2019 Healthcare Digital Marketing Trends Survey: Academic Medical Center Edition
Geonetric’s annual collaboration with eHealthcare Strategy & Trends delivers the most comprehensive look at the digital evolution of healthcare organizations available. Now, we’ve done a deep dive into the data provided from AMCs so you can better understand your unique opportunities and challenges.
Use this planning tool to learn how AMCs are:
Approaching staffing – now and for the future
Investing in digital as a part of the marketing budget
Attacking challenges unique to complex organizations like AMCs
Planning for redesigns
Tackling business listing management
And more
COVID-19 Editorial Style Guide
You’ll find guidance on:
Voice, tone and readability
Language that counters stigma
Official disease and virus names
Trending terms that may be confusing or tricky
Need help updating already published content? Review our quick tips for content governance during a crisis, or reach out to Geonetric’s expert healthcare writers for assistance.
Download our Guide
Ready to Rebound: Next Steps for Healthcare Marketers
Geonetric’s Chief Strategy Officer, Ben Dillon, will be joined by experts from a range of healthcare marketing disciplines to provide guidance and actionable recommendations for the road ahead.
Attendees will learn:
The current state of healthcare marketing, including strategies for moving forward.
Key principles of agility that help leading organizations respond more quickly and effectively to uncertainty.
Approaches to engaging your local communities and building confidence in your organization and brand.
Methods for promoting available services and educating patients on the risks of delaying care.
Strategies for bringing services back online and filling schedules in a controlled approach while juggling multiple priorities.
Answers to your live questions and those of your peers.
Use Empathy to Guide COVID-19 Home Health Care Marketing
Follow our COVID-19 communications pointers for strategic, empathetic messaging in your website content and other marketing assets.
Affirm availability of home visits. Reference trusted and credible sources, such as AARP®, that encourage continued services with increased precautionary measures.
Answer common questions. What concerns are your home health caregivers hearing from patients and their family members? Use those questions to generate ideas for your content marketing assets and other communications.
Communicate when and how patients with symptoms of or potential exposure to COVID-19 should inform your organization. Instruct your patients not to wait until their provider comes to their house for a visit to inform them.
Explain how your policies have changed due to the virus. Emphasize new and existing safety protocols that prevent the spread of infection, such as frequent hand-washing, wearing of masks and gloves, between-visit disinfection, checking staff and patient temperatures, and other practices.
Highlight the benefits of your services. Your organization’s home health care providers play a vital role in the well-being of your patients and their loved ones. Many patients who receive home care have health conditions that put them at higher risk if they get the new coronavirus. Support from home health providers can keep patients safer and healthier at home, prevent trips to the emergency room that could lead to exposure, and provide reassurance to anxious loved ones unable to visit in person.
If any services have moved online, give clear and detailed instructions on how patients can access their providers via virtual visits or phone calls. Cover how patients benefit from check-ins with their home care providers. Explain the specific services a provider can offer electronically or by phone, such as safety assessments, management of chronic conditions, rehabilitation services, emotional support, and more.
Share the firsthand experiences of your patients and providers. Stories about how your organization has adapted services due to COVID-19 and what patients are experiencing may be picked up by local media covering the pandemic. Telling your provider’s stories can also create greater empathy and understanding for the processes you’re putting in place to face this illness. These stories can help prospective or current patients feel more comfortable with home health services.
Review the hours and contact information listed on your website, location profiles, and Google My Business listings, and update them if needed. If your hours or other business information has changed, make sure your content accurately reflects these changes, to prevent patient confusion or frustration.
Voice & Tone
In all your communications during this challenging time, make compassion the centerpiece of your messaging. There will be a time for more traditional marketing when the threat of the pandemic passes. What’s always true — yesterday, today, and tomorrow — is content that recognizes its audience’s emotional state and responds to it with a positive tone and helpful solutions not only leaves readers feeling more at ease, it can increase brand loyalty.
Your Source for COVID-19 Digital Support
Check out Geonetric’s free COVID-19 resources or contact us today for content strategy and development services and SEO support.
Tips for Using Social Media During COVID-19
More Eyes on Social Media
During a public health crisis like the COVID-19 virus pandemic, people want to learn how to stay safe and healthy, and how to get care when they need it. Many are turning to their local hospitals and health systems for that information.
In fact, a Geonetric consumer survey, 33% said their trust in their local health system has increased or strongly increased during the pandemic.
Part of where this information seeking and trust is happening is on social media.
According to a New York Times analysis, social media, in particular, has seen a rapid increase in use during the social distancing, shelter-in-place, and self-isolation of the pandemic. More specifically, Facebook has seen a 27% traffic increase in desktop users and a 1.1% traffic increase in Facebook app users.
Answer Your Audience’s Questions
Social media gives your team a direct-to-consumer channel to engage audiences. Tools like Facebook and Instagram let you use images, videos, stories, and text-based posts to connect in real-time with people who have questions and concerns you can address.
As you engage your audience on social, keep an eye on the trending questions and concerns from your community, such as:
When to wear a face mask or use protective gloves – and how to use them correctly
Where testing is available
What common symptoms are
Healthy foods to make from pantry basics
How to exercise safely and effectively when quarantined
Questions coming from real people also open doors for other content marketing for your audience, and provide a supportive, educational perspective that people need.
If you aren’t sure what to post, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention has created a free social media toolkit with copy, images, and infographics to share with your followers.
Lend an Empathetic Ear — and Voice
During a crisis like this, your community and colleagues are facing uncertainty and anxiety. This puts you – as a healthcare marketer – in a distinct position to guide, educate, and help. In times like this, it’s more important that you act as a neighbor, not as a brand.
Beyond sharing health and wellness tips, evolving updates, and other newsworthy information, you can foster empathy with social media marketing by sharing stories inside and outside your walls, including
Donations and gifts to your staff and front-line clinicians
Celebrations of your colleagues and patients in the hospital
Stories from doctors, nurses, and staff who are helping your community
Stories from patients and families
Mercy Medical Center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, shared photos of staff wearing donated masks across their social channels. The posts also linked to their website for more information about making donations.
Delivering Content with Empathy
The language and images you use in your posts are important to your audience. Engage tips on how to write for the web and use social media, and apply them to your posts:
Keep posts meaningful, write in the present tense (if possible), and use short paragraphs to make the posts easy to read and scan
Use empathetic images – even if they’re stock photos – that avoid anxiety and convey empathy and healthy tips
Cross-link to relevant content on your website, such as blog posts or content marketing, service line pages, or your crisis resource hub
Make posts actionable, to lead people to helpful information or next steps
Strategize Your Social Media
According to a study from Sprout Social, the optimal day and time to post vary by platform. It’s important to note that these recommended times to post on social platforms are based on pre-pandemic circumstances but can be used as a good benchmark to begin with and optimize as times proceeds.
Such benchmarks can help you reach more people by posting on the right channel at the right time – and take advantage of specific features and tools.
Facebook
For the healthcare industry, Facebook sees the most engagement on Wednesdays from 10:00 a.m. to noon. The typical business workweek also gives reliable times for engagement from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
In response to the coronavirus outbreak, Facebook implemented features for business pages to publish business hour updates and service changes. As Google My Business and Bing Places have done, Facebook lets businesses make updates including:
Making temporary closures
Offering online classes
Offering telehealth services
Instagram
The best time to post on Instagram for the healthcare industry falls on Tuesdays at around 8:00 a.m. Incorporate trending crisis-related hashtags, such as #flattenthecurve, #stayhome, and #quarantineandchill, into your content in an appropriate and tasteful way.
Use Instagram to provide educational content that points viewers to your website for up-to-date and credible information. Don’t shy away from using Instagram to share inspirational content to give viewers that glimmer of hope they need.
Twitter
Top times in the healthcare industry to post on Twitter are on Wednesdays from 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Other weekdays from 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. have also proven to show reliable engagement.
Twitter recommends using images and videos to attract users and reach a wider audience. Consider using threads for status updates and restrictions that just don’t fit into Twitter’s allotted 280-character posts.
LinkedIn
With LinkedIn’s target audience being primarily professional users, the best times to post occur during the workweek, Tuesday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Amid the coronavirus outbreak, LinkedIn has increased efforts to assist organizations and communities dealing with the impact of the pandemic, including offering free job postings. This service — available through June 30, 2020 — receives additional promotion from LinkedIn to highly relevant candidates through the “Urgently Hiring” job category.
YouTube
The best time to post on YouTube falls during weekdays from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. Views tend to peak during the weekday evening hours, so by posting in that window, you’ll have plenty of time for your video to be processed and indexed by Google.
Optimize your videos with accurate titles, descriptions, tagging, and transcription. When possible, include relevant keywords in the video title and description to attract search users.
Video content that is educational, inspirational, and helpful is a great resource for viewers.
Monitor Your Social Traffic
Posting on optimal days and times is a good starting point for any organization to engage on social media. After you’ve built a solid foundation of followers and engagement, check your channels’ insights and analytics.
These data points help you analyze when your page’s target audience is engaging most with your content. This strategy is especially important to utilize during the COVID-19 virus. With limited data right now on optimum times to post, it’s more important than ever before to look at your own social media metrics. Take these findings and adjust your schedule and content calendar.
Social media marketing metrics you should measure fall into three primary categories:
Audience – Shows gender, age, location, and other demographic information to help you determine who’s engaging with your content
Content – Allows you to spot patterns in engaging and less-engaging posts, including link posts, images, videos, and text-based posts
Engagement – Provides benchmarks to gauge performance, including likes, comments, clicks, shares, views, and more
You can typically find this information through each social platform’s insights/analytics tool. Tools like Google Analytics and UTM parameters aid in tracking how social media drives traffic to your site. UTMs allow you to tag links to track which social platform is bringing the most visitors and how those visitors are engaging with your site.
The Most Important Thing is Empathy
Your social media presence can be a source of relief for some or a source of hope for others. Take your position in times like these as an opportunity to connect with your community beyond providing care in your clinics. This is a perfect chance to extend empathy and provide outstanding support during a difficult time for everyone.
If you’re not sure how to set up your social media analytics and tracking, or you need help building social posts and campaigns during the pandemic, reach out to Geonetric to get started.
COVID-19 Healthcare Consumer Survey
The COVID-19 pandemic has substantially changed daily life. To help healthcare marketers across the country better understand how this new reality intersects with people’s healthcare experiences, Geonetric conducted an online survey of 600 internet users across the U.S. The surveys were completed April 3, 2020.
Learn how COVID-19 has affected consumers’ decision-making around healthcare as well as how they are responding to different types of communication from health systems. See data on how COVID-19 has:
Impacted consumers’ decisions and plans around seeking care for non-COVID-19 concerns
Changed content topics consumers want to learn about
Affected content format preferences by age segment
Impacted consumers’ trust in their local hospitals and health systems across different demographics
Download our White Paper
6 Tips to Improve Email Communication During COVID-19
Your health consumers need information from you right now. Whether it’s details on symptoms, treatments, telehealth, making masks, how to clean their home, protecting their families, making donations … the list goes on. And they need information from a source they can trust – you.
You’re probably creating some of this great content, but are you emailing it? People are turning to their inbox now more than ever. According to research by Paved, open rates were up 15% worldwide through March.
As you get ready to hit send and share vital information via email, here are six tips to make sure you are being as effective as you can in this new landscape.
#1: Test What You Think You Know
Ask any email marketer (experts at Litmus and MailChimp included) and they’ll tell you – email marketing best practices are changing and changing fast. For example, your old send times and days may not be the most effective anymore, now that many people are working from home and looking for information from experts at different, more varied times. For example, according to WorldData, before March, 8:00 – 9:00 a.m. was the best time to send email, but from March 20 to April 1, that time has moved to 2:00 – 3:00 p.m.
Also keep in mind is that although your instinct may be to stop email communication, people are turning to their inbox now more than ever – they want to hear from you there. It’s important to keep your communication cadence, while paying attention to your analytics to make any needed adjustments.
#2: Use the Words Your Subscribers Are Using and Looking For
Pay close attention to the words your subscribers are using on your site as well as Google Trends data and keep an eye on the changing use of words that are making an impact in the broader email landscape.
For example, using COVID-19 is not recommended in subject lines of emails. Not only are users burnt out after all of the commercial emails providing “A Letter From Our CEO on COVID-19,” but also there’s already spam being spun up utilizing that term. Using this term scarcely in subject lines and instead using terms like Coronavirus, pandemic, epidemic, etc., will help you avoid getting flagged as spam. This is just one of the new terms that you need to pay attention to trends on. Resources like subjectline.com are a great way to check on recent trends and help you improve deliverability and open rates.
#3: Consider Asking Your Subscribers What Information They Want
Believe it or not, surveys are also popular during this time! Users want to understand how they’ll benefit from giving you their time to take the survey more than ever. So consider asking your subscribers what information they want from you and make it clear that their feedback will inform the details you’re sharing with them.
If you already have a regular newsletter, consider reaching out to those subscribers and asking them directly to complete a short survey about the types of information they’re looking for you to share. Maybe your subscribers are burned out on hand-washing information but they want to know how to stay mentally healthy while at home. You can use their responses to plan your content marketing mix to meet those needs and send out new, requested content to your subscribers.
#4: Don’t Forget to Segment
Segmentation has never been more important for your email subscribers and you. Your new and expectant mothers, for example, have totally different needs than your foundation donors. Meet each of your audiences where they’re at and provide the information they will benefit most from hearing.
For example, if you do have an email segment for your foundation donors, consider telling them how donating now directly impacts your ability to address COVID-19. Whether it’s funding PPE or making sure there’s little to no interruption of care, this audience will want to know how their contributions are helping in this challenging time, and it may even spur them to give more.
#5: Reassure Your Subscribers
As a healthcare marketer, compassion is probably top of mind for you frequently. That’s more important now than ever. Language, images, phrasing, it all goes into reassuring your subscribers that, while taking COVID-19 seriously is necessary, we’re in this together and we will find a way through.
One way you can do that is providing content that helps them make the best of their new normal. Consider stories on topics like:
Options to get exercise and staying fit at home
Meal planning for healthy eating
Tips for cooking together with kids
Ways to reassure kids during COVID-19
DIY tutorials on making masks for personal use or donation
Ways to safely donate blood
You can address the new needs of your subscribers and assure them they can rely on you.
#6: Share Your Reasons to Celebrate
Have you been seeing success with treating COVID-19 cases? Are you recognizing your hard-working frontline staff? Has your community made generous donations of meals or PPE supplies? These stories of connection and encouragement are all happening, despite how hard things are right now. Take the time to recognize and celebrate all the wonderful stories happening in your community and share them with your subscribers, too.
Use Email to Engage and Connect
Email is an important part of your crisis communication plan. As you create new content for your social and website platforms, don’t forget to use email to connect and engage with subscribers who want to hear from you. Do you need help figuring out your email mix or want some help reviewing your email plan? Or are you just getting started with email marketing? Contact Geonetric and get support from our experts.
Health Consumer Needs During COVID-19: Survey Results and Discussion
Join us as Ben Dillon, Chief Strategy Officer at Geonetric and David Sturtz, Vice President of Business Development at Geonetric, discuss findings from the survey.
In addition, Joy Weller, Manager of Digital Media and Marketing at EvergreenHealth (Kirkland, WA), Christina Peaslee, Executive Director of Marketing Communications and Content Strategy at Cape Cod Healthcare (Hyannis, MA), and Darren Moore, Digital Content and Brand Manager at LMH Health (Lawrence, KS), will be joining us to share how their organizations are tackling COVID-19 communication on the web and what are the next priorities for their teams.
Watch on-demand and learn:
What COVID-19 topics consumers want to hear
What formats they prefer for engaging with content
What information sources health consumers trust
How well consumers are navigating changing care options and opportunities around telehealth
How this data compares to real-life communication strategies at play at organizations like EvergreenHealth and Cape Cod Healthcare
What healthcare marketers are focusing on next
Telling Healthcare Provider Stories During COVID-19
COVID-19 has thrust healthcare workers into the spotlight like never before. We’re all feeling vulnerable, and there’s surging interest in the people we rely on to take care of us.
Social media posts by medical professionals have gone viral. An Iowa nurse’s posts describing what it’s like to work on the pandemic frontlines were shared tens of thousands of times and received over 1 million likes, including from actress Liv Tyler. News outlets regularly carry stories about health professionals working tirelessly to save lives, and it’s common to hear references to “healthcare heroes.”
The Power of Narratives
Your own employees’ first-person narratives can powerfully reinforce the basic information you’ve shared about how patients can help stop the spread of coronavirus. It’s invaluable for your external audiences to hear about how their actions may impact a nurse or doctor with a face and name. And when patients see medical professionals’ dedication and commitment, they’ll feel reassured someone will be there to care for their family, if needed.
Inside your organization, employees benefit from hearing the stories of their colleagues. Your organization has told them how to do their jobs safely and effectively, but personal narratives can fill a need that’s just as vital — the drive for human connection during a crisis. Workers want to know how their colleagues in different roles, departments, and buildings are coping. Most importantly in this time of social distancing, everyone wants to know they’re not alone.
Topic Ideas
Consider soliciting first-person content about topics like:
How medical professionals are supporting each other and managing their physical and mental health
What a day is like for an urgent care employee during the COVID-19 outbreak
How the pandemic is affecting:
Healthcare professionals who aren’t on the COVID-19 front lines, like maternity nurses, social workers, or diabetes educators
Employees who work in nonclinical areas, like food service, housekeeping, or a call center
Medical students, resident physicians, and their training
How medical staff are trying to protect their own families from the virus
What healthcare workers want the community to know
Post content that’s most relevant to other employees on an internal forum, like your intranet. Share information that’s appropriate for the public on your content marketing hub, crisis resource hub, and social media.
What Some Health Systems Are Doing
Tidelands Health published a story about the work of critical care nurses during COVID-19 and included photos of care professionals the community doesn’t normally get to see. The article quoted a nurse explaining what keeps her motivated: “I got into this job because of my love of caring for other people,” she said. “Running away is not really an option.” But you don’t need a full article to get the message across. On Mercy Cedar Rapids’ Facebook page, the organization shared a physician’s photo of the emergency department team, along with his words of pride about the work they’ve been doing. It was one of Mercy Cedar Rapids’ most popular recent photos. The community posted hundreds of thankful comments in response, giving the medical team valuable encouragement.
Ideas for Getting Started
Consider making a social media post like this with a photo and a few words from a different employee each day for a week. Or:
Offer to ghostwrite a first-person story based on an interview with a busy healthcare worker
Ask a nurse to record a short video clip describing what she’s thinking and preparing for at the start of a shift, and then record another clip after the shift
Publish a Q&A conversation — on a podcast, video, or written blog — with a healthcare provider about their experience
Start a blog with short entries contributed by one or more employees a few times a week
Yes, your healthcare employees are swamped. But some will still want to take time to make their voices heard. Telling stories can be a therapeutic form of stress relief. And you don’t need a polished, five-minute video or 1,000-word blog post to leave an impact. Especially in times like this, audiences care more about the message than the production value.
Reach Out
Need help getting started? Contact Geonetric. Our experts can help you tell the stories of your “healthcare heroes” and galvanize support for your organization.
The Value of Healthcare Content Marketing During a Crisis
The Role of Content Marketing in a Crisis
A recent NRC Health survey found that 43% of people are turning to their local hospital or health system for information about the coronavirus. But what does that mean in the face of a public health crisis, such as the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic?
At Geonetric, we define content marketing as a strategic approach to create valuable, relevant, and consistent digital content with the goal of stimulating your audience and helping connect them with your brand. It means you have the chance to connect with your community with educational, informative content that helps them stay healthy.
Focus on Empathy, Not Conversions
Rather than focusing on driving conversions and appointments, use this time of crisis to create content that shares empathy, provides guidance, and tempers anxieties.
For example, you might consider articles about:
Activities, recipes and habits to stay healthy in social-distancing:
Your patients and community members have many questions during a healthcare crisis, and some of them might be coming in to your front-line staff on the phone or in the clinics.
Ask your team members what they’ve heard and brainstorm potential content marketing assets to respond, such as:
Video Q&As with experts
Infographics to help visually break down complicated information
Listicles for tips
How-to articles for guidance
If the answer isn’t robust enough to warrant a content marketing article, podcast, or video, consider adding it to a neatly organized FAQ section of your crisis communication hub.
Involve Your Stakeholders
In times of healthcare crisis, people want information they can trust. Invite your doctors and medical specialists to be part of your content creation as experts.
This could be in the form of a live Facebook video, or perhaps a question-and-answer-format blog post about myths and truths of the crisis. University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics hosted a live Q & A session on Facebook to answer questions and concerns from their followers.
It’s not just infectious disease experts that people want to hear from during a pandemic. Consider inviting your mental health professionals, nurses, dieticians, obstetricians, and physical therapists to provide information for various audiences on how to stay healthy.
Publish & Share
Once new articles and assets are published on your website or content marketing hub, get them ready to share across:
Social media channels – When a new story publishes, share it with your social followers to drive traffic and keep them informed
On your site dynamically – If possible, employ tagging and taxonomy functions to display content across relevant related pages of your website
Local media – Alert local newspapers and news stations of tips and expertise to share with your community
Your email newsletters – As you’re reaching out to your subscribers, be sure you’re updating them with relevant crisis articles and tips to stay healthy
Your intranet – Any articles that are written to help the community understand the crisis can have equal value to your colleagues and teammates, so share your recent blogs and content assets to your intranet, too
Have a Governance Plan in Place
If you follow the advice provided here, you’ll be spinning up lots of content. You’ll be answering questions and concerns, directing traffic for a community in need, and fulfilling requests from stakeholders to keep your audience informed. That’s why it’s so important to have a solid crisis content governance plan in place.
Not Sure Where to Start? Mine for Ideas
Since the COVID-19 outbreak, social media and search engines have seen a spike in traffic. Not just because more people are online, working remotely, and socializing digitally, but also because people are trying to learn everything they can about the virus.
As a healthcare marketer, you’ll want to seek out the types of queries people have about the crisis. You can start with your own social media accounts, by reviewing comments and questions people have left on your page or to your account.
You can also explore tools like Google Trends, which gives you glimpses into popular and on-the-rise searches. Likewise, Google Search Console and your website’s internal site search can help you understand what crisis-related information your site visitors are looking for.
Get Started
If you’re ready to put your content marketing to work during a crisis, but aren’t sure where to start, reach out to Geonetric. You’ll work with expert content strategists, writers, and developers who can help you build content marketing assets or a branded content marketing hub to support your marketing efforts, patients, and communities.
