EmpRes Healthcare: Using Sentiment Data to Improve Communities Holistically
Increase in listing views in the year after EmpRes joined Reputation, Oct. 2020-2021
Increase in Actions taken in the year after EmpRes joined Reputation, Oct. 2020-2021
Centers received Great Place to Work Certification in 2022, up from four centers in 2021
The Client
Based in Vancouver, Washington, EmpRes Healthcare comprises several 100% employee-owned companies that provide management and consulting services to a variety of rehabilitation and post-acute care centers, assisted and independent living communities, and home health, hospice, and home care services across the Western United States.
Finding the Right Partner
EmpRes Healthcare launched its partnership with Reputation in March 2020 largely in response to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the company had been comparing the Reputation platform against its competitors for some time.
EmpRes sought to improve survey responses from both employees and residents (following admission and discharge). The company also wanted the ability to completely automate its surveys — data, documentation, the surveys themselves, etc. — in a platform that could not only streamline those things, but also mainstream its communications.
The company partnered with Reputation because it wanted a centralized platform that would allow it to hone in on its social engagement down to the single community level, which EmpRes knew it would need to remain successful during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Increase in listing views in the year after EmpRes joined Reputation, Oct. 2020-2021
Drawing Insights and Intervening
After joining Reputation, EmpRes was able to make some inferences about the sentiment data it was collecting from its residents and employees.
“We started seeing that residents weren’t happy,” says Emily Brown, Director of Communications and Social Media at EmpRes Healthcare. “They felt they were missing activities or engagement, and some employees were indicating negative sentiment, too. If those people are taking care of your patients, something needs to change.”
With most non-essential staff working remotely, it was difficult for Brown and her team to connect with individual care centers on a regular basis as well. To help, Brown would physically go to different locations to get firsthand feedback, ask how she could help, and provide more resources, but that was just the start.
Increase in Actions taken in the year after EmpRes joined Reputation, Oct. 2020-2021
Building Engagement and Celebrating Wins
Along with increased resources is an added focus on employee wellbeing, care quality, and social engagement. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, EmpRes cut the time it was spending on social media outreach and usage, which predictably led to lower local care site usage of the Reputation platform.
EmpRes has made it a goal for everyone in the company to be using the Reputation platform, and they want each of their locations to take ownership of their reviews, Reputation score, and so on. To help with this, Brown and her team run a monthly meeting where they review specific scores and discuss the elements impacting a given score.
“We do the monthly meeting to help boost engagement, and people are having fun with it,” says Brown. “People are excited to see how they’ve improved their score, or they take it as a challenge to look at reviews and everything on there to see how they can get better next month. We’ve found that Reputation has been the engagement tool that’s helped us move forward. It’s been really helpful having Reputation on our side and seeing people have fun with improving their scores.”
EmpRes’ focus on resident satisfaction and employee sentiment is paying off. In 2022, 12 EmpRes facilities received Great Place to Work Certification — up from just four sites in 2021 — along with the EmpRes corporate entity, underscoring the trust EmpRes has earned from its employees.
centers received Great Place to Work Certification in 2022, up from four centers in 2021
What’s Next?
EmpRes intends to continue leveraging the gains it has made until they are woven into the fabric of the company itself.
“We think building a new culture at EmpRes is incredibly important, and seeing the improvement throughout our staff and resident sentiment has been motivation to keep driving,” says Brown. “When I first came on, not everyone grasped the importance of reviews. Some executive directors got it and partnered with me. Now we have a group of centers that are really diligent with their Reputation Score and some have seen a full star increase. Just looking at the reviews and the posts and the engagement, it’s amazing what they’re doing: boosting ROI, increasing their rank in SEO, and improving every aspect of their care.”
To help further its success, given the spread out nature of its business, EmpRes plans to place substantial focus on its Google Business Profiles. Google is a significant entity in senior care, and EmpRes intends to use those profiles to increase engagement with residents and prospects, generate more leads and sales, and provide assurances to its communities through the profile’s Q&A feature.
EmpRes also plans to work more closely with Reputation to fully utilize the platform’s Actions product and continue making gains in improving resident and employee sentiment.
“We’re really proud to be a Great Place to Work in 12 of our centers and as a company as a whole,” Brown says. “Seventy percent of our employees say we’re a great place to work, and I think it goes back to looking at our staff sentiment.”