We’ve just received our sneak preview of the 2014 Private Duty Benchmarking Study from Home Care Pulse and there is some very interesting data to help you grow your home care business. Over the next several months we’ll be sharing some in-depth analysis of various sections of the study, but we want to whet you appetite with a few of the more interesting data points.

This year’s sample was slightly smaller than last year – 551 companies compared to 617 – the growth numbers are significant. Let’s take a look at some highlights.

• The median sized company increased from $1,160,000 to $1,398,090.
• We have new insights into the size of companies by year – the median sized company after the first year was $259,842, the second year was $464,000, and then the median for years 3 and 4 was $968,000.  A company that is following the median path will be at $1.5 million by the end of year six.
• The net ordinary income for the median sized company was 23.5% of revenue
• The median sized companies are bigger on the east coast and west coast, and smaller in the south, central, and great lakes regions
• 70% of revenue is coming from private pay, and 9% from long term care insurance.
• The number one referral sources is past and current clients
• The number one  marketing method for referral marketing is making sales calls
• The number one marketing method for consumer marketing is internet SEO
• The number one thing that sets providers apart from their competitors is Caregiver Quality
• The number one threat facing home care companies is caregiver shortages
• The median sales conversion ratio from Inquiries to Assessments was 38.8%
• The median sales conversion from Assessments to Admission was 80.6%
• The median cost of acquiring a new client was $478.57

These are just some of the valuable data points included in this year’s study.  At Leading Home Care and the Academy for Private Duty Home Care we are delighted to be a sponsor of the Sales and Marketing section of the study.  We’ll have access to much more data, and we’ll have Aaron Marcum as a guest on a future live web conference to discuss more highlights of the study and how you can use this information to grow your business.

In the mean time, we suggest you order a copy of the final report and spend some time studying what others in the industry are doing, and how that compares to how your own company is doing.  If you have some questions and would like to know more about how to use this data to support your strategic decision making, give us a call at 502-339-0653 and set up an appointment to talk with Stephen Tweed.