tips for using social media to grow your medical practice

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The Best Tips & Techniques

for Using Social Media to Grow Your Practice

in 2011Monique Ramsey

Cosmetic Social Media

Meet Monique Monique Ramsey

Founder, Cosmetic Social Media

• 20 years experience: medical practice management, marketing, training, and consulting

• Certified Social Media Strategist since 2009

• Winner 2010 #influenceSD Award for Best Social Media in Business

• Alert Presence recognition of her work with Top 5 Medical Practice Facebook Fan Pages

• Panelist, Speaker, Trainer

• Interviewed by SmartMoney Magazine, American Medical Association, Dermatology Times

• Contributor to Cosmetic Surgery for Dummies®, published by Wiley & Sons

• Development and Implementation Team for Inform&Enhance® practice management software

Referral Paths – Then & Now

Social Media by the Numbers

Twitter• 120 Million Daily

Visitors• 55 million Tweets per

day• 300,000 new users per

day• Twitter search engine

gets roughly 600 million search queries per day

• 10th most popular website on the internet

Source: ReachLocal

Social Media by the Numbers

Facebook• 500+ Million Active Users• 150 million accessing via

their mobile devices• 700 billion+ minutes per

month• 30-45 age fastest growing • 2nd most trafficked site on

web• 700,000 local business

pages• 30 billion+ pieces of

content shared each month

Source: ReachLocal

Brand Monitoring

80% of Twitter usage is outside of twitter…

People update anywhere, anytime…

Imagine what that means for bad (AND GOOD) customer experiences!?

Resistance is Futile

If a conversation takes place online and you’re not there to hear it, did it actually happen?

Of course it did…and it continues – with or without you.

DYK (Did You Know)…

80% of U.S. Internet consumers research health information online

Most popular online activities:*

1) email

2) using a search engine

3) researching health information

24% of US online consumers said they engage in some form of health-related social media at least once monthly**

72% of e-patients searched for medical information just before or after a doctor’s visit***

*Pew Internet Project report

**Forrester Research, MediaPost.com

***Q1 Productions

Social Media“It’s not something; it’s what you do with it.”

Ian Kennedy / Yahoo!

“It’s not a noun- it’s an adjective! It’s something we connect with other

people through.

Cave paintings were the original social media…. It was sort of a story,

it was visual, and it had so many different elements to it.”

-Chris Heuer, founder, The Social Media Club

When Done Right…Social media...

• Creates emotional connections

• Gives patients sense of:

• Belonging

• Community

• Ownership

• Positions MD/Practitioner as the expert

• Informs patients

• Can ultimately increase quality of life for MD, staff and patients

Now What?!

• High Transparency• High Trust• High Touch• High Traction

Monique’s Social Media High T’s

• Transparency leads to credibility

• No hidden agendas

• Be Authentic

• Be Humble

• Be Yourself

• Controlling vs. *influencing*

High Transparency

Image Source: EverydayTenacity.com

• Word of Mouth (WOM) is the most powerful medium on the planet. It’s honest and natural.

• Social media can harness the power of WOM recommendations and make them “go viral”.

• Social Media and the web as a referral validators.

• 3rd party review sites (Yelp, Google, Vitals.com)

High Trust

Source: Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey, April 2009

• Natural extension of your marketing plan

• Adding more touchpoints with your patients creates top of mind awareness

• Build your online community by engaging

• Give them something of value & expect nothing in return

• Know what they like – give them what they need

• If you don’t someone else will

•

High Touch

High TractionRadical Strategic Visibility

Fresh ContentBlogging Helps SEO

Social & SEO

Source: http://thefuturebuzz.com

Blogging Attracts Links

Source: Data from over 1,500 small businesses - http://bit.ly/XDkQV

Blogging = Social Media Success

Blogging Brings More Site Visitors

Blogging

InformalConversationalReal-time

Who Should Blog?SEO/Webmaster

Guy

The Physician

The Intern

Your Child

The Office ManagerYour Ex

Hired Writer

The Pizza Guy

The Receptionist

What to Write About

•Information is a valuable commodity

•Write about a question you hear every day

•Talk about the latest theories•Debunk myths•Help them learn something they didn't know before

Elements of a good blog post

La Jolla Cosmetic Surgery Centre Blog

Compelling Headline

Optimized with links and key words

Short & Sweet (350 words max)

Simple writingTells a Story “Someone Like Me”

Best Tips & Techniques for Facebook

Choose the right VOICE for the practice and share relevant content daily

Allow fans to post – leads to valuable dialogue & sharing!

Don’t just sell… mix it up

Test to see what resonates

Have some personality!

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Facebook

EngagementEncourage participation with…• Polls and Quizzes• Questions• Contests (be sure to check

the rules) http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php

• Testimonials

TopicsInsider / Family• Show them your

world to make them feel like a part of your family

• Show off the pictures of the latest office party, seminar, or other “behind the scenes” gathering

• Have fun, be human

Tips

Be quick to respond- so check often

Limit #posts/day – think about your own news feed – clutter leads to peeps hiding you

Have your Facebook posts auto-feed to Twitter & LinkedIn

Photos- Upload practice pictures periodically and encourage your fans to upload photos anytime they wish. When your fans upload a photo, the thumbnail posts to their profile wall and out into the news feeds of their friends.

Use Apps to Your Advantage

Post = 420 character max

Over 420 – use “Notes” Section

Import your blog to Notes or use an app such as Networked Blogs

Use the Video section for any short (90 seconds or less) informational videos

Use apps such as SlideShare to re-purpose that last seminar you did (with proper permissions, of course!)

Pet PeevesIt’s called FACEbook

for a reason

Better

An empty section is

not engaging

vs.

Volume Of Facebook Sharing By Day

But… do what works best for you – whatever will give you the best chance of consistency (success)

Most Shareable Words on Facebook

Source: Science of Facebook - http://bit.ly/aWL2JX

Join My List

What better way to grow your email list than Facebook!• Constant Contact app

allows people to sign up for your list without ever leaving Facebook!

Quantity vs. Quality

You’d Be Surprised

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LinkedIn

Best Tips & Techniques for LinkedIn

Typically used for professional to professional contact– but…

• More and more savvy e-patients are using LinkedIn for their own professional networking.

• The more new tools that become available for sharing, connecting, finding common ground (similar to Facebook) the more comfortable people will get with using it… and ultimately use for finding a good doctor.

Best Tips & Techniques for LinkedIn

Uses apps similar to Facebook – hook up your blog feed, Twitter updates, SlideShare presentations, etc.

Fill out your profile completely! Get 100%

Join groups and see what’s happening in your field(s) of interest

Choose digest settings to receive email of group updates

Follow conversations on relevant topics with just one click

Get and give recommendations

Best Tips & Techniques for LinkedIn

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Twitter

Twitter CAN Bring New Patients!

Best Tips & Techniques for TwitterAdd yourself to Twellow (Twitter Yellow Pages) and use their categories to search for followers and key people to follow in your industry and local comminuty

Personalize your Twitter page so it is branded – use avatar photo of yourself or a “face” of the practice

Voice is still important

Social graces are important

RT = re-tweet

#FF = Follow Friday

Trending Topics

Make use of the extensive “search” functionality to follow influencers and leaders

Use a tool such as CoTweet to schedule Tweets

70/30 or 80/20 rule

Give something of value

Use a link-shortener such as bit.ly or budurl

# = “HashTag” – use like this: #beauty (makes it searchable!)

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YouTube

YouTube

YouTube is the world’s 2nd largest search engine…

People are watching 2 billion videos a day on YouTube

Every minute, 24 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube

Did you know?You can have your very own branded YouTube channel?

Radical Strategic Visibility

Social Media Cycle

Your Social Media Rx• Cannot “set it and forget it” –

social media is engaging with people – not messaging at people

• Content is King – commit to 10 minutes a day on creating content. Type it, dictate it or do an audible post at audioboo.fm

• An apple a day… you need to be posting every day (or 5/7)

• Keep it professional – NY Times Front Page Rule

• Social Media is not a quick fix. Don’t give up – it takes time to build communities!

A Word About Privacy

New AMA policy encourages physicians to:

• Use privacy settings to safeguard personal information and content to the fullest extent possible on social networking sites.

• Routinely monitor their own Internet presence to ensure that the personal and professional information on their own sites and content posted about them by others, is accurate and appropriate.

• Maintain appropriate boundaries of the patient-physician relationship when interacting with patients online and ensure patient privacy and confidentiality is maintained.

• Consider separating personal and professional content online. • Recognize that actions online and content posted can negatively

affect their reputations among patients and colleagues, and may even have consequences for their medical careers.

Final ThoughtsSocial media is no longer optional. You will reap the rewards

but need to invest the time to get the benefit.

• “When a brand does its job right, it creates an emotional connection.”

–Brian Solis

• It's not about ROI - It's about creating awareness, having people understand the brand will create engagement, which will lead to revenue.

• “If you aren't constantly evolving along with your customers you will be doomed to fail.” – Steve Kaufer, CEO - TripAdvisor

We Adjust to Your Needs

Teach  Create Implement Maintain 

… a Social Media and Patient Engagement Marketing Strategy for your company

…teach you the basics and beyond so you can do it yourself

…put the strategy into action and let you take over the reigns

…we handle all of the details and run your social media campaigns so you don’t have to!

We provide a spectrum of services:

Questions?