The Complete Launch Starter Kit

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Preparing for takeoff

Congratulations! As a forward-thinking funeral professional, you just took a step toward innovating your business!

Choosing a software partner for your business is not an easy decision, so we’re excited that you’ve selected us as your guide to get better funeral home technology.

The goal of this guide is to help you get off to a great start with Passare so you can see an immediate return on the investment you've made. We’ve helped a lot of funeral homes get started with Passare, and we have created a simple plan to help you, too.

Our goal is to make your switch to Passare as smooth and simple as possible. Following this plan will help you avoid getting stuck between your old process and Passare. The key to success is to identify what is absolutely necessary to move forward and what can be added at a later time. By following the steps outlined in this guide, we promise that you will be in flight with Passare as quickly as possible.

We are honored to partner with you to help you run your business and serve families better than ever before.

Let’s get started!

TIP: If you’re a larger firm, have more complex business operations, or a complicated company structure, the account executive you are working with will encourage you to get an upgraded Launch plan. Hear them out! With a Launch plan, your Passare onboarding will be even more tailored to your specific business needs, and you’ll get even greater value out of Passare from the start. Regardless of what plan you choose, the information in this book will be important to helping you have a successful launch.

View different Launch plans here. >>>

How one funeral home had a successful Passare takeoff

Broussard's Mortuary was founded in 1889 in Southeast Texas and has grown to six locations and now serves over 1,500 families each year. CEO Jayme Broussard Toeppich and her brother Blue Broussard, a fifth-generation funeral director, recognized that the software they had been using for the past 20 years was not getting the job done.

So, what was holding them back from changing? Training their staff. Jayme and Blue were worried their staff members across all their different locations would struggle to learn and implement new technology. But after meeting with Passare, Jayme and Blue took the leap.

Throughout this guide, we will follow the Broussards through every step of their launch, from set up to going live, and how your funeral home can replicate their success.

Getting started with your launch plan

Our goal is to help you get up and running with Passare in 30 days. We’ll share tips that have helped our clients meet or exceed this timeline. Every Launch plan looks a little bit different, depending on how many locations you have, how many staff members you have to train, what software you are moving from, and much more. Together, we will create a custom plan that fits your funeral home’s needs, including your desired timeline for takeoff.

First, let’s go over who will be involved in your launch and their roles throughout your setup.

The Passare team

Within Passare, you will interact with multiple people. Think of our team as ground control.

Your team

Depending on the size of your team, “The Boss” might also be “The Champion.” For larger organizations, there might be multiple Champions representing various teams such as funeral directors, admin staff, or accounting. Please ensure that whoever you choose to be “The Champion” is able to commit the time needed to work with Passare to get the platform set up.

Start with "why"

The very first thing that your team needs to know is why you have decided to switch to Passare. Remember that while your staff may appreciate the business reasons for moving to Passare (creating efficiency, better reporting, etc.), they care more about the impact it will have on them and their daily workload. When you communicate the “why” behind switching to Passare, they’ll be able to see the benefits for the business and the entire team.

For most of your employees, there will be 2 questions you need to answer:

To be effective, these answers need to come from “The Boss.” Your staff will have a lot of questions at this point, so communicate what you know, but remember that it is OK for you to tell them “I don’t know yet, but let me get back to you.” While it’s not entirely necessary to communicate specifics at this point, it is important that your staff knows you are being open, transparent, and working toward finding solutions for everyone. This will help calm any concerns your staff has.

Kicking off a successful implementation

At Broussard's Mortuary, Jayme was “The Champion” and worked with Passare to set everything up. After sending in all of the setup items, Jayme recruited key team members from their 3 main teams: accounting, administration assistants, and funeral directors.

“It’s important to bring in the right people at the right time. We had a few team members that were hesitant in changing software. We chose not to involve them in the process upfront because we wanted the people we selected to be cheerleaders for the rest of the organization."

Jayme Broussard Toeppich, Chief Executive Officer

Broussard's Mortuary | Texas

Review processes & complete setup

Define basic use & processes

Now, it’s time to think specifically about how you and your team will use Passare.

There’s a lot you can do on the platform, and you won’t use every feature on day 1. That’s perfectly normal! No one software platform is exactly the same, so the processes you used in your old software (if you had one) will not look exactly the same in Passare.

If you are coming from another platform, the easiest way to get started using Passare from day 1 is to try to copy your current processes into Passare, while also thinking about how each of your old processes will change. If you’re a first-time software user, your transition from old processes to your new ones in Passare will look quite different. But don’t worry! We’ll walk you through every step of the way.

Whether you’re moving from a different software or starting fresh, here are some questions to ask yourself when rethinking your processes:

In our Complete Launch Starter Kit, you’ll find questions to help you further think through your processes and how they’ll change with Passare. Access it here.

Send in your setup items!

One of the biggest problems new customers face when getting started is sending in the right items needed for setup. There are 4 main items needed:

1. Price lists

This includes any and all lists, like your General Price List, but also any casket, urn, or vault price lists.

2. Chart of accounts (COA)

If you are planning to send financial information from Passare to your accountant or accounting software, then your COA will need to be set up.

3. Forms

We will set up your contract as a standard contract template or a custom contract, all government forms, and your custom forms. Our library has over 1,000 forms that you can choose from. We likely have what you need, so check the forms library first or ask your Implementation Manager to help you find what you’re looking for.

Can’t find the right form? If we don’t have the form you need in our library, then you can use one of your custom form requests.

Custom forms can be whatever you want them to be. When you request a custom form from us, please provide a sample form in the original, digital format. If you need more custom form requests, you have a few options: create and add the form on your own or let us build you an additional custom form for a small fee. This does not include custom contracts. If you need a custom contract created, please talk with your Implementation Manager.

4. Logo(s)

Lastly, we will need to get a high-resolution logo for your organization. This logo will be placed within Passare, where you’ll see it each time you log in. It will also be displayed in Planning Center for families to see and can be populated onto all of your paperwork.

TIP: Many funeral homes view this step as an opportunity to update price lists, chart of accounts, or forms. Do not do this! You have already committed to a big project in launching Passare, and you don’t want to add more to your to-do list. We have seen many customers get stuck in their implementation because they needed to update one thing that ended up taking months. It is extremely easy to update all of these items after they are in Passare. Save that project for another day!

If you’re unsure about any of your setup items, find helpful tips in our Complete Launch Starter Kit.

In it, you’ll also find step-by-step instructions on setting up your Chart of Accounts.

Explaining new features to the team

After gaining a better understanding of Passare and how it would fit into their business, Jayme and her chosen team members determined which parts of Passare they wanted to use immediately and which ones features they would implement later.

“This allowed us to be able to further explain the ‘why’ and defend each of the features and fields we were going to be using when the rest of the staff approached us,” Jayme said.

Check your instance

We’re almost there! Everything in your platform should be set up and ready to go at this point. The next step is to meet with your Implementation Manager to review and approve everything that has been set up for you.

Before moving forward, here are some things in your Passare instance (your funeral home’s Passare account) that you will want to review and approve before launch:

It will also help to create a few cases and run them through the processes you previously defined to make sure there are no gaps before communicating those processes to your team.

Simplifying processes with Passare

Once Broussard’s reviewed and approved their instance, Jayme and her staff saw the huge time savings that came with Passare.

“We were creating several documents for each service by hand, and Passare has completely streamlined this process through forms,” Jayme said. “Our sales contracts, invoices, VA forms, and authorizations were generated with the click of a button. We thoroughly enjoyed the control that Passare gave us. We were able to make adjustments to our price lists and inner office forms instantaneously.”

Once all the forms, price lists, and checklists were customized to their needs, it was time to get their staff on board.

Gain buy-in from staff

Any new process or procedure is a big change for your staff. For a smooth and painless transition, take these steps to gain buy-in from your entire team.

Communicate with your team

Learning how to do something new can take a lot of work. But after you’ve communicated the “why” behind the changes, your staff can see how Passare will make their job easier and more convenient. Still, it’s normal for your team to feel uneasy. Build confidence by communicating a solid plan for rolling out Passare to your organization:

To help you communicate effectively with your team and gain buy-in, our Complete Launch Starter Kit has a list of questions you can fill out and share with your team!

Carrots & sticks

Passare is only as good as its users. That is where carrots and sticks can be handy.

A “carrot” is a reward your staff gets for using Passare, while the “stick” is a consequence for refusing to use Passare. A reward could be as simple as offering the “best” user a gift card or celebrating milestones with your team, like “100 families invited to Planning Center” or “100 cases processed through Passare.” Give your team a goal and see what they can do!

Your staff also needs to understand that refusing to learn how to use Passare is not an option. We’ve seen some “Bosses” reflect this through performance reviews and disciplinary action forms.

That might sound extreme, but the alternative is losing thousands of dollars in your investment of Passare.

A seamless transition to Passare

Broussard’s made it clear to their staff that there was no plan B when moving to Passare.

“When we began using Passare, we also removed our old software platform from all of our computers,” Jayme said. “Any time you allow room for a fallback and give people an option to not change, they won’t.”

Broussard’s did have some staff that were hesitant at the beginning of the process. All, however, understood the reasons for moving to Passare and that it would make their individual jobs easier.

Ready for takeoff!

The day has arrived! All your hard work has been to make today as smooth and easy a transition as possible.
Here are some best practices for your first few weeks of using Passare:

Call immediately

When questions or issues come up, let us know! Passare is a big platform, and it is impossible to train for every scenario. We fully expect you to have questions, and we are happy to provide all the help you need.

Monitor your team

You have communicated to your team what the carrot and stick are, but now it’s actually time to follow through. Our support team can help you put together a report that can be automatically sent to you to make it easy for you to view who is entering the information you have specified.

Access your resources

You have many resources available to help you navigate Passare. Here are a few to be aware of:

• Help Center – The Help Center is constantly updated with instructional articles and tutorial videos at support.passare.com. If you have a question about features or functionality, you can usually find an answer by searching the Help Center.

• Contact your Support Team - 800-692-5111 or support@passare.com.

Achieving success with Passare

At Broussard’s, once the team got past the initial learning curve, the staff fully embraced the new system. Jayme felt that having the support of Passare’s implementation team was key to getting off to such a smooth start.

“Customer service was exceptional, and their response time exceeded our expectations,” Jayme said. “They listen to client feedback and deliver improvements that make our job easier. We commend Passare on its ease of use and practicality. Broussard’s recommends Passare to anyone in search of next level case management software.”

We hope you have a successful launch! If you ever need us, we’re a phone call away.

Find your Launch Plan

Software implementation isn’t scary when you have the right plan (and the right team!). Through training sessions with a dedicated Launch team member, your whole staff will feel fully confident when you start using Passare.

Choose from our Basic, Plus, or Premium Launch plans to get an onboarding experience that fits your team and your goals. Learn more about what each plan includes here: