Why Should Hospitals Use Social Media?
“Social media has some type of influence on nearly 40% of recent hospital or urgent-care center patients, with more than half of 25-to-34 year olds reporting they are influenced by it.”
(source: Spring 2009 Ad-ology Media Influence on Consumer Choice survey from Ad-ology Research)
As more and more patients are searching for doctors and hospitals online and seeking information about health, social media has become another marketing tool to reach customers where they are and build relationships with the community.
Hospitals are Using Social Media in Various Ways
Hospitals are jumping on that opportunity, using social media to become more trusted and appreciated by their community. They are using it to run their organization better, to encourage more one-on-one doctor-to-patient interaction, propel their latest news and findings, for public relations, and even recruitment.
-Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center CEO Paul Levy has taken to blogging in order to show current and potential patients exactly what he and his hospital are up to. He touches on his address to the local union trying to unionize hospitals, a dinner held with a team of prostate physicians and patients, and even their journey into Kaizen (a Japanese philosophy that focuses on continuous lifelong improvement).
-Scripps is using Twitter to put out PR fires, and being rewarded with horrible reviews being retracted and replaced with stories of great customer service:
“Scripps uses Twitter to turn angry patients into loyal ones. Its basic approach of “try new things, be nice to people and don’t say anything that our legal department would object to” has yielded “little instances of gratitude that make what we’re doing worthwhile. Raging angry fires put out, people passing around our wellness stories, horrible reviews retracted and replaced with stories of great customer service.”
-Many hospitals are educating patients and making themselves ultra-accessible by using Twitter during live surgery:
Aurora Health Care, a 13-hospital integrated delivery network in Milwaukee, Wis., has mastered Twitter. The health system has more than 6,000 followers (@Aurora_Health), when many other hospitals have hundreds. They “live-tweeted” during a double-knee replacement surgery to help promote its orthopedics service line.
What Can Lo/So do for Hospitals?
Social media programs can benefit hospitals in many ways: protect and promote your brand, extend the impact of your traditional marketing programs, and create brand champions. Hospitals are using social media to recruit, communicate during a crisis, manage their reputations, fundraise, educate and to humanize their organizations.
Successfully using social media as the hospitals mentioned above do is no easy task. It takes time, resources and dedication. Lo/So can accomplish all this…making you accessible and helping you stay connected.
An Extension of Your Marketing Team
Allow Wainscot Media to manage your social media program. We’ll work closely with you to send out your messages and information through a Facebook fan page, a Twitter account, AND a blog.
The Lo/So service package will build a highly effective social media platform for your hospital on your terms. You’ll rely on our expertise in working with hospitals. We’ll work closely with you as an extension of your marketing team to generate content, obtain necessary approvals, review and monitor all comments.
Hospitals need to use social media to engage in conversations with their staff, patients and residents of their communities. Nothing can accomplish that more easily than a social media platform developed specifically for you by Wainscot. We’ll work with you to make sure all your efforts are made known to your followers immediately, promoting a relationship that customers will reward.
With one in three hospitals now having a formal social media plan in place (something researchers say is key to using such media successfully), don’t get left behind.
Be sure to visit the Wainscot Media booth (#133) at CONNECTIONS 2010 to find out more about the importance of social media to hospital marketing and how we can develop a platform for you easily and effectively!
While you’re there, enter to win a brand new Apple iPad!
Also, plan on attending Publishing Director Deborah Barrow’s round-table luncheon discussion on social media trends in healthcare on Monday at 12:30 p.m. at table 44.
Learn more about Hospital Social Media Marketing now on our web site. More information about the Society for Healthcare Strategy & Market Development 2010 Conference: http://www.shsmd.org/shsmd/conference/index.html
See you at the show!
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