Posted by Roman Kniahynyckyj on Fri, Sep 10, 2010 @ 06:40 AM
With the new health care reform law poised to create a more competitive health insurance market, hospitals will need to position their brand as the brand of choice for health care consumers.
Hospitals, like many organizations, have begun to embrace social media. Ed Bennett provides a comprehensive list of social networking tools U.S. hospitals currently have in place.
If you are extending and amplifying your hospital's brand via social media, keep the below items in mind:
- Bring the providers to the people: As patients are always seeking to maximize time with providers like physicians, nurses, and physical therapists - a Facebook or YouTube video of a physician or other provider discussing a common treatment or procedure will help augment a time-pressed hospital visit. It also offers a provider the opportunity to refer patients to your hospital's social media sites.
- Extend key physical assets into social media: whether it's a vastly expanded emergency room, a critical care transport service, or brand new scanning technology, be sure to feature your important physical assets in your social networking efforts through virtual tours, Google AdWords, tweets or even Facebook and smartphone apps.
- Know your online audience and expand your payor mix: who is visiting your hospital's online properties? Do you want to target additional demographics? If you are a hospital that serves a larger Medicare or Medicaid patient set, you may consider optimizing your social media efforts to attract a self-pay population for services like plastic surgery or cosmetic dentistry.
- Don't forget about basic blocking and tackling: if your patient satisfaction rates are low, or your clinic wait times are high, or appointments are taking too long to be scheduled, or your website hasn't been updated since the 1990's - don't worry about social media. No amount of tweeting or Facebooking will address (or cover up) core operational issues.
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photo: brykmantra
Posted by Chris Knipper on Thu, Aug 06, 2009 @ 03:44 PM
Since so many of our clients are in the highly-regulated healthcare industry we often are responding to many of the same questions in regards to inbound marketing efforts and specifically the use of social media like Facebook and Twitter. How do we monitor comments? What are we allowed to say, or not say in response to blog posts? How do we respond to the less-than-positive contributions that come in? Or what if they ask questions that may need oversight from a legal perspective, or a clinical perspective?
In his BlogWell New York case study presentation, "Social Media in aHighly Regulated Industry," Director of Corporate Communications MarcMonseau describes how Johnson & Johnson touches more than onebillion people every day with its health care and well-being productsand services. So how can social media play a role in such a regulatedarena? Learn the steps Johnson & Johnson took to become morecomfortable with online engagement, how social media policies aredeveloped, the ongoing efforts to educate and inform, and how to dispelmyths about the risks of social media.
BlogWell New York Social Media Case Study: Johnson & Johnson, presented by Marc Monseau from GasPedal on Vimeo.