5/20/2020
Healthwise Communications Team
In a recent survey, 41 percent of online users said social media influences which doctor or hospital they choose. But only 31 percent of providers and 26 percent of hospitals use social media. That’s a major disconnect between consumers’ expectations and healthcare marketing.
Social media offers a unique opportunity to connect with consumers and promote healthy living. But winning the social media game is challenging. Creating content from scratch every time you need something to publish can be demanding, inefficient, and expensive.
And staying active on social media requires a ton of content and a huge time investment. Even when you manage to get accurate, consistent, and evidence-based health information, you need to keep it updated and accessible so your marketing team can use it instantly.
Many healthcare organizations have switched to a “content as a service” (CaaS) solution as part of their overall marketing strategy to make sure they have content that’s ready to publish anywhere, including social media channels. Sure, social media is just one area in your content-distribution plan, but it’s one that’s full of opportunity and promise.
As an enterprise content solution and part of your social media strategy, a structured content model like CaaS makes it easier for you to:
CaaS—also sometimes called “structured content” or “modular content”—helps you create and sustain relationships with consumers and patients on social media forums or networking sites because it provides you with flexible content you can post on any social media platform. You can add fresh, engaging content frequently to keep patients interested. People can easily share your content with their friends and contacts on social media—spreading your message even farther.
Patients have a growing trust in health organizations with a social presence. In fact, one recent study found that 57 percent of consumer decisions to receive treatment at a healthcare facility are strongly influenced by that provider’s social media presence.
As you’ve probably already realized, creating content for the healthcare field is much more time-consuming than that for most other industries—you have to stay on the cutting edge of research, write accurate content, and put it through multiple medical and editing reviews, all while making sure your writing is inclusive and engaging. And making an infographic or video takes even more time and resources. By using CaaS, you’ll never have to worry about creating enough health content to fill your social media streams.
Bonus: You can also use that same content for your website, patient or member portal, and emails.
Over 90 percent of people ages 18 to 24 trust medical information on social media. And this trend is likely to increase over time because of the rising use of social media by younger people. Your team has probably spent a lot of time addressing misinformation or clarifying confusing health content patients find online. By consistently using one CaaS solution as the source of your health education, your marketing team can post the most accurate, current content and help your organization become a trusted source of information on social media.
Many CaaS models use application programming interface (API) technology to be sure content is updated in real time. It’s a modern, simple way to ensure you’re distributing the freshest, most accurate content available.
Social media is an excellent platform for distributing information about seasonal and common health conditions, diseases, and other public health issues. CaaS keeps you on the mark with the topics you need, and the information is always up to date, accurate, and ready to deploy across multiple channels.
Using social media to communicate about preventive care, such as health screenings and immunizations, is a great way to get those seasonal messages out and empower people to manage their health.
CaaS also lets you provide instant, accurate information during a health crisis. One medical center used CaaS to create a page about measles in just a few hours when their community faced an outbreak last year. And healthcare systems scrambled to generate reliable COVID-19 education to share with patients and members when the virus spread to the U.S. When time is of the essence and a population’s health is at stake, structured content lets you share health information as quickly as possible.
As new social media channels continue to crop up, and more people turn to these platforms for health information, there will be even more opportunity to drive traffic to your website, attract new patients, and keep current ones happy. And with telehealth and other virtual interactions on the rise, people increasingly expect the internet to provide medical advice. A CaaS solution can help you keep up with that ever-growing need for social media content.
Think about just how many content assets your organization needs each year. Now imagine you could skip the research, creation, and review stages and simply pick and choose from a huge library of user-tested posts, articles, and videos whenever you wanted. How much time would that save your team? How much better would your content become? How much money would that save your organization?
Want to know more about how CaaS can help you keep up with content demands? Check out The Healthcare Marketer’s Guide to Structured Content to learn about the exciting possibilities CaaS can open up for your organization.