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AVID #HCMKTG Week in Review: July 19–25, 2010
Each week, we review hundreds of news, blogs, studies and papers that relate to healthcare marketing communications, also known by its Twitter hashtag, #hcmktg. Here are some that you might have missed…
Applause from the peanut gallery! Although we are primarily known for our Website design, SEO and PPC services, and online video productions, we are also full-scale marketing strategists. Creatively embracing technologies such as electronic billboards and mobile phones fully matches our philosophies about holistic, integrative marketing techniques.
Along with being a solid use of the classic “winter in summer” promotion theme, this article was noteworthy because it used PRLog for its distribution. PRLog is a free service for publishing news releases (including RSS), and it’s one of the easiest and fastest ways to build quality links to your Website, as well as to further the reach of your messages.
It may want to re-rethink that effort. Without giving them a little more time (and perhaps a deeper examination), it’s entirely possible that they are still engaging in outdated marketing strategies.
Although a new Website is intended to “appeal to younger audiences,” it seems to assume a “build it and they will come” strategy. The key will be how well it maintains efforts to not just “build up its presence on social networks,” but to truly engage with its networks.
The pending launch of Google Caffeine (which is the subject of our newsletter feature story next week) is largely going to reward hospital Websites that have a fully understand and engage in building links with social media, news distribution sites like PRLog, etc. If there’s anything to “rethink” right now, it’s that.
This article is perhaps a bit too complex to quickly summarize…but it’s a very profound contemplation of the challenges that hospitals and healthcare systems face with using mass media to inform its communities—sometimes at the risk of “scaremongering” those same audiences. Check it out.
Just in case you might qualify for a piece of that $400 million pie and weren’t aware of this new program…don’t forget who told you about it!
Derek Rudnak | Communications Specialist | AVID Design
AVID Design is a full-service healthcare marketing agency that builds progressive, cutting-edge healthcare Websites, rich media applications and physician videos.
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July 26th, 2010
Posted in Things 'n' Stuff, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Google: To Regulate or To Not Regulate? An #HCMKTG Perspective
Last week, The New York Times published a thought-provoking editorial about the pros and cons of Google’s search engine algorithm being subjected to some type of regulation or government scrutiny.
 Antitrust investigations of Google’s search engine algorithms in Europe might have prompted some to consider the need for search engine regulation—but how might that help or hurt healthcare and hospital marketing and its “customer,” the patient? I don’t want to engage in an economic/political debate about the merits or evils of government regulation in free enterprise. Instead, I was particularly intrigued with this sentence: “When Google engineers tweak its supersecret algorithm—as they do hundreds of times a year—they can break the business of a Website that is pushed down the rankings.”
It’s always a bit uncomfortable to perceive hospitals as “businesses” and patients as “consumers” or “customers.” Even as a healthcare and hospital marketing and SEO specialist whose job requires seeing healthcare from both perspectives, I still resist any cynicisms and truly believe that hospitals and their staffs do what they do because of their passion for improving people’s lives, rather than purely or even primarily because of financial gain.
However, in the context of Websites and search engines, the “hospital as a business” is a very appropriate perspective.
Within that context, hospitals depend on Websites so that customers can find them—but also vice versa. And it’s that “vice versa” that makes whatever Google does to constantly improve its search engine results pages (SERPs) that should never be tampered with by outside forces—even if it does create (or sustain) challenges with maintaining hospital Website SEO.
Google Caffeine Redux
Earlier this month, we blogged about how the new Google Caffeine Web indexing system will affect hospital SEO and SERP rankings. This is perhaps one of the more significant recent events that can very easily “break the business of a Website” and affect its rankings.
And to that, I say “Good.”
Along with my faith in the benevolence of hospitals, I also have faith that Google wants to deliver a search engine that truly levels the playing field and discourages (or at least disrupts) unethical and black hat SEO practitioners.
As it always has, Google rewards Websites that provide relevant content—and for people in search of solutions, services and other information that relates to their health and well being, the “Google way” is one that benefits healthcare “customers.”
As long as Google stays out of the healthcare industry and doesn’t attract the attention of antitrust regulators (like it has in Europe because of accusations of unfair placements of links for its affiliates like Google Maps or YouTube), from a healthcare marketing perspective, there is no need regulate Google’s algorithms. It ain’t broken, so don’f fix it.
Derek Rudnak | Communications Specialist | AVID Design
AVID Design offers cutting-edge SEO for healthcare and hospital Websites. Contact us today for a free evaluation of your Website!
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July 23rd, 2010
Posted in Analytics and Metrics, SEO | No Comments »
AVID #HCMKTG Week in Review: July 12–18, 2010
Each week, we review hundreds of news, blogs, studies and papers that relate to healthcare marketing communications, also known by its Twitter hashtag, #hcmktg. Here are some that you might have missed…
A thought-provoking article on its own, it relates quite well to our blog last week about hospital brand image vs. actual quality of care.
Take another look at our blog before reading this article—and keep it in mind as you are challenged with another notion: “Considering the trumpeting of the rankings, consumers—also known as would-be patients—might well wonder what difference such a list makes, or how seriously to take it.“
Hmm.
The article’s topic is simple enough to paraphrase: A household spoon can be a dangerous way to measure children’s medicine dosages. Yet, the simplicity of that powerful message makes it an ideal one to share on your Facebook page, Twitter, newsletter, etc.
This topic will continue to build momentum—online and in the halls and break rooms at hospitals—in the next couple weeks. What’s being said at your hospital? Has your CIO expressed any thoughts? This is a fantastic subject for him or her to use your blog as a platform to not only educate your patients and community, but your internal workforce as well. Stay tuned…
It’s always nice to see a client get recognition for continuing to embrace innovative healthcare-related marketing techniques.
Do you mention your physicians and staff members that attend or present at medical conferences? These are excellent PR opportunities for your hospital and staff.
Additionally, the themes and topics that are covered at these events also provide an invaluable resource for subjects that could be addressed in your hospital’s print and online publications.
Derek Rudnak | Communications Specialist | AVID Design
AVID Design is a full-service healthcare marketing agency that builds progressive, cutting-edge healthcare Websites, rich media applications and physician videos.
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July 20th, 2010
Posted in Things 'n' Stuff, Web 2.0 | No Comments »
Your Hospital Website Design and Interactive Healthcare Marketing Partner
Does your hospital need a partner for all of your interactive hospital and healthcare marketing needs?
If you answered YES,(which we knew you did because we are psychic) then look no further because AVID Design is a full service healthcare marketing agency that offers a plethora of Web-based hospital and healthcare services and products to help support your hospital Website’s presence and fulfill your marketing initiatives.
 AVID Design is all that and a bag of chips! Has healthcare content on your Website become stale? Need to develop a successful SEO strategy or PPC strategy complete with optimized healthcare content? We can do this!
What about developing a solid social media strategy for your site? We can do this for you too!
Or perhaps your Website needs a facelift with a new design that includes video and rich media elements? We even have our own specially designed robust hospital content management system, AVID CMS™, that allows you to plug-in easy to use application extensions directly into the system. Man, that’s a lot of stuff!
From our award-winning hospital Website designs to being recognized as creating the Most Innovative Product by Healthcare Design Magazine for our hospital digital signage system, CaptivCast™, to all the services and products mentioned above, AVID Design clearly proves to be a full service solution provider AND a leader in everything that encompasses interactive hospital and healthcare marketing.
Lisa M. Federico | Content Specialist | AVID Design
AVID Design is all that and a bag of chips! Contact us today to learn more about how we are your leader in hospital Website design and interactive healthcare marketing and what we can do for you!
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July 19th, 2010
Posted in AVID Design, Digital Signange, Marketing, Pay Per Click (PPC), SEO, Social Media, Web 2.0, Web Design | No Comments »
Golf and Healthcare and Hospital Branding: Games of Image?
After years of resisting the game—perhaps because of nearly as many years of repeated Caddyshack viewings that made the stereotypes about snobby country club culture overshadow the Zen-like beauty of the game—I have very recently become obsessed with golf. Needless to say, it was just a matter of time before a golf-related posting was going to soon grace this blog.
 Image is everything? It’s hard to believe that anybody dressed like this could be responsible for selling millions of dollars worth of high-end camera equipment, but that’s precisely what a guy with a mullet haircut and Spandex shorts named Andre Agassi did for Canon. But before you sigh and close your browser, hold on. I don’t want to wax about far-reaching metaphors that feebly attempt to bridge playing the game and hospital marketing. Instead, I want to look at the more closely and realistically related concepts of golf and hospital marketing and branding.
One of the first things I’ve learned about golf is that it’s an industry as much as it’s a game. Golf product companies want me to believe that one company’s products are better than another’s, and that by using them, I’ll be better. Does healthcare marketing sound all that much different?
The golf industry often attempts to sell (or at least introduce) that idea with any number of marketing techniques, such as endorsements from top players. As former tennis champ Andre Agassi used to say in his ads for Canon cameras, “Image is everything.” Although endorsements aren’t as common in healthcare, hospitals regularly try to promote an image that their brand can (literally) make you better.
Being the Best at Being Better
Although golf is just a game where one strives to be better (at the game)—as where hospitals deal with matters where being better is sometimes a matter of life or death—golf’s various products and brands differ in price, quality and function the same way as hospitals and their service lines and doctors.
But how does one discover which brand is truly the best at making you better?
A couple of months ago, I couldn’t have told you the functional difference between a pitching wedge and a lob wedge, much less the quality difference between Taylor Made clubs and Callaway Golf clubs. I can now, though—and I’ll spare you the explanations of the differences. But how did I discover those differences.
• Word of mouth (from friends)
• Referrals (from trusted professionals)
• Advertising (print, television and online)
• Customer reviews (print and online)
Now let’s assume that I was in a situation of needing to discover which treatment is best for a condition I have, or which hospital is better at performing that treatment. How would I do this? (Hint: It’s the same list as above).
Note that I didn’t mention statistical analysis, e.g., quality of care reports. It’s not that they aren’t useful or that I (or others) wouldn’t use them, but they typically aren’t primary techniques for researching hospitals. Instead, they are more likely to be used once people become aware of the leading brands and services.
Let’s now consider your hospital’s marketing and advertising. What does it truly mean to be the best…and what are you doing to be the best, or at least promote that image?
Are you perceived as a leading brand? Do you make it easy to learn about the treatments you offer and which is better?
And what about your competitors? Are they perhaps second-rate when compared to you…but project an image that implies something more?
Derek Rudnak | Communications Specialist with | 36.4 Handicap | AVID Design
AVID Design is a full-service healthcare marketing agency that builds progressive, cutting-edge healthcare Websites, rich media applications and physician videos.
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July 16th, 2010
Posted in Marketing | 1 Comment »
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