A pre-crisis journey concept
Today the product is built around the urgent moment: search, get a list, talk to an advisor. That's a funnel, not a relationship. These two connected tools are designed for the families who aren't desperate yet, so they arrive warmer, decide better, and trust us longer.
The journey, in two steps
One carries into the next: what a family names in the first tool pre-fills what they weigh in the second.
A calm, branching intake that helps a family name their situation before it's urgent. No email, no qualifying on cost, and "just planning ahead" ends in a plan they keep, not a sales call.
Not a spec sheet. The family weights what matters, and three communities re-rank live with honest tradeoffs surfaced, so they can weigh care, distance, and cost together instead of drowning in amenities.
APFM's existing quiz opens with a zip code and closes with "an advisor will contact you soon." It's built to capture demand that already exists. The gap is everyone upstream of that moment, and everyone who stalls inside it.
Care Readiness serves the family who isn't ready to convert, and treats "not yet" as a valid outcome the funnel can't currently hold. Compare Communities serves the highest-trust moment in the funnel, where choice paralysis quietly kills referrals. The same principle runs through both: the family's priorities drive the experience, and cost is their lever, never our filter.
What this is: a self-directed concept. I wrote the strategy off APFM's public moves, designed both flows, and built the working prototypes with Claude Code. It's meant to show how I think, not to be shipped as-is.
What I'd do next: ground it in real data before building anything. I'd want APFM's drop-off rate between first visit and advisor contact, and a few conversations with advisors about the signal they wish they had on the first call. That's the upstream research that tells you whether the planning-ahead path is the right bet or a distraction.
What I'd test: whether a deliberately low-pressure "no call coming" outcome actually grows later conversion and trust rather than leaking leads, and whether priority-weighted comparison measurably cuts time-to-decision against the current directory. Both are A/B-able.
Concept and prototypes for discussion. Statistics are drawn from APFM and external caregiver research cited in the strategy memo; community names and figures in the tools are illustrative placeholders.