Due to its flawless bridging of the gap between patients and healthcare, social media analytics has proven to be a ground-breaking instrument for the healthcare sector. Live and frequent updates on a specific ailment, individualized information about any health concern, improvement of health education due to the large audience reach, and many other things that were previously restricted to the hospital grounds are now widely available. Given that they now have a better understanding of their market, healthcare firms are better able to highlight their good attributes to their intended audience.
How Social Media Analytics Could Be Useful to a Private Hospital
Many health care providers want to publicly express their pride in their work because they are so passionate about it. Many hospital personnel have a habit of posting photos and comments on social media. Despite the need to inform staff about HIPAA issues and internal hospital social media policies, there is a significant chance to capitalize on the collective power of your workforce on digital platforms. Every day, hospital staff members such as nurses, doctors, technicians, environmental services, and others leave their jobs with the knowledge that they have assisted a person in need.
Providers can provide a human face to a clinical experience by capturing those good sensations and sharing them with a social network. Hospital staff members offer a lot of knowledge and experience. A hospital may share and engage with the community more effectively than ever if it permits that information and knowledge to exist outside the confines of the hospital.
Patient Engagement and Cost Reduction
Social media’s entry into the healthcare industry has changed how it is seen. You will see that today’s healthcare systems are more of a consumer-based organization if you attentively examine the patterns. 42% of adults overall and 54% of Millennials want to accept their doctors’ advice. Healthcare professionals need to build a patient-centered strategy and change their mindset from one of providers to retailers in order to engage patients.
You will need the information you gather from consistently watching the social media activity on your accounts in this situation. Keep tabs on what people are saying about your services so you can determine whether or not your patients are satisfied. You can learn more about your patients’ preferences by closely monitoring their comments, FAQs, and feedback.
Customers will feel satisfied when you take into account their input, seek to uncover your weak points, and improve your offerings. 60% of physicians already believe that social media raises the standard of patient care.
After you deliver superior patient care, you’ll notice a rise in customer satisfaction and patient engagement. You won’t need to invest any additional funds in the marketing that will significantly lower the overall expenses of your marketing because your rapid responses and hard work will speak for you.
Monitor audience behavior
There is much to discover and experience on social media, and pages are not the only way to build brand awareness. Why not use social media monitoring to your advantage to keep tabs on audience behavior? Start by developing active patient communities. Your practice’s search traffic will go up as a result.
Keeping tabs on visitors, the percentage of likes and dislikes, and comments is all you need to do. You’ll gain insight into what people are thinking. Attend to their preferences and incorporate them into your offerings. It will result in better engagement, which in turn will eventually lead to conversions, as well as an increase in the number of patients on your social media account.
Make sure you develop online groups that are patient-focused. Here, you can share important health advice with your patients and business partners. Additionally, you can upload the individual narratives of your staff members and patients. Monitor the aforementioned variables and consider how your content, which is increasing your visitors, has affected them. Share the articles that your patients like reading the most.
Establish consistency
By establishing consistency, we intend to appear trustworthy in the eyes of your customers, partners, bloggers, and influencers by publishing material and answering their questions. No matter how big or small your practice is, you must maintain consistency if you want to thrive in the cutthroat healthcare industry of today. Deliver your messages with clarity and positivity in a consistent manner. You only need to monitor mentions, go at remarks, and assess the patients’ needs. You can concentrate on enhancing your services as you learn what your patient desires.
Deliver Personalized Information and Frequent Updates
When COVID-19 was in effect, social media analysis and monitoring proven to be innovative in bridging the gap between patients and healthcare systems. The key was constant monitoring of the information loaded about the novel coronavirus, which enabled personalized information and regular updates. After realizing the existing necessity, it assisted healthcare systems in demonstrating their beneficial effects.
The healthcare systems were able to conduct thorough investigation and analysis thanks to the data that was being generated constantly during the pandemic. It actually assisted in streamlining how healthcare systems approached the problem as a whole during the pandemic.
improved decision-making
In marketing, every action is taken with the goal of coming to a meaningful conclusion and making a choice. Similar to this, healthcare institutions use social media monitoring to comprehend how a certain action affects important decisions. It has aided in making regular advancements in the creation of diagnostic equipment, new medications, or updated medical technology. Investigating disruptive opportunities has been made much easier with the use of social media monitoring.
The healthcare sector must be engaged on social media, and monitoring trends is another essential task that must not be overlooked. Social media monitoring is quite helpful in this situation for pinpointing the triggers and planning the subsequent stage of engagement-inducing actions. It can help healthcare systems in a variety of ways, from creating communication to establishing one’s brand.
How can Hospitals Make the Best Use of Social Media
Physicians as advocates
Particularly on social media, doctors are a significant resource. In emergency situations, interactions between doctors and patients are frequently described as being hurried and impersonal. However, a patient and his or her family will be able to form a stronger, more reliable connection with the doctor if the doctor is able to take the time to speak and reveal their personality in a digital format. Blogs like KevinMD.com aid in giving doctors a face. Families feel more at ease when surgeons use YouTube or Vimeo to describe procedures. Encouragement of doctors and other healthcare professionals to use social media can be a big advantage to your company whenever policies and objectives are clearly articulated.
establishing connection
It’s critical for hospitals to be active online to maximize the opportunity to connect with patients as more and more people turn to the internet for health information, a supportive network, or even assistance in locating a doctor. According to a recent study, healthcare facilities with active social media profiles also scored highly on the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems. Consumers of all ages are increasingly turning to digital media as a starting point when researching health-related topics. Finding your company online and on social media helps allay concerns by revealing the human side of employees who are delivering patient care.
Establishing communities
The capacity to foster communities among patients and people of the community is one of the most well-known opportunities social media presents for hospitals. Social media uses common experiences and histories to connect people in an online setting where, frequently, people feel more comfortable sharing and inviting others into their life. Naturally, patients and their families may have a poor or disruptive experience throughout their hospital stay. The hospital can engage patients on a deeper level by offering an online community where they can communicate with the hospital and others who have had similar experiences. Additionally, it can allow patients to exert control over their interactions, something they might not feel when in the hospital.
When it comes to population health and illness management, creating communities can be especially beneficial. By offering a location where patients may connect with others going through similar experiences, a virtual community of like-minded people is created. Asking questions and getting ready for the care interaction prior to visiting the care area helps patients establish a relationship with the hospital.
Feedback
Hospitals can listen to and participate in online dialogues by using social media. Even if hospitals might not always participate in the talks, the knowledge gleaned from observing the exchanges is priceless. Additionally, it enables hospitals to strike up a dialogue with the community and share knowledge and information before a crisis occurs.
Online patients at some hospitals are invited to join social media groups that address particular issues like diabetes, breast cancer, or healthy living.
Leveraging active users can ensure that your online community stays active. This can attract other people to the conversation with the promise of real-time conversation and information. Other hospitals use engaged, online patients to create advisory boards that promote patient engagement workshops and other hospital-based community resources. Such practices allow you to test programs or services with a smaller group before presenting them to the general public, and can range from a Facebook poll about changing the cafeteria food to asking for local volunteers to help with your annual coat drive.
Due to its flawless bridging of the gap between patients and healthcare, social media analytics has proven to be a ground-breaking instrument for the healthcare sector. Live and frequent updates on a specific ailment, individualized information about any health concern, improvement of health education due to the large audience reach, and many other things that were previously restricted to the hospital grounds are now widely available. Given that they now have a better understanding of their market, healthcare firms are better able to highlight their good attributes to their intended audience.
It’s all because of social media analytics! These days, we can easily find out anything we need to know about health. In fact, when someone has a health issue, search engines are the first thing they turn to. Consider the volume of data produced per second only by social media and search engines. Leading analytics firms offer top-notch research and analysis to help healthcare providers stay competitive by making sense of this unstructured data.
What are the Implications of Using Social Media in the Healthcare Industry
HIPAA compliance
One of the main issues with social media in healthcare is HIPAA compliance. Healthcare personnel are wary of using social media because they worry that their posts may violate patient privacy or expose their networks to viruses or cyberattacks.
Thankfully, HIPAA provides detailed instructions on how to safely share data, remarks, images, or videos online without transgressing patient privacy rules.
These include “de-identification” of patients through the deletion or omission of names, insurance or Social Security numbers, dates of birth, and photographs, as well as the exclusion of particular information on uncommon medical conditions, such as the dates on which they occur. Patients can also give their permission for medical professionals to broadcast their pictures on social media.
Desire to stay professional
Many healthcare workers are concerned that their social media use would come across as unprofessional to potential patients. They might also be concerned that their peers would stop respecting them and see them as less capable, serious, or knowledgeable.
These days, it’s crucial to think about the scope and reach of your posts as a medical expert. Every post does provide readers more insight into who you are as a person, much less as a healthcare provider, therefore it’s important to post only acceptable stuff.
Fear of negative response
No matter how cautious you are or how unobtrusive your social media marketing for healthcare is, someone might not like it. You might receive unfavorable feedback, and someone might take offense. The easiest way to deal with the unavoidable backlash is to make sure you are abiding by all legal requirements and acting sympathetically on all social media platforms.
Sometimes a social media comment you get may offend someone (and not the original content). Monitoring comments, likes, and shares can help alleviate these situations by allowing you to address (or, if necessary, ban) any hostility.
Security Risks
Users of social media frequently worry about the possibility of their personal data being taken. At the start of 2018, social media-related problems accounted for over 4.5 billion, or more than 56%, of the compromised data records.
Although more recent evidence suggests that health information is safeguarded, security and data breaches continue to happen often. Everyone needs to pay attention to patient privacy, but especially the healthcare provider.
Legal action may be taken against you if you intentionally disclose sensitive information like social security numbers. Social networking increases your chances of making mistakes.
Specific guidelines for secure online publishing are now provided by HIPAA. This includes the censoring or removal of a patient’s name, health insurance or social security number, birth date, or images. The patient also has the right to delete particular information concerning a rare condition, such as the dates of its diagnosis.
Therefore, in order to lower the likelihood of compliance infractions, the personnel must receive enough training. They must be aware of what they may and cannot share.
False Information
The majority of consumers are concerned about incorrect material appearing in healthcare social media marketing strategies, and it does so frequently. In reality, it takes the truth six times as long to reach 1,500 people as a lie. Your patients’ health is at risk, and social media is notorious for spreading conflicting information.
In 2018, around three-fourths of the most popular health stories had inaccurate or misleading material. As a result, the majority of users on social media only read the title and skip over the content.
In other words, the likelihood of spreading misleading information over the truth is 70% higher. It’s ideal to add headlines that are simple to read and to the point in order to prevent this problem.
Lack of Control from the Healthcare Professional
The lack of control you have over social media in healthcare is another disadvantage. Negative comments will inevitably appear on the content you share, and everyone’s social media page will display them. Overall, there will inevitably be irrelevant and even critical responses to your messaging.
The fact that once it’s out there, it’s there forever may be another issue you run into. Negative comments might be able to be deleted, but enough people have seen them to alter their opinion of you.
Keep an eye out for any negative. Instead of attempting to ignore it, take a stand and make your point right away. By doing this, you demonstrate to people your concern for your reputation.
Time-consuming
It takes time to maintain a social media presence, thus it’s difficult. Even if you only have a few social media accounts, you need to consistently create new material to maintain the buzz. More channels inevitably require more time, but in the modern world, especially, your healthcare workers are already overburdened.
Additionally, the outcomes take time to manifest. It can take months of sharing before you gain a sizable audience. The battle to be the greatest never really ends because there are so many other healthcare organizations vying for each user’s attention on social media.
The Danger of Self-Diagnosis
Potential patients use social media to self-diagnose even though they typically conduct at least one healthcare-related search per year. Instead of making an appointment with you, they might visit your page to learn more about their disease.
Best Practices for Social Media in Healthcare
Spread accurate information during healthcare crises
The ongoing health crisis generated by the spread of the novel coronavirus virus is an excellent example of why it’s essential to use social media as a healthcare provider and how you can use it for a good cause.
It’s more important than ever to have an active presence on social media in these uncertain times. As a healthcare specialist, you have the authority to inform the public about health measures, how to stop the spread of the virus and provide reliable sources of information.
Unfortunately, fake news and misinformation on COVID-19 are still spreading like wildfire, and healthcare providers have the power to educate the public.
Here’s an example of how the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases chooses to educate their community on safety measures regarding COVID-19.
Here’s another example from the Cleveland Clinic on how to wear your mask correctly to slow the virus’s spread.
2. Educate your patients with healthcare tips
One of the most important goals of healthcare social media is to educate individuals about various health conditions. We advise putting an emphasis on prevention and leading a healthy lifestyle, as well as being aware of the signs of specific conditions.
On instance, to inform the public about hot themes in health and wellness, the Mayo Clinic produced a video series for Facebook. Here is a little yet useful video that explains how to stop heart palpitations.
3. Don’t be afraid to have fun
In the medical field, the topics you talk about on social media have to be treated responsibly, but this doesn’t mean you can’t have some fun when the context is appropriate.
Here’s a cute example from Thriva, a health monitoring service. Keeping in mind that most patients fear or avoid seeing a doctor when they feel unwell, they created a marketing campaign with a short video for Halloween. The message was that checking your health is not that scary.
4. Raise awareness with creative campaigns
As mentioned above, a little bit of fun never hurt anybody, especially if it’s for a good cause. Creating a viral and funny campaign to educate people on severe health issues is doable. And, if done right, it can become an instant success.
5. Create a community where people can connect
Social media is also used by people to feel accepted and a member of a group. Therefore, connecting with others affected by the same medical illnesses through these platforms is crucial for patients’ daily lives.
People who have certain disorders or who have chronic illnesses frequently feel like they want to separate themselves because of their ailment, which makes them feel lonely or rejected.
That’s where social media’s influence can be useful. It can facilitate global communication and reduce isolation.
You can set up a Facebook group where members can communicate freely, meet others who have similar conditions, and offer support to one another.
According to research, Facebook Groups are used by 30% of the top US hospitals as part of their social media strategy.
Here is an illustration of a group the Mayo Clinic established for people with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. People can interact with one another, learn about Mayo Clinic services, and obtain assistance choosing treatments in the group.
7. Help patients overcome doctor visit anxieties
One of the most crucial uses of healthcare social media that is sometimes overlooked is improving patients’ attitudes toward going to the doctor. Many people need reassurance that there is nothing to worry about because they are nervous or uncomfortable about getting tested or doing something.
Sharing uplifting and inspiring words may persuade patients to seek medical care and prioritize prevention.
One of the most widespread medical phobias is dental anxiety, which is a typical problem. According to a study on dental anxiety, 58.8% of people report having it. On a scale of symptoms, 12.5% reported having extreme anxiety, 19.1% reported having high anxiety, and 27.2% reported having moderate anxiety.
8. Respect the patients’ privacy on social media
Social media usage in the healthcare industry needs to follow a few standards and guidelines. Privacy on social media should be respected for ethical and legal reasons. By no means should you post private information about your patients on social media.
Any type of diagnostic or medical history information that is published without patient consent may be in violation of HIPAA.
It’s crucial to realize that patients might be identified without being given their names. A HIPAA breach is when you post something online and leave out the patient’s name but include information that could be used to identify the person.
Conclusion
Social media analytics make it simple to make important business decisions such as product pricing, supply chain cost reduction, enhancing and maximizing sales performance, etc. The way we approach healthcare concerns today has surely been made simpler by the convergence of healthcare organizations and social media. Social media data analytics has made it simple for healthcare organizations to make key business decisions.