Eight out of ten consumers search for health information online, 74% through social media. Your competitors already know this. And they’ve been creating online content for years. So, the real question is how does your healthcare brand stand out in a competitive, oversaturated digital space in 2021?
Several key points of research and strategy help your healthcare brand’s social media reach more than just your already-loyal followers.
- Conducting an audience audit
- Creating high-quality content
- Social listening
- Identifying key influencers and advocates
- Using your analyzed data
Conducting an audience audit
A quick Google search easily provides the demographics for each social media platform. But the demographics of your audience might be different from the norm, or even what you’d expect. The only way to know exactly who’s an advocate for your healthcare brand online, is to audit your audience. This research can be done annually or during your routine social media audit. Regardless, this information reinforces your messaging and goals so your organization can pinpoint exact who they want to speak to with information that will engage them and encourage them to act.
Creating high-quality content
Does the content on your organization’s social media platforms show your thought leadership? 80% of people appreciate learning about your brand through custom content. Social media content is an opportunity to demonstrate not only your commitment to the communities that you serve, but also your leadership within healthcare. High-quality social media content is about more than just sharing provider and patient stories. High-quality content must do the following things:
- Build trust with your audience that feels real and genuine.
- Establish yourself as a thought leader and expert who can solve their issues.
- Generate leads and boost conversion rates as they continue to return and click on your CTAs.
- Boost your SEO rankings by getting rewarded for original content.
Social listening
Social listening is an important part of audience research. At its most basic, social listening is about tracking mentions of and conversations about your brand on social media. While it’s similar to social media monitoring, its difference is that it looks beyond analytical data and into the granular, real-time conversations that your followers, fans and potential audiences are having about your brand. Social listening provides your brand with clear knowledge of your social media sentiment. In a nutshell, social media sentiment is what people feel about your brand on social media. As we all know in branding and marketing, the feelings, perceptions and attitudes about your brand are some of the most important information that can grow your brand successfully. And in a personal sphere such as healthcare, these matter even more.
Identifying key influencers and advocates
Who are some of your biggest allies online? The fans, influencers, and advocates of your brand who amplify your voice on social media. And knowing exactly who they are and how to use them is an important tool for your healthcare organization. Identifying fans, influencers and advocates begins with reviewing your audience audit and seeing who is sharing positive information and also has a large amount of informal social capital.
Using your analyzed data
Your organization has access to an unprecedented amount of social media data through the analytics tracking systems on each platform. While there are differences on each platform, overwhelmingly, that analytical data is more than enough to assess what is and isn’t working. The most difficult part isn’t accessing the data but being able to distill all of the information down to your successes and opportunities on each platform. It’s important that an expert eye condenses these datapoints into critical next steps to advance your healthcare brand’s social media strategy and goals.
Successful social media requires extensive research and strategy to make sure that your brand is sharing your most important messages with the exact audience who needs to see them. Within your busy schedule, having a social media expert assist your team can be beneficial to the success of your social media. Being able to stand out from amongst your competitors in a very crowded marketplace is critical for the future of every healthcare brand.
Need help with your brand’s social media? Let’s talk.