Hospitals in the Social Media space
Over the past year and a half I have heard the phase “social media” 100,000 times. No matter where you turn your attention someone is discussing social media and how it can help your business. For brands there is no escaping social media, their only choice is to embrace it. One industry that has embraced social media as a means to communicate with their target audiences is the hospital industry. Since 2006 the number of U.S. hospitals engaged in social media has skyrocketed. Over the past three years more than 350 hospitals throughout America have engaged their brand in one type of social media.
According to the blog “Found In Cache” by Ed Bennnett, a hospital Web manager who is engaged in the social media space, as of September 21, 2009 there are 186 hospital YouTube channels, 190 hospital Facebook pages, 267 hospital Twitter accounts and 35 hospitals that have their own blogs. The hospital industry is silently leading the way in the social media space; however, there it is hardly reported.
Hospitals are being pretty innovative in the ways they have chosen to use the social space. There are a ton of examples out there explaining the ways in which hospitals are using social media to engage patients but here are a few that stand out. In Detroit, at the Henry Ford Hospital, doctors while performing a brain surgery on a 47-year-old man used Twitter to answer consumer questions. At Nebraska Medical Center a patient shared her experience with cancer on YouTube causing the NCU to open a monthly clinic for the condition. At Sarasota Memorial Hospital Twitter is used to answer patient questions and provide them answers in real time about health issues. Plus consumers can inquire about patients who are currently staying at the hospital via Twitter.
The reason why you are seeing hospitals make the jump into the social media space is that it makes perfect sense for their industry. During all of our lifetimes we are going to have many physical interactions with a hospital, some positive and some negative but healthcare is consumed by everyone. Think about it; healthcare is the most important service you will ever utilize. So when you are discussing a service that almost all consumers will use at one time or another, it makes sense for an industry to use all potential communication tactics possible. Expect to see more hospitals join the social media movement; remember more than 60% of Americans have used the Internet alone to search for information on a health topic. Pretty soon it will be 60% of Americans have used social media tactic to gain insight on a health-related topic.
Tags: Facebook, Hospitals, Social Media, twitter
