Healthcare Social Media

Scroll along your news feeds and I am sure you are seeing the same thing I see. Companies posting generic, unappealing content. Look, here we are celebrating an employee birthday. Yawn. Look at this photo of happy patient A with Dr. B. Original not. Our doctor was featured in this magazine. Yeah for us. This is not really social media. This is an employee bulletin board that has become your Facebook Page.

Now I am not saying it isn’t ok to post photos of staff celebrating, patients smiling or sharing your media exposure. All of this kind of content is fine in moderation. But even then you should have a unique spin or a way to create a dialogue. And that is the key. Start a conversation. Don’t talk at your fans. Engage them. Connect with them. Share and swap ideas, thoughts and emotions. Be social.

Even better though is to develop content that is truly unique and compelling; content that will stand out in the crowded news feed. Think of your news feed. What would you click on? Likely something that shows emotion or humor.

This photo – a tribute to women who lost children – reached 1.5 million organically and had 77,000 likes and 65,000 shares. Emotional Connection is the key

This is the photo that defines content that goes viral. You can see the numbers. It was also covered by more than 350 media outlets around the world.

Here is a photo that makes you stop and look at it, Raw emotion, An intimate moment. How did we even get to see this private moment?

And yes, there are the staff photos with happy patients. But make them unique. This one spans four generations.

And by all means get your fans involved. User generated content can be better than anything you can develop. Think about it. If you have 10,000, 1000 or even 100 fans that is how many potential content contributors you can have. Equally important is getting the staff involved. They like it, they feel good about it and they can learn to spot and develop good content. You can’t be everywhere. They are your eyes and ears; an extension of you. Here is a video from inside an exam room where a woman hears her baby’s heartbeat for the first time after suffering nine miscarriage – emotional video

And finally, here is the photo epitomizes social media solid gold. This photo of a baby surrounded by the needles her mother used to conceive through IVF went viral, reaching more than 2 million people organically and covered by more than 350 media outlets around the world. It was a photo sent to us by a fan via a staff member. This underscores the importance of having everyone involved. Social media must be social.