Monthly marketing review with the Adava Care team. Sebastian Gant joined as incoming account manager, shadowing Melissa Cusumano. The call covered urgent Meta ad fixes, a deep dive into Google Ads quality score challenges driven by "A Place for Mom" competition, a planned "no fee" promo A/B test for November/December, a website photography overhaul, transparent pricing strategy, and LinkedIn access for Kari.
Attendees:
- Melissa Cusumano (Asymmetric)
- Sebastian Gant (Asymmetric — incoming account manager)
- Mark Hope (Asymmetric — absent)
- Kurosh Dejgosha (Adava Care)
- Kari Krause / kkrause@adavacare.com (Adava Care)
- Cassandra / cassandra@adavacare.com (Adava Care)
- Jenni Tolson / tolson@adavacare.com (Adava Care — Regional Director of Operations, Milwaukee)
- J. Spinelli / jspinelli@adavacare.com (Adava Care)
| Owner | Action | Due |
|---|---|---|
| Sebastian | Update broken Meta ad links to correct URLs | Today |
| Sebastian | Disable "Multi-advertiser" placements on all Meta ad sets | Today |
| Sebastian | Create new Google Ads group to A/B test "no fee" promo for Nov/Dec | TBD |
| Kari | Take new iPhone photos at community visits (exterior + interior, capture fall colors) | Next community visit |
| Kari | Send community pricing lists to Melissa's team | Soon |
| Kari | Provide shipping address for printed inserts (reply to Dennis's email) | ASAP — inserts done Friday |
| Melissa's team | Edit and implement new website photos once received from Kari | After photos received |
| Melissa's team | Add community pricing to location pages | After pricing received |
| Melissa's team | Send October GBP posts for review | Today |
| Melissa's team | Send October blog content for review | Today/tomorrow |
| Melissa's team | Investigate sharing Adava Care Canva folder with Kari | Soon |
| Kurosh | Schedule time with Mark Hope (rescheduled from prior cancellation) | TBD |
Current photos are inaccurate and unappealing, creating both a poor user experience and potential liability:
Plan: Kari will take iPhone photos during upcoming community visits, focusing on fall foliage for exterior shots. Melissa's team will edit and update the website. Interior signage/room numbers are far enough down the pipeline that the team agreed not to wait — numbers can be Photoshopped in later if needed.
A professional photographer (Melissa's contact in Kenosha) remains an option if iPhone photos don't meet the bar.
Sebastian walked through the quality score breakdown for Adava Care's campaigns:
Quality Score components:
1. Expected Click-Through Rate (eCTR) — compared against competitors in the same auction. This is where Adava Care is underperforming. "A Place for Mom" runs ads with copy like "No Cost Assisted Living," "Compare Costs," "Best Homes" — cost-focused language that drives higher CTR because cost is the #1 concern for families searching assisted living.
2. Ad Relevance — how well headlines/descriptions match the bidded keywords. Mixed results; hard to tailor to every keyword.
3. Landing Page Experience — generally average to above average. Not the problem.
Impact: A quality score below 5 means Adava Care pays a higher effective CPC to compete. "A Place for Mom" is the dominant competitor in nearly every location auction.
Context on "A Place for Mom": Adava Care ended their paid contract with APFM. APFM still lists Adava Care (and former community Matthews) in their directory but does not send referrals — they only route leads to paying clients. Families who find Adava Care through APFM and want to contact them directly can still do so, but APFM won't facilitate it. There is pending legislation around the predatory referral model these directories use.
Glendale impression share is strong (roughly 2x nearest competitor). Other locations are more contested.
Two complementary strategies discussed to counter APFM's "no cost" messaging:
Option 1 — Transparent Pricing on Website
- Add actual community pricing to location pages. No other local competitor does this.
- Rationale: counters "no cost" claims with clarity and builds trust. Kurosh noted pricing is fairly consistent across communities with minor variations.
- Kari to send pricing lists; Melissa's team to implement.
Option 2 — "No Fee" Promotional Ad Campaign
- Run a waived community fee promo for November/December (community fees are typically ~$2,500).
- Ad copy: "No Fee" + relevant assisted living keywords. CTA: call for details (Kari explains the value of the waived fee on the call).
- Sebastian will create a new ad group to run alongside existing campaigns as an A/B test — not replacing current ads.
- If a dedicated promo page is needed, the team will build one; otherwise a section on existing location pages may suffice.
- Rationale: winter is a slower season for move-ins; a promo gives people a reason to act now.
Kurosh had set up new employment ads as an A/B test (Advantage Plus audience vs. standard). Sebastian reviewed and flagged two issues requiring immediate fixes:
Advantage Plus audience: Sebastian's analogy — like a billboard company that lets you dump budget and they choose placements, including poor ones. Cheaper CPCs but potentially lower-intent traffic and worse placements. The A/B test has 6 days remaining; the team agreed to let it run to completion to collect data before drawing conclusions.
Employment ad targeting note: Because these are employment ads, Meta requires declaring the special ad category, which limits audience targeting granularity. This is expected and unavoidable.