5 Ways to Serve Your Families After the Funeral Service
March 22nd, 2012
You spend so much time helping your families arrange the funeral service—answering their questions; helping them decide what type of service they want; coordinating the cremation or burial—but what happens after the service?
For most of your families, that’s when the grief sets in. Just because the actual service is over, doesn’t mean your relationship with them has to be. There are a number of aftercare solutions you can provide your families to assist them through their stages of grief.
By utilizing your website as a resource for grief and healing solutions, you can continue to serve your families long after the funeral service is over.
Here are 5 ways to serve your families after the funeral service:
1. Send Daily Email Affirmations
Every day is difficult when you’re suffering the loss of a loved one. Give your families the ability to sign up to receive daily email affirmations of hope and healing. By sending your families daily email affirmations, you’re reminding them that they are not alone in their grief journey. At the end of the year, they will have received 365 days of encouragement, inspirational messages, helpful tips and healing activities, all designed to help them manage their grief and healing.
2. Provide Interactive Aftercare
Everyone grieves in different ways, and for different amounts of time. Offer your families the convenience of coping with their grief from the comfort of their own home. By featuring interactive grief videos on your funeral home website, families can customize their care based on the kind of grief they are experiencing. The best part is, by offering these educational interactive videos on your funeral home website, your families can access grief care 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
3. Share Grief Resources
Even after the funeral service, your families are likely to turn to you for guidance and support. Use your funeral home website to position yourself as a go-to expert in your community by providing educational grief and healing resources. Stay current on grief support groups and workshops happening throughout your community and keep an updated list of local doctors who specialize in grief and healing. Also consider sharing a list of comforting books and articles that might be useful for someone suffering from grief.
4. Make a Permanent Online Memorial
Remembering and honoring the life of a loved one is an important part of the grief and healing process. Give your families a place to preserve memories, photos and videos of their loved one online by creating a social memorial website for the deceased, within your funeral home website. The social memorial website will serve as a gathering place for friends and family to visit time and time again, to connect with one another and share memories. This online archive will tell the life story of their loved one, creating a sense of family history for future generations.
5. Offer Ongoing Support
Grief isn’t something you get over; it’s something you learn to live with. Let your families know that you’re thinking of them and haven’t forgotten about their loss by sending them a special remembrance in honor of their loved one. Even something as simple as flowers or a card can serve as comfort to them. By providing your families with ongoing support in the days, weeks, months or even years after the death of their loved one, you are helping them to heal.
A lot of people may not realize it, but a large part of the funeral profession is providing families with services after the actual funeral service. By utilizing your funeral home website to offer families a variety of aftercare services, you continue serve your families through their grief and healing journey.
What are some other ways you continue to serve your families after the funeral service is over? Please share your comments below! 🙂
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