Closing out this year, we decided to publish yet another “Top [insert number here" blog post.

Hey look...even Wayne and Garth had a Top Ten list! Schwing!!!

As tired as we were about hearing (and writing) about social media–no way, way–you guys sure seemed to like reading about it.

So, without further ado, here are our top 10 blog posts of 2010:

1. How to Setup an SMS Text Message Donation Service for Your Hospital
2. The Caduceus: Origins and Meanings
3. Five Ways to Measure the ROI of Healthcare Social Media
4. Top 5 Emerging Social Media…for Hospitals?
5. Hospital Website Standards and Best Practices… Does Your Hospital’s Website Live Up to the Standards?
6. Google Caffeine Impacts on Healthcare and Hospital SEO: Now What?
7. Friending Hospital and Healthcare Competitors? There’s No Question
8. Hospital Hurricane Preparedness and Digital Signage
9. iPad and Hospital Marketing: Let’s Start the Conversation
10. How Many Hospital Facebook Pages Should You Have?

Happy New Year,  we’ll see you in 2011–Party on!

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Well, another year has come and gone. So long 2010, hello 2011!

We’ve put together a compilation of this past year’s featured stories and hot topics from our newsletter, AVID Insight. If you are not an AVID Insight e-newsletter subscriber (which I strongly suggest you be), then here’s what you missed…

January 2010 – Hospital Website Patient Portals: Where to Begin

Offering advantages to both physicians and patients, patient portals are increasingly becoming a popular service for managing health.

• What are some features and functions of patient portals?

• What are the advantages of having a patient portal?

• How do you start a patient portal?

February 2010 – Six Essential Hospital Digital Signage Uses: the 2010 Edition

Digital signage is becoming more of a universal communication platform for healthcare facilities—both large and small, and becoming an integral part of hospital’s overall communication strategies.

• What is the value of digital signage?

• How is digital signage growing?

• How can digital signage be used at hospitals?

March 2010 – Traditional vs. Online Hospital Marketing: Erasing the Lines in the Sand

Times are a-changin’ in hospital marketing dividing “old school” traditional hospital marketers and “new school” online hospital marketers.

• What is causing this erosion?

• What new hospital marketing paradigms are emerging?

• What hospital marketing obstacles remain?

April 2010 – Six Best Practices for Hospital INTRANET Usability

The value of having an intranet is significant, and is continually becoming embraced by hospitals and healthcare systems.

• What are the challenges in identifying an intranet strategy for hospitals?

• How do intranets improve the workforce?

• What are some intranet best practices hospitals should consider?

May 2010 – Emotion vs. Intellect: Quality of Care Content and Hospital Website Marketing

There are two types of writing styles when writing hospital Website quality of care content. These two types—emotional and intellectual—can be challenging to write in order to satisfy these sensibilities.

• What are the challenges for writing quality of care content?

• How do you properly prepare and balance quality of care content?

• How do you deploy quality information on your hospital’s Website?

June 2010 – The Magic Metric: How to Improve Hospital Website Conversion Rates

Conversion rates are the most critical metric when analyzing Website performance and ROI for online healthcare marketing analytics.

• What is a Website conversion and how do they affect hospitals?

• What are some types of hospital Website conversions?

• How do you build a successful conversion strategy for you hospital’s Website?

July 2010 – All Hands on Deck: Five Ways to Educate Your Internal Workforce to Promote Your Hospital Website

Marketing your brand internally is essential in promoting your brand externally, so maintaining a well informed workforce to enhance external perceptions of your hospital’s brand is crucial.

• Why should your hospital’s workforce be informed about your brand?

• Why should your hospital’s workforce harness their influence with hospital patients and visitors?

• What are some concepts to consider as you improve your hospital’s marketing potential?

August 2010 – Is Your Hospital’s Website Ready for Caffeine?

With Google Caffeine being released this past year, the landscape for traditional SEO and indexing is surely going to change significantly.

• How will Caffeine index relevant content?

• How will Caffeine affect healthcare and hospital SEO?

• How will hospital and healthcare Website content managers prepare for the change of your hospital’s Website SEO?

September 2010 – Your Hospital Can Can’t Afford to Not Attend Healthcare Marketing Conferences

It’s no surprise that healthcare marketing budgets are tight, especially this past year. Don’t let economic conditions diminish the value of attending a healthcare marketing that is focused on what you do for the hospital.

• What is the value in attending a healthcare marketing conference?

• How do you get expenses approved to attend a conference by hospital marketing leadership?

• How do you really afford to attend a healthcare marketing conference?

October 2010 – Overcoming the Healthcare Marketer and Hospital Foundation Disconnect

Sometimes there is a bizarre disconnect between hospital marketing departments and their hospital foundations, which one would think would have a remarkably integrated relationship since they both share similar objectives for the hospital.

• Why is there sometimes a bizarre disconnect between the two?

• What are some advantages of integrating both departments?

• Read about how Tanner Health System and MCGHealth integrate their marketing and foundation departments.

November 2010 – Fanning the Flames: Reviewing Predictions for Hot Healthcare Marketing Topics in 2010

Last year we made predictions as to what we thought were going to be the hot healthcare marketing topics for 2010.

• What were some of 2010’s hot healthcare marketing topics?

• Were some of our predictions correct?

• Which healthcare marketing topics from 2010 will still be on fire in 2011?

December 2010 – AVID Design’s Annual Internet Healthcare Marketing Predictions: 2011 Edition

Since the year is coming to a close, we’ve come up with a few topics that are on the top of our list as far as what we believe is in store for online healthcare marketers and experts in 2011.

• What are our predictions for online healthcare marketing technologies in 2011?

• Is social media still hot? Is mobile technology still hot?

• Will increased spending for rich media continue?

Coming in January’s edition of AVID Insight: Hospital intranets and employee communication. Sign up today!

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In September, expert predictions by Digital Signage Expo were made (and revealed) about the digital signage industry for 2010.

With the year winding down, we were interested to see how AVID Design’s flexible, scalable and affordable digital advertising signage solution for hospitals, CaptivCast™, measured up to those predictions.

AVID Design Communications Specialist Derek Rudnak explored seven industry predictions and how they relate to CaptivCast™:

• Big Hardware Players Make Big Moves

• Big Software May Move in as Well

• Capital for Network Deals Will Get Smarter

• Smaller, Ad-Supported Networks Dwindle in Number

• The Recession and the Natural Software Cycle Produce Two Interesting Effects

• New Consulting Practices Will Cater to Big Players

• Solution Winners Will Emerge by Marketplace

Read Derek’s full story on our CaptivCast™ Web site.

If your hospital is looking for digital signage, check out the features CaptivCast™ has to offer for easy digital lobby signage.

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Last week, I read an eye-opening blog about how stadiums that host NFL games use digital signage. Of course, healthcare and hospital digital signage systems have their own unique functions and usages, but as anybody with an interest in innovation would likely agree, one of the keys to finding innovative digital signage solutions is to leverage ideas from other arenas (no pun intended).

The NFL is a master of marketing and branding…digital signage is but one of the ways that you can study the NFL for improving your hospital’s marketing and branding.

One example that stood out was how the New Meadowlands Stadium—which is the shared home of the New York Football Giants and the New York Jets—uses digital signage to create custom content for each team…or more specifically, for each brand.

From changing the general color scheme throughout the stadium (blue for the Giants, green for the Jets) to information throughout the concourses to the “digital ribbons” that line the seating decks, a few button clicks instantly turn a 82,000-seat stadium in a highly customized marketing, branding and communications experience.

When you think about the various locations and utilities throughout your hospital—room to room, wing to wing, floor to floor, building to building—digital signage is one of the best ways to deliver precise yet dynamic information, all from the convenience of a computer.

Furthermore, the ability to generate and distribute this type of content requires remarkably little tech savvy or training. In fact, the software for our CaptivCast™ digital signage system for hospitals is specifically designed as a turnkey solution for hospital communication administrators to use.

So, if you are a football fan—or a sports fan of any kind—watch for how stadiums use digital signage the next time you watch a game, either on TV or in person. It won’t be hard to immediately start imagining how a series of LCD or plasma TVs throughout your hospital can be used in a winning fashion to promote or share your messages!

Contact CaptivCast today for a free demonstration of our hospital digital signage system!

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It’s August, which means we are now entering the thick of hurricane season (which officially runs June 1–November 30). But regardless of when a hurricane can strike—or any other type of natural disaster, such as an earthquake or tornado—one thing is certain: your hospital will immediately become the center of the universe for your community.

Having a digital signage system in your hospital will ultimately prove to be a critical part of your emergency preparedness.

Of course, most will come to you in need of medical attention. But many others will come for other reasons. Along with those that are at your hospital because their friends and family have been admitted for medical care, you will also have a noticeable surge in emergency responder personnel, as well as others that simply are there for shelter and provisions.

Cleanup, Aisle 7!

How are you prepared to manage this sudden population that is scared, stressed, confused and in desperate need of information?

Sure, you can use your hospital’s intercom or a PA system, but really…are you running a hospital or a supermarket? Although blasting a verbal message with low-fidelity is certainly one way to inform people, it’s definitely not the only—and certainly not the best way.

Might I suggest digital signage for your hospital?

Elsewhere in this blog, we’ve touted the unique advantages that digital signage offers for internal marketing and branding opportunities. However, in emergency and disaster situations, hospital digital signage is also unrivaled for its ability to quickly, accurately and uniformly share your own directions, instructions and information, as well as the same from television broadcast and the Internet.

Of course, a digital signage system can also be used during non-disaster periods. But considering that very few hospitals exist in areas that are exempt from natural disasters—not to mention non-natural disasters such as terrorist attacks—sooner or later, having a digital signage system in your hospital will ultimately prove to a critical part of your emergency preparedness.

AVID Design offers a unique digital signage solution for hospitals, CaptivCast™. Contact us today to learn more about an effective and affordable digital signage solution for hospitals and healthcare systems!

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