Social media is everywhere today, and many medical and dental practices are trying to figure out the right balance to use this tool for marketing and promotion. At the same time, social media can also be a way for patients to review and send feedback about a business or practice—both positive and negative. Here are some tips to manage you social media presence, avoid the detrimental effects of negative feedback, and ensure that you get the maximum benefit from your online presence.
How Social Media Benefits Patients & Practitioners
Social media is a powerful tool for connecting people, taking word-of-mouth advertising to a new level. It allows people to solicit and share feedback with friends, family, and colleagues about consumer experiences. For patients, social media also offers a direct connection to your practice so they can stay updated with what is happening, and a well-executed marketing plan keeps your practice at the top of patients’ minds so they visit and recommend you for dental or medical care.
Minimizing Negative Reviews and Feedback
While the internet can be a great place for customers to find you, it can also be a place where people go to broadcast negative experiences. Here are some tips for combating negative reviews and building and maintaining a positive online presence:
• Develop your brand early and often by posting content that positions you as an expert in your field.
• Encourage satisfied patients to post positive reviews.
• Offer a way for patients to share their feedback with you privately, and be responsive by correcting potential problems quickly.
• Monitor online mentions of your practice using Google alerts so you can find out about negative reviews right away.
• Be proactive by responding to patients’ questions and comments on social media to build a loyal patient base.
Being proactive with your social media presence can help you minimize negative information and establish a positive reputation with current and future patients.
We Can Help Manage Your Social Media
Managing social media requires time, skills and manpower. Solution21 offers custom social media and marketing solutions. Please call us at 949-336-7575 or send us an email and our web specialists will contact you.
With social media, it's all about the photos. Top image sharing sites like Pinterest, Instagram and Vine are proof of this. Leading internet marketing agency, Hubspot, recently revealed a study that says photos on Facebook produce 53 percent more Likes than a text message post. Your dental practice needs exposure and you can do this by engaging in social media and posting great images.
Here are 5 photos your social media followers want to see:
Followers
This is a guaranteed to be liked and shared. Obtain permission and post pictures of your patients on social media, preferably of them smiling after the treatment. In this day and age of selfies, who wouldn't love to see pictures of ourselves and our children with perfect smiles on the website. This is proves to your patients that you are their number 1 fan and that you care about their smiles.
Yourself and your team
Patients will more likely stay loyal to their dentist or doctor who takes time to pose with the staff and post their photo on social media. Your patients are sure to keep coming to your office if show that you and your staff are sociable and likable.
Equipment and technology
While dentistry and dentists may be a common sight, the same cannot be said of dental equipment. There are some amazing dental technology that have been invented to make trips to dental office less painful and these are worth sharing on social media. It will help educate your patients, ease their fears and highlight your dental expertise by discussing some the tools you have and how they are used. You will be surprised at how many patients are interested in advancements in dental technology.
Special moments
Posting photos of special moments that patients don't normally have a chance to see make your social media followers feel as if they belong to a family and that they are part of your group in a special way. Special events such as birthdays, events and celebrations, or of your pets, are all worth capturing and shared on social media.
Outside the office
People, be they patients or not, are always fascinated to see professionals as real people with real interests and hobbies or activities. Share photos of your hobbies, vacations, charity work and anything you think that will help people trust you with their health. Remember, if patients feel like they know you or connect with you, they are more likely to stay loyal to your practice. Some might think this is too personal, but social media is personal. Your followers are your patients and your patients are people.
Too busy to manage your practice social media needs? Let Solution21 help! We can plan an organized and effective social media strategy for your practice to keep your patients engaged and to get potential clients interested in your services. Contact a Solution21 social media specialist at 949-336-7575 or email info@solution21.com to learn more.
As we all know, online marketing is constantly changing and developing at a fast pace. To keep up with the trends and changes in marketing, technology, social media and algorithms, we have come up with a list of top marketing tips to help your practice get off a positive start this new year. Solution21's Victoria Calaguian details some of the top marketing tips to help you market your practice online this 2014.
A lot of dentists, surgeons and other medical professionals are looking at new ways to improve their practice profitability, better promote their services and overall improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Paid Advertising & Marketing
Social media and blogs are free channels to advertise your practice, but they take a lot of time, and relying on organic ranking just won't cut it anymore. You have to consider your practice like a real business that requires budget for advertising. Online paid advertising with AdWords, Remarketing and Facebook are highly strategic and relatively affordable. Developing a comprehensive marketing strategy through ads and press releases for publicity is a smart way to attract new patients.
Enhanced Content
Because content is king and considered the most important part of your website. Through great content, you will be able to generate leads, referrals, build loyalty and increase patient retention. With the search engines focused on your content, you need to provide your website visitors and potential patients with current, timely, helpful and relevant content. You need to have an informative content that will answer to their questions and address their health issues. Make sure to include positive reviews as part of your content to promote your practice's commitment to great customer service. Furthermore, good content means good traffic on your website, which will help increase your search rankings.
Be Sociable
Be more involved and ramp up your social media efforts. In today's connected world, social media is paramount to the success of your practice and your online efforts. Social media can take a lot of energy and time to manage, so choose the right network that works best for your practice and focus your efforts there. If you are to choose more than one social network, you will need professional help to strategically manage your multiple social media involvement.
Build Backlinks
This is simply based on the premise that the more people like your website, the more valuable it must be and the higher ranking it deserves in search results. It boosts your credibility when other websites point relevant links and bring attention to your websites through blogs, articles, photos or social media. Backlinks fuel traffic to your website. However, you have to be aware of the guidelines set by top search engine Google on what websites should and should not do in order to get a higher ranking.
Solution21 specializes in website design and marketing for dentists, surgeons and other medical professionals. For more than a decade, Solution21 has shown thousands of dentists, surgeons and physicians that right website design and strategic marketing are highly effective at building practice profitability.
The Science of Social Timing and Blogging
Timing can make or break your blog.
This KISSmetrics infographic explores how timing can affect your blog readership. Posting content during high traffic hours of daytime can lead to more visitors, comments and engagement. You can get more prominence when posting during night time with less noise, but you get fewer visitors during these off hours. The data also reveals that most users read blogs throughout the day, with the highest percentage in the morning between 8am to 11am. Average blog gets the most traffic on Mondays, but more comments on Saturdays because most people don't work or are free on this day.
Takeaways:
- Majority of people read blog posts in the morning.
- More men than women read blogs in the evening/at night.
- An average blog gets more traffic on Monday than any other day of the week.
- The average blog peaks in traffic around 11am Eastern Time.
- An average blog gets more comments and engagement on Saturday.
- The average blog receives the most inbound links on Monday and Thursday.
- The average blog receives most inbound links at 7am Eastern Time.
Of course, we did not forget about it. It's New Year and it's time for a new start. CNN's satirical resolution list reminds us to put together our own list to help improve your medical or dental practice social media strategy.
Think before you post. According to the article,"It takes only a few seconds to compose a dumb tweet. The damage can last much longer.” This is specially true with professional and business accounts.
Thinking before posting a tweet or Facebook message may seem an easy and obvious thing to do. But even the smartest people don't always have their wits about them and often find themselves the brunt of internet outrage for saying or posting something thoughtless and stupid.
Most practices are wary of the possibility of a negative backlash online but a social media expert can show you how these situations can be leveraged to create unique, profitable opportunities for your practice. Remember, every post is a reflection of your practice so make sure your messages consistently convey your level of professionalism. How people perceive you online can affect your reputation. So before hitting the publish button, think about these:
Is this inappropriate or offensive? Always play safe not post things that may be deemed rude, offensive or inappropriate.
How will this affect my brand or reputation? Always carefully craft your messages for accuracy and to reflect your level of professionalism. Don't be impulsive or you'll be sorry.
Check facts before you share. Misinformation caused a lot of guffaws and outrage in 2013. Verify facts or content for accuracy before you blindly follow, forward, retweet or share any message that appears to be an interesting, strange or funny information. Don't be too quick to repost or comment on trending issues so you don't fall prey to hoax or lawsuits. A little research can go a long way in social media.
Stay positive. It's often tempting to jump in and speak your mind on major issues or minor annoyances, but as dentists, doctors and medical professionals, you must think twice about posting negative comments and updates.
Do not engage in a word war or lash out at a customer for giving you a bad review. If the statement is untrue or malicious and you have supporting evidence to prove the statement to be inaccurate, you can request for the comment to be removed. But in the absence of factual evidence to disprove any claims or statement and the site doesn't take down the negative statement or review, you should consider correcting the post in the comments section by presenting your side of the story in a professional manner.
Less, but more quality posts. Social media users have very short span of attention and skip over long-winded and rambling posts. Anything longer 140 character or 70 words is better posted on your practice or medical blog, where there's no word limit. Create short, but impactful posts on your Twitter and Facebook accounts.
Need help managing your social media?
We understand the hectic schedule of dentists, surgeons and other medical professionals.But you cannot skip social media engagement with your practices because of patients’ growing demands for digital communication in managing their healthcare. Let Solution21 social media experts help! We can plan an organized and effective social media strategy to get potential clients interested in your services and manage your reputation. Contact a Solution21 web specialist to learn more.
