agreements keep their working arrangements clear and transparent - something her client’s value. Although some other Senior Living Advisors don’t require privacy agreements, Amy believes having one clearly tells people how they use their information and tells them how they keep it private. It’s not to lock people in, it’s to protect their privacy and speaks to her business’ transparency.
You want to create a business that does not burn you out. Amy is working with the kind of people who are going to respect the value for what she does, respect her time and respect what she is doing.
Amy even implemented a small charge for other services, including for independent people in their homes who want to have a look at retirement homes but are not fully committed. They want to tour three or four homes, but in the end, decide not to move. She wanted to help them, but they can't use her business’ time that way. So, she implemented a small fee and there are people that have been happy to do that. If they can give them the information and they give it a go and then decide not to move in, they're happy to pay a small fee to cover some of our time.
Making more change
Amy used to pick up the phone every single time because she didn’t want people waiting. But also her industry is quite competitive. If people are calling from the hospital, for instance, they get a list of advisors and if their call is missed then they call the next person in line, they do not wait. But, having her phone by her constantly is not a way to live, especially now with a two-year-old, husband, dogs, etc. It's just unreasonable. So now the business has a Business Development Manager who mainly is on the phones, which gives their clients someone to talk to during business hours and usually gives them someone to talk to right away.
This way people understand and feel comfortable that one of the Advisors will call them back, and that they do understand their needs and they’re taking care of things. It’s an added sense of reassurance.
Amy’s client service has always been top-notch. Having a dedicated office person to actually answer calls when Amy is busy or on a tour, has been helpful. People feel that they've been taken care of properly right from the start.
Not everything has to be done by you to be done well to be done in your way
This additional time created by having a Business Development Manager has allowed for more time for her family as well as more time for business development. Amy is the one that's developing the business and shapes it. There's a lot of things that come up or pivot that they can do throughout the day that will open this up to be able to help more families and serve better if we implement different things. She is constantly building her business.
Amy is still able to provide her clients with the best service but has learned that it doesn't have to always be exactly the same to still have the same core values. And this has given her the opportunity to bring more team members on to free of her time to create new things (like write an eBook.)
Fighting the resistance of change
Change can feel hard to make and there can be a lot of resistance to how it's going to work when things have always worked a different way.
Amy was able to move through and make big changes around pricing, services, and delegating tasks to grow her team and make systems sustainable for everyone. And her business is all the better for it!
Amy released an eBook about a month ago called “Breadcrumbs: Piecing together the Retirement Living Industry.” It's designed for families, caregivers and seniors. It’s based on a lot of speaking she does and about developing Amy, just as a knowledge base. It talks about different things her business has come up against as well as different situations, so families reading it know they're not alone, that other people are going through this and a lot of times people relate a lot better to stories. At the back of the book, there is a section called, Where are they now?” It tells readers what's happened to her clients, all the names are changed, of course, but it tells people what's happened. Something that has been really well received, much like her business in general.
Resources & Links
Amy’s eBook: Breadcrumbs: Piecing together the Retirement Living Industry
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Podcast editing by Eric Wellman
