31% of Users Want Online Healthcare Video to Solve Problems, Offer Incentives

No sooner than after we finished publishing our healthcare online video SEO blog series, eMarketer released some extremely interesting figures about ways that Internet users want hospitals to use online video and new media.

Click image to see full-size image.

Although the survey data also included figures for other industries and sectors, healthcare was often at the top (or bottom) of most categories:

• 31%: Solve my Problems/Provide Product Service Information

• 31%: Offer Me Incentives

• 26%: Solicit My Feedback on Products/Services

• 25%: Develop New Ways for Me to Interact with Brands

• 19%: Entertain Me

• 19%: Market to Me

What the Figures and Findings Mean to Healthcare Marketers

Extrapolating the real meanings of these findings doesn’t require too much thought, whether looking at the top or bottom ends of the results:

• At the top, users want healthcare videos to provide solid reasons to come to your hospital. If it’s not a solution to their specific problems, then it’s an incentive that users desire—of which both are quite presumably being measured against what your competitors can or can’t deliver.

• At the bottom, users clearly don’t want to waste their time. Most healthcare marketers would likely not create videos that are designed to purely entertain visitors, but they might be inclined to use video to explicitly or aggressively market their brands. At any rate, neither are users want.

Do you agree with the results? Do they compare to objectives for your hospital’s online videos? What else do you think users want or don’t want?

AVID Design offers full-scale and mobile healthcare video production solutions.

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February 5th, 2010

Posted in Analytics and Metrics, Online Video / Rich Media, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

Creating a Video Sitemap on Google

Getting traffic to video content on your hospital’s Website such as physician video testimonials and virtual hospital videos can be a tricky task, especially if you do not have a video Sitemap in place.

Creating and sumbitting a video Sitemap is important for video content on your hospital's Website.

Closing out AVID Design’s blog series on video search engine optimization (VSEO), it’s important to know that for optimizing videos you must create a specific Sitemap for them so search engines, like Google, can make your video content searchable for your hospital’s Website visitors.

By using a Sitemap protocol, and video specific tags you can easily create your own video Sitemap. Be sure to include the following:

• A keyword rich description in the metadata fields
• Links to any landing pages that video content is on
• The location of the video player, video file and thumbnail file
• The Sitemap location in your robots.txt file

After you create your video Sitemap you are ready to submit it to Google Webmaster Tools—which also provides great tools for analytics, configurations and diagnostics— and for it to be indexed.

All this should help you get your video content fully searchable on Google Video and be listed in Google searches.

Check out some of these great Websites/articles for information, tips and tricks on creating a video Sitemap:

• Google Webmaster Central: Creating Video Sitemaps
• How to use Google Video XML Sitemaps for Video SEO by Mark R. Robertson of ReelSEO.com

Has anyone out there created a video Sitemap for their hospital’s video content?  Do you have any additional tips on doing such?

This concludes our VSEO blog series, but you can always check out other blog posts or any of AVID Design’s services including  healthcare video production, healthcare Website design and healthcare content strategy and creation.

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January 28th, 2010

Posted in Online Video / Rich Media, SEO, SEO Tips, Tricks and Advice, Web 2.0 | 1 Comment »

Engagement Objects – Interactivity for Hospital VSEO

Imagine a hospital’s Website with no photos on their online nursery page, no map on the location/directions page or no audio on the patient testimonial’s page.  You’d feel disconnected, lost and distracted when navigating to those pages.

Thankfully, many hospitals embrace the usage of multimedia elements such as photos, maps, video and audio on their Websites.  These multimedia elements make up what industry professionals like to call “engagement objects.”

This engagement ring captures your eye - the same way engagement objects on a hospital's Website can.

The Role of Engagement Objects

Engagement objects do just what they say—engage.  They include any kind of interactivity that enhances the user’s experience such as:

• Audio Files
• Charts
• Live Streaming
• Maps
• Photos
• Polls
• Video

Engagement objects play a contributing role in how search engines, like Google, determine a Website’s ranking through a blended search.  A blended search, or universal search, is where search engines include these engagement objects as part of their search result.

Having an engagement object such as a physician video about what to expect with cardiac surgery in the area of mitral valve replacement—following best practices for video search engine optimization (VSEO)—can help achieve a higher page ranking for your hospital’s Website.

So, engagement objects score big for both hospital marketers looking to up their rankings and Website users looking to become involved.

Do you think hospitals will use more video and engagement objects on their Websites in order to gain a higher page ranking?

Our final VSEO blog series ends Thursday with a look at Creating a Video Sitemap on Google.

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January 27th, 2010

Posted in Online Video / Rich Media, SEO, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

Top 10 Tips for Video Search Optimization (VSEO) For Hospitals

Are the videos on your hospital’s Website optimized?  If not, then they should be.  Not only is Web content important to optimize, but having videos and other multimedia tools optimized increases search engine rankings and traffic to your hospital’s Website.

Grab a pen and write down these tips for video search engine optimization (VSEO).

Since search engine spiders are mostly unable to read and look inside of videos to determine what the content is, there are certain things you can do to optimize your videos appropriately where the spiders can figure out what the video is about.

Here is a quick list of 10 tips for VSEO for you hospital’s Website:

1.) Create specific keywords for the video’s filename, URL, title, captions and in any tags.

2.) Develop relevant keyword anchor text and avoid using “click here” or “watch here.”

3.) Place videos on related content pages within your hospital’s Website.

4.) Host your video on user-generated content sites such as YouTube and use their embedded code on your site. YouTube has a high page ranking and will be indexed quicker. Be sure to link videos back to the site you want your users to go to.

5.) Use a video distribution service like Tubemogul to upload and post your hospital and healthcare videos to several video sharing sites.

6.) Build external and internal links within your community to boost your hospital’s Website.

7.) Encourage people on social networking sites to bookmark your hospital’s Website and post your videos to their personal blog or Website.

8.) Create an MRSS feed or video site map for your newly optimized videos to make it easier for search engines to locate all the video content.

9.) Offer a full-text transcript of video content such as RAMP’s (formally EveryZing) MetaPlayer.

10.) Make sure your hospital’s Website is optimized and be aware of how it is performing.

Our VSEO blog installment continues Wednesday with Engagement Objects: Interactivity for Hospital VSEO.

AVID Design specializes in creating hospital Websites, blog sites and integrated social media strategies and content.

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January 26th, 2010

Posted in SEO, SEO Tips, Tricks and Advice, Social Media, Social Networking, Web 2.0 | 4 Comments »

Video Search Engine Optimization…An Introduction

This is the first installment of a series of video search engine optimization blog posts.

Hospital marketers know the importance of SEO for their hospital’s Website.  Getting your hospital’s name to rank at the top of the page by using relevant keywords and driving conversions within your content is your ultimate goal.

Increase traffic to your hospital's Website with video search engine optimization (VSEO).

But did you know that posting such things as virtual tours of your hospital’s facility, patient testimonials and physician videos on your hospital’s Website or on user-generated sites can be optimized to help your hospital’s Website achieve higher rankings in search engine results?

Video search engine optimization—or VSEO—is vastly growing as a means of getting traffic to your hospital’s site.  In this series of blogs we’ll cover the following:

• Top 10 Tips For Video Search Engine Optimization For Hospitals
• Engagement Objects: Interactivity for Hospital VSEO
• Creating a Video Sitemap on Google

Check back Tuesday for the Top 10 Tips For VSEO For Hospitals.

Does your hospital have a trusted and reliable partner to build, manage and plan your online marketing strategies? AVID Design offers free assessments for Websites, content, strategy and more.

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January 25th, 2010

Posted in Online Video / Rich Media, SEO, SEO Tips, Tricks and Advice, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

How to Setup an SMS Text Message Donation Service for Your Hospital

As much as I’m saddened by the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake disaster, I must admit that I’ve also been quite impressed and intrigued with how organizations are using social media and mobile technology to raise awareness and funds for the survivors.

Establishing an SMS-based donation system is perhaps one of the easiest and economically sound ways to get your hospital’s marketing integrated with mobile communications.

By now, you are probably familiar with the opportunities to make Haitian earthquake relief donations via SMS text messaging on your mobile phone. But what you may not know is that you can setup a similar donation collection system for your hospital, such as for a foundation.

Mobile Giving Foundation to the Rescue

The Mobile Giving Foundation (MGF) is the self-described “glue” between a charitable giving campaign, the wireless industry and wireless users/donors.

To get started, your non-profit organization (NPO) must first prove its eligibility per the MGF’s guidelines. Next, your NPO will need to select and contact one of the MGF’s approved Application Service Providers (ASP) for further consideration. (Naturally, there’s a thorough vetting process to protect all involved parties.)

Once approved, the NPO and the ASP work out a pricing package similar to the current Haitian earthquake SMS donation options of $5 or $10. These amounts are then added from the donor’s bill from their wireless carrier.

The wireless carrier then passes 100 percent of the charitable funds to the MGF…and then within 30 days, the MGF sends 100 percent of the donation to the NPO. Related fees are charged directly to the NPO on a post-donation basis.

Of course, you would need to rely upon any number of methods to promote your charitable donation SMS service. Which would you use? Are you currently using SMS to collect donations? How has the experience been?

AVID Design is highly experienced in creating integrated healthcare marketing strategies that can include SMS donations.

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January 22nd, 2010

Posted in Social Media, Social Networking, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

Georgia Hospital Bed Tax: Three Ways to Be Heard

Last week, Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue’s new budget proposal called for a $247.8 million “hospital bed tax.”

Although it’s often uncomfortable to discuss the financial side of healthcare—such as with the proposed Georgia hospital bed tax—it’s a reality that social media can assist and improve.

We certainly don’t want to politicize our blog or this issue or to take sides, but it’s a safe assumption to say that most of you in the hospital and healthcare biz won’t agree with this proposal.

But whether you agree is meaningless if you can’t express your position on this issue—and this is precisely where social media is your opportunity to build support, engage opponents, and gauge your community’s opinions.

How to Use Social Media to Comment on the Bed Tax Proposal

Although these are three ways to use social media to communicate about the Georgia hospital bed tax issue, it’s also a primer on how to use social media for any healthcare-related topic or issue in any state.

Blog: You can and should be issuing “official statements” through traditional media releases. However, a blog lets your hospital’s executive and medical leadership express themselves more personally and subjectively.

Furthermore, if your blog enables readers to post comments (and it should), it’s also an ideal opportunity to truly engage in a conversation with your community.

Twitter: Tweets that get the attention of various community members, leaders and organizations—especially through the skillful use of keywords and #hashtags—not only further the echo of your online voice, but it also introduces you to other’s voices.

Facebook: Along with reposting any relevant blogs or tweets, you can continue to attract and engage community members, particularly if you reach out to other business and fan pages.

Also, there’s nothing stopping you for launching a page that expressly supports or defends the Georgia hospital bed tax proposal.

What are your opinions about the proposed Georgia hospital bed tax? Could this affect your hospital, clinic or nursing home? How else could somebody use social media to get involved in the conversation?

AVID Design specializes in creating hospital Websites, blog sites and integrated social media strategies and content.

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January 20th, 2010

Posted in Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

Three Considerations for Your Hospital’s Website Catastrophe Readiness

No matter where your hospital is located, there’s little reason to think that you aren’t subject to the possibility of a catastrophe—natural disasters, terrorist attacks, biological outbreaks, etc.

Unlike previous decades, people will turn to your hospital’s Website for support during a catastrophe. Are you prepared?

If or when such an emergency should strike, your community will be counting on your hospital’s Website (assuming they can access it) for information.

Is your hospital’s Website ready for a catastrophe? Here are some things to consider.

CMS vs. Non-CMS Hospital Websites

If you are using a CMS, that means you likely can access your Website’s content if you or other administrators aren’t at work—or worse, can’t get to the hospital.

If your Website is not built on a CMS, think about creating a temporary homepage that can be immediately switched on that either links or automatically redirects visitors to a reserve CMS-based Website…even it’s just a basic WordPress Website.

Even if you are at the hospital at the time of an emergency, there’s simply not going to be enough time to build new Web pages with traditional HTML methods. On other hand, a CMS will let you and other provide up-to-the-minute information—even if it means linking back to specific pages on your existing Website.

Who’s On Your Hospital’s Emergency Information Team?

No matter when a disaster hits, if you don’t know who is on your information team—or how to contact them or vice—it’s too late.

Build and maintain a roster and guidelines for managing information during an emergency. Along with the obvious information (e.g., home and mobile phone numbers), be sure that emergency team members know how to access and use your Website management system. This includes login, passwords and training.

Mobile and Social Media: A Hospital’s Last Lines of Contact During an Emergency

If your hospital is already active with mobile content, definitely consider integrating it into your emergency plan. After all, as more and more people use mobile technologies to access information—and since emergencies don’t strike when everybody is conveniently in front of a computer, not to mention eliminating Internet connections and power—mobile might be their last lines of contact.

But even if you aren’t yet established with mobile-focused Websites, remember that social media is technically part of the mobile family.

Along with having a plan ready that will let you disseminate information, also be prepared to monitor social media to answer questions and provide additional support. As 911 lines will presumably be overwhelmed (if not completely disrupted), social media could also prove to be a final line of contact.

Do you have other suggestions or ideas for emergency Website preparedness? What are some other issues hospital Website administrators should consider?

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January 18th, 2010

Posted in Marketing, Web 2.0 | No Comments »

Five Ways to Measure the ROI of Healthcare Social Media

As I prepare for the drive down to Columbus, Georgia to meet with Columbus Regional Healthcare System’s marketing team to kickoff the 2010 social media projects that we do in collaboration with them, I can’t help but keep thinking about a LinkedIn forum question I recently read about measuring social media ROI.

Looking past the dollar value of healthcare social media’s ROI is the key to better appreciating its contribution to a hospital’s marketing efforts.

For those not familiar with the acronym (which would be a total shock, considering the focus of this blog!), ROI stands for “return on investment.”

Since healthcare marketing budgets are often criticized because they aren’t directly related to a hospital’s primary purposes—to heal the sick and injured and to prevent illness—“proving” its value is often best done with ROI yardsticks.

Not the New Kid on the Block Anymore in 2010

Thinking about getting into healthcare social media is so 2009. The hot topic now is not about if a hospital should integrate social media into its marketing strategy, but instead is about how much it should invest, either in regards to time or money—which often translates into issues such as hiring or retraining staff, hiring social media consultants and content creators like us, etc.

As with anybody that puts an investment of time or money into something, they will be more willing to do so if they can have some assurances that they’ll get something out of it—which was usually easily done with old school ROI metrics. For example, in the past, all one had to do was to spend “x” dollars on a print ad, track the conversions, and then determine whether the campaign was a success.

Online hospital marketing isn’t so black-and-white, and social media clouds a healthcare marketer’s ability to clearly define the goals, objectives and parameters that contribute to a quantifiably “successful” campaign.

So enough preamble. Unless you have advanced degrees in economics, accounting and other skills that let you “prove” something that is too complex to define with simple arithmetic. Perhaps it’s time to reconsider hospital social media in terms of what it’s supposed to do: connect your hospital or healthcare system to the community, rather than being just another interruptive advertising tool.

Here are five ways to start rethinking social media ROI:

1. Put a price on new contacts. Every new Facebook fan or Twitter value has tremendous value, especially if you are providing useful content that improves your hospital’s trustworthiness, commitment to the community, transparency, etc.

2. Put a price on participating in blogs and online forums. How often are you stepping outside of your own Tweets and blogs and engaging in the conversation, such as on blogs? This very blog is a perfect example. If you are reading, why not share your thoughts? As with most blogs, our blog is intended to be an interactive forum.

3. Put a price on every bad thing that is said about your hospital. Here’s a personal example: I very recently criticized a certain cable TV and Internet provider on Twitter, and within minutes, I was contacted by their customer service. Instead of letting me fester and continue the attack on their brand with others that were inviting me to their blogs that encouraged similar criticism, I instead was working out my problems with the company.

4. Put a price on every good thing that is said about your hospital. Could there be any better return on investment than an honest and unsolicited compliment?

5. Stop putting prices on things. The march of time has proven to make everything in life more complex—why should tracking ROI be any different? If there is one thing that defines social media, it’s that it’s viral, geometric and exponential nature.

Do you have suggestions for ways to measure healthcare social media ROI? Is this something that is a concern at your hospital? Has it prevented your entry or expansion with social media?

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January 13th, 2010

Posted in Analytics and Metrics, Blogs + Blogging, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter, Web 2.0 | 3 Comments »

Monitoring With Tweetdeck and Searching With Twitter

Just the other day AVID Design was approached by a client who had a question about monitoring their brand on Twitter.

Searching through "junk," much like "dumpster diving," is NOT how you want to obtain your search results.

When searching for their name – which happens to also be an acronym shared by others – a lot of unrelated “junk” showed up on the results page.

The client was eager to learn that filtering out all the “junk” (by using Tweetdeck) with Twitter’s search operators makes it easy to follow mentions and search specific keywords.

Tweetdeck – No Need to Ask…

You’ve heard us talk about Tweetdeck before and how most of us at AVID Design use it and advocate it.  It turns out, that it’s a great tool for brand monitoring and a way to keep track of certain types of mentions and Tweets for your hospital’s Twitter account.

Basically, Tweetdeck is an organizational tool for Twitter that takes your feed and breaks it down into pieces which you can customize, manage and monitor.  Tweetdeck allows you to easily see what is (and what isn’t) being said by your hospital and about your hospital.  It’s especially useful if you have multiple Twitter accounts in need of monitoring, which you know you must do.

That’s all groovy and gravy about monitoring, but what about filtering out the “junk” and drilling down to find what you are really seeking?

Twitter’s Search Function – A Smooth Operator…

Not only can you search Tweets based on words, people, places, dates and attitudes, but many Twitterers are unaware that you can also use Twitter’s search operators in the search box to help filter out the “junk” and become more specific with what you are looking for.

For example, if you want to search for specific Tweets that contain the phrase “swine flu” with links, you would simply type “swine flu filter:links” in the search box and your results would appear.

But what about searching for something like “nursing” without generating tons of results such as “nursing home” or “nursing school?”  For this, you can use a search operator to contain a word, while omitting one commonly linked to it.  You would type “nursing -home” in the search box.  And voilà…the results you want!

This awesome search technique allows you to dig deep and drill away to get the search results you are looking for.

We know you don’t have a lot of time and are understaffed, that’s why AVID Design offers free Web 2.0 assessments and services for online marketing strategies such as brand monitoring to make your job and life easier, just like we did for the client mentioned in this blog post.

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December 29th, 2009

Posted in Brand Monitoring, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter, Web 2.0 | No Comments »