Hospitals have always been conservative marketers with very controlled messages. Medical Minutes. Health screenings. Warm and fuzzy t.v. ads.
Did you ever think you’d see a hospital using tools like Twitter, Facebook or YouTube to help carry their message to their potential “customers.” Well, I haven’t seen it in Des Moines yet, but it’s getting close.
Alegant Health, a hospital located in Omaha has embraced social media marketing wholeheartedly. They have their own YouTube Channel where they have posted 59 different videos that have been watched 2,169 times. Their Twitter account has 248 “followers”. They have a facebook page that has 248 fans. They also have two blogs, a podcast center and a separate video center.
Hospitals are quickly learning that their audiences are going online for h
ealthcare information. If they want to build strong relationships with these people, they’ve got to be there too.
Is it a new trend? Sorta. Go to www.ebennett.org and you’ll find a list of 172 hospitals that are currently using social media – including 112 YouTube channels, 75 Facebook pages, 72 Twitter accounts and 16 blogs. And that’s a very unofficial count.
The best part about social media? When done well, I doesn’t have to cost much to make it work.
Author: Tom Flynn III
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
They have been using blogs for a long time now. Surgeons and medical practitioners especially, have been known to embrace this mode of promotion/marketing/relationship-building. We used to manage quite a few medical blogs too. It’s a good thing this form of communication is spreading to more and more people in the medical field though.
- Cosmos Star Consultants
It’s too bad that Alegant Health recently laid off the key employee behind these impressive media stats. The Public relations department at the hospital must not think that these stats make a difference in the community. Shame on them.
Interesting stuff! However, I debate whether social media is a trend or here to stay. There’s so much to gain from face-to-face communication instead of hiding behind a screen, but I also realize the importance of an integrated approach. BTW, from my PR background, I can tell you the PR office is pretty far down the totem pole when it comes to providing advice on layoffs.
Nicole:
Technorati currently states it is tracking over 112.8 million blogs.
YouTube serves 1 million videos EVERY DAY and is the second largest search engine in the world behind Google.
Twitter has over 1 million users.
There are over 150,000 podcasts available on iTunes.
There is no debate.
Here’s another recent example of a hospital using Twitter…during a surgery!
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/02/17/twitter.surgery/