How Senior Living Operators Balance High-tech Tools, Human Touch In Sales And Marketing 

Cutting-edge technology like AI has its uses in senior living sales and marketing – and its fair share of pitfalls.

On the one hand, data analytics can help operators parse sales leads and broaden their reach with prospects. On the other hand, technology like AI is only as good as the support and infrastructure that operators build around it. Operators should weigh their options before making big investments, and ensure that whatever they are using does not eliminate empathy and a human-to-human connection.

Either way, senior living sales and marketing tech is advancing rapidly, and operators should prepare accordingly, according to Robin Visser, director of marketing and digital strategies for Christian Living Communities (CLC). The Englewood, Colorado-based operator has nine communities.

About a year ago, AI tools were in their “toddler phase,” she said. This year, AI tools are in “middle school” and still getting more complex.

“Next week, they could be in grad school,” Visser said during a panel at the recent Senior Housing News Sales & Marketing conference in Bonita Springs, Florida. “Buckle up and ride the ride.”

How Phoenix, CLC use AI in sales and marketing

In 2025, senior living operators are using AI tools in their sales and marketing processes to summarize calls, stage units so prospects can see them with furniture, train employees and better stand out in web searches.

Visser said her teams are utilizing AI-driven content to help “cut the fluff” from its website by removing flowery language and being more resourceful, which helps score higher with AI overviews on platforms such as Google, particularly with how the platform is pushing its summaries for searches. Visser noted this could change the way search functions work as a whole.

“We’re already hedging our bet against that time when maybe search goes away, and we’re going to already have that content,” Visser said.

Customer relationship management (CRM) systems also can benefit from added AI tools, said Phoenix Senior Living Vice President of Marketing Justin Harden. The Roswell, Georgia-based company has 44 communities in nine states.

Phoenix Senior Living has paired its new CRM, with tools that categorize residents according to their place in the senior living sales journey. Prospective residents are separated into buckets including new inquiry, pre-tour, tour scheduled, post tour and ready to move in. Phoenix also is scoring leads based on customer interactions on its website.

Phoenix is using AI to roleplay scenarios with sales staff and sharpen their skills, which Harden sees as an untapped opportunity for the wider senior living industry.

Phoenix also takes advantage of AI to transcribe and share calls with prospects and uses generative AI to brainstorm new social media posts. Moving forward, Harden added he could see local search results from purchased map packs being labeled as AI generated like they are on programs such as Google images and TikTok.

Despite those uses, Phoenix and Harden are careful not to implement technology simply to implement it. Similarly, senior living operators must have the infrastructure to support the technology they want to use, from ensuring communities have wireless high-speed internet to connecting analytical tools to useful data.

“Don’t go trying to fix things that aren’t necessarily broken,” Harden said.

Although some AI tools let users generate images with prompts, Visser cautioned that senior living prospects can “tell something is off.” Thus, she advises against using AI images in marketing materials.

Additionally, she stressed the importance of operators looking to adopt AI programs to use paid subscriptions to help protect company data and the content being produced. Some free AI platforms are trained off all data put into them, meaning “you’re helping people learn from your data.”

AI still can’t replace human touch

As many senior living companies would say, senior living is a relationship business and empathy, trust and transparency are held in high regard among prospective residents and their families. Although AI can save time, it can’t replace a human being at the end of the day.

CLC mandates that its marketing materials must be at least half-created by humans, Visser said. Harden echoed the sentiment.

“Our seniors are trusting us to care for their loved ones,” he said. “While AI and automation makes it easier for us, we cannot lose our north star. We’re people focused.”

Visser added that while AI and language learning models are improving, they are still missing the “intrinsic values of empathy.” CLC experimented with AI personas that simulated potential customers that would receive marketing materials for an upcoming community. While she said most were “dead on,” the company’s marketing team still reviewed the end product for quality and consistency.

“It’s going to be a partner with us, but I don’t think it will ever take over or eliminate the need for human beings in creating content,” Visser said.

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