Medical Marketing Enterprises, L.L.C.
Website Optimization, SEO, Reputation Management for Medical Practices
Keeping your website and social media up to date can be a real time crunch. Here are a few ways to do it easily and efficiently.
Do you know you are able to auto post directly from your website to many of your social media accounts? There are plugins which can allow you to auto post via the RSS feed of your site.
Consider, too, a social media dashboard such as Hootsuite, a platform that keeps all your social media platforms organized and open in one window.
If you have a social media account, there is likely a WordPress plugin allowing you to auto post from your WordPress site to the social media account of your choice.
Every time you publish a new post or article from your website, it automatically posts to your social media account! It’s an easy way to keep your website, and your social media account up to date! You can even “customize” the post after the RSS has been received.
For example, this plugin allows you to auto post to your Facebook account or page as soon as you hit the publish button on your website!
Facebook Auto Post WordPress Plugin – AccessPress Facebook Auto Post
And here’s a similar plugin for LinkedIn.
It’s difficult to manage multiple social media accounts, but Hootsuite allows you to manage multiple accounts with same dashboard and with a single browser window! Logging in separately to each individual account becomes obsolete.
Login to your Hootsuite account and you have instant access to ALL your social media accounts. You can manage posting efficiently and effectively.
If nothing else, platforms such as Hootsuite reduce the drudgery of logging in separately to each and every account you maintain. With a single login, you have access to all your accounts (and only one password to remember, too!).
Hootsuite offers some awesome upgrades, such as the ability to add polls or quizzes to your posts. This is a great way to engage your audience.
All the best,
Randy
I recently interviewed Steven Christiansen, M.D. for my podcast “Russ and Randy.” Steve is an ophtho resident at the University of Iowa Ophthalmology department. Before starting residency training, he created an eye related health website (www.EyeSteve.com) and promotes himself through social media, specifically Twitter (@EyeSteve).
The episode “Interview with Steven Christiansen, M.D.” is hosted on iTunes.
Just before starting residency, Steve realized he was about to embark on a 30-40 year career in Ophthalmology. Why not create a digital space now and see how it grows? (Personally, it’s a fantastic idea and I can not wait to see what develops in the next 5-10 years!)
Steve’s issue – how to promote the content?
Steve started promoting his website content through Twitter (@EyeSteve) and now receives over 12,000 page views per month!
In addition to the usual search engine optimization (SEO), Steve has created a significant following on Twitter to increase the exposure of his website. Persistent use of Twitter, consistent publications and quality writing on his website has allowed Steve to create this in such a short time.
In the interview, Steve recalls how the University of Iowa recognized his fluency with Twitter. They asked for his help. Unlike other departments who have successfully implemented social media to connect with their patients, Iowa wanted to keep in touch with alums and residents specifically using Twitter.
In the beginning, no one had a Twitter account, but it has fast become an important communication tool among faculty, alum and residents and is especially helpful when attending a meeting, such as the AAO. Members are able to share information, such as:
From no use to a powerful communication and sharing tool.
Incidentally, Steve published, “Twitter at the 2014 and 2015 Annual Meetings of the American Academy of Ophthalmology”, Ophthalmology, Vol. 123, issue 8, p1835-1837, published online August, 2016, www.AAOJournal.org.
The article analyzes Twitter use between the two meetings, again in a demographic naive to Twitter. The AAO regularly maintains a Twitter account during the meetings and through the year!
How do you use the same Twitter content for both your colleagues who are doctors and patients? On one hand, how does information about the latest in scientific knowledge (discoveries, treatments, meeting attendance) relate to patients? Also, how do posts about a new optical shop or a new EMR system, intended for patients to promote your practice, appeal to your colleagues?
Steve has a great explanation why this works for him.
There actually is some cross-relevance. Patients get better educated about their health and about their provider. Colleagues become impressed with connecting with patients and using a digital platform to communicate with patients!
Follow Steve @EyeSteve
www.EyeSteve.com
Many thanks Steve!
All the best,
Randy
If you head over to “RussandRandy.com” you’ll see that this weeks podcast episode is an interview with Dr. Rob Melendez, a comprehensive ophthalmologist and refractive surgeon at Eye Associates of New Mexico.
Rob and I have known each other for several years, crossing paths at the annual American Academy of Ophthalmology meeting as we have common interests in social media and marketing.
Rob loves Facebook and social media to promote himself, his brand and his practice.
Rob advocates that doctors must take control of their own marketing. If you are not actively promoting yourself and your practice, patients looking for your goods and services must rely on information for secondary and tertiary sources.
Dr. Melendez “takes charge” and contributes his own information to the Internet via his website, but especially through social media platforms such as Facebook.
He takes a multi-faceted approach.
As an example of “taking control,” Dr. Melendez recommends you claim as many of the review sites as you can. There are probably dozens of aggregator sites (business sites which ask for reviews of the businesses or doctors listed on the site) which list you and your practice.
Examples are Healthgrades, RateMd, Yelp, etc.
Claim these accounts and upload pertinent data and information. What services to you provide? What hours of operation? What are your practice goals?
Be bold and upload a headshot! Not only are you providing accurate information about you and your practice, but you have the opportunity to outshine your competition who likely ignore such opportunities.
Patients naturally want to find out information about their doctor. Most doctors are uncomfortable about sharing information about themselves. Patients are interested in finding out “who you are” in addition to “what you are.”
Dr. Melendez points out that social media is simply an extension of what we are already doing face to face in the office. How are you? How was your vacation? I’ve got a graduation in the family.
“Facebook advertising is a marathon, not a sprint.”
Rob has 4 tips to improving your ROI with Facebook.
By keeping track of money spent in the fashion outlined above, you should easily be able to track new patients to your practice…giving you your ROI (return on investment).
Converting a visitor to a patient from the Internet or your website is a result of a process. Understanding how authority, value and trust are fundamental to patient conversion is essential to your Internet marketing strategy.
This is the first step. Your content must be credible, reliable and accurate. Your content must be authoritative. You must be an authority…an expert.
For healthcare, this is easy. We are natural authorities when it comes to medical or healthcare questions and problems.
As healthcare professionals, we do not have to prove our authority. We have medical degrees which automatically confer “authority” to our content. Simply produce content which educates, informs and is accurate to maintain your authority.
How does your website provide value?
Value is provided to your readers by your articles. Your articles should answer a medical question or solve a healthcare related problems. Answering questions and solving problems provide the value your readers are seeking.
It’s important that your articles remain clinically accurate for you to maintain your value. Again, we are assumed to be the immediate authorities and it is assumed that our content is clinically accurate and credible.
If you are able to successfully provide value, your next patient develops trust in you and your website.
Trust must be achieved before your next patient schedules an appointment with you and completes the process of becoming your next patient.
This is a necessary 3 step process. Missing any component will halt the progression of conversion. By the way, this is essential to your social media Tweets and posts as well.
If you have any questions or concerns, please leave a comment below.
All the best!
Randy
In August 2016, Russell Faust, M.D. and I launch a new podcast on Healthcare and Medical Internet Marketing. I invite to download on iTunes and subscribe to our blog, RussandRandy.com!
Healthcare and Medical Internet Marketing
Healthcare’s Rx for Web and Social
