Social Media & Healthcare: Marketing in Medical Industry
Healthcare is as integrated and client-centered as all fast-paced industries. Like most businesses, healthcare companies need to stay present and active among competitors. Now, with society’s immediate shift to the virtual realm where the modern citizen lives online, social media is the optimal resource to remain relevant and respected.
Table of Contents
Why head to social media?
To use a resource effectively, it’s important to know what it can do for your company. Social media helps understand your patient’s interests and motivational factors and opens a communication doorway for all-around interaction. Engaging with patients and stakeholders on a tertiary platform lets you gather more user-generated content, and the opportunity to learn from online responses.
It also allows you to spread awareness so you’re at the forefront of medical advancements. Since the pandemic, the world’s trending topics mostly revolve around healthcare. With a platform to speak up, your company can share helpful information, clarify misinformation, and communicate during crises. This is an organic way to be recognized as reliable and share-worthy, optimizing your ORM.
Social media presence with the integration of a Social Listening tool lets you generate insights and compare Online Reputation so you can remain at the top of your game. Social listening comprises insights you can use to get a clear picture of how your brand is perceived by tracking your organization’s brand mentions, slogans, online campaigns, and visibility among industry buzzwords.
Also, Read Social Listening, Internet Culture & Fast Food
Social listening allows you to view competitors’ activities, responses to brand campaigns and, most importantly, helps stay aligned with HIPAA guidelines. A sound eye on trending conversations grants your company the chance to do public health monitoring, equipping you with information and statistics.
What strategies can I use to market?
Live-tweeting
UCLA surgeons had patient play guitar while they implanted brain pacemaker + live-tweeted the operation #UCLAORLive http://t.co/rWDSPFmoMp
— UCLA (@UCLA) May 29, 2013
Hashtags
Another strategy is hashtags. This tool enables you to start trends, contribute to ongoing trends, and brand your campaigns. Hashtags are a great way to increase citizen engagement and become a center point for social movements.
Also, Read Five Instagram Hashtag Analytics Tools
The magnetic effect of hashtags was showcased by Carilion Clinic four years ago, when they started a breast cancer awareness campaign called #YESMAMM, sharing information about the illness. Not only did this highlight Carilion Clinic as a brand alongside their vital content, but it also allowed them to drive traffic towards their website as they provided a link on each post urging women to schedule a mammogram appointment; a tool known as backlinking. This movement spread all around the country, with other medical institutes promoting the same cause, like UMC in New Orleans:
Say #YesMamm to your annual #mammogram at #UMC. Schedule yours today: https://t.co/iyg1pn3MFp pic.twitter.com/XLn7SiW070
— University Medical Center New Orleans (@UMCNO) September 18, 2017
CX management platforms like Locobuzz track individual hashtag campaigns along with sentimental responses so you can analyze and improve performance.
Citizen engagement
Finally, an evergreen tool in social media marketing is Citizen Engagement. When you open your platform to the public, your current and potential customers feel heard and included. Citizen engagement is multi-faceted. One tried-and-tested strategy is being active on discourse forums (e.g. Reddit, Quora, Yahoo Answers) to cater to users’ unique queries and benchmark your company as a knowledge hub. This can greatly impact your shelf-life as a reliable medical source and opens a doorway to interact with users of all ages.
A few years ago, Columbia University Health launched a wellness forum called Go Ask Alice!, where they provide a judgment-free platform for their audience to ask healthcare questions and receive personal answers from Columbia’s medical professionals. The site is still populated with users even outside of Columbia University, and the forum is a watering hole for any and every healthcare inquiry.
Combining social strategies
Some tools go hand in hand- a hashtag is a good catalyst to boost your citizen engagement. Here’s an example of how the Anne Arundel Medical Center incorporated both strategies in their Movember Facebook campaign, #AAMCStashie. Movember is an online movement to promote and raise awareness for men’s health, and the medical center asked their audience to post a selfie with a mustache to show their support for the cause and share their stories. The humorous, versatile responses highlighted the scope of immersing your audience in your movement and your brand.
Another wholesome engagement strategy is using or generating inspirational content to motivate and connect with your audience; a concept known as an internal trigger. Humanizing your business and collaborating with your users guarantees a standard for customer loyalty, and increases the circulation of your brand online. The best part is that this marketing strategy can be employed both within and outside the business.
An example of the former is stachemustache, a platform that features personal experiences, insights, and activities of their employees (and others in the industry) on the frontlines. Doctors and medical reps have the chance to share their accounts and, with minimal effort, present a realistic and accurate view of their profession that can serve as an inspiration and a guide.
Effectively market & manage your company online
Social media is the ultimate resource to extend your company to not just the eyes of your audience, but lives. Combining these tools and routinely maintaining your media presence can transform the reputation, reach, and lifespan of your brand.
Managing and monitoring can be a challenge, especially in the fast-paced and demanding world of healthcare, but there are a number of CX management platforms designed for you to measure insights, responses, and mentions on a singular platform.
Take a 7-day free trial at Locobuzz to get social media insights now!
