It’s a common problem when developing social media content for a medical
practice—patients don’t want or need the in-depth details of the latest
medical research, but there’s only so much information you can give them
safely outside of a consultation. How do you keep your accounts active
without repeating yourself endlessly or offering only obscure medical
factoids?
Great health care social media works because it’s simple. Before you
compose your next blog post or Facebook update, consider these four
communications tricks:
Make a list
Everyone loves a list. This is a core tenet of modern content writing,
which is why you find numbered posts with short-form content all over the
web these days. Lists are easily digestible when readers don’t have time to
dig into complicated details. They keep the reader’s attention.
The other reason lists are so popular with content developers is that by
structuring your content as a list
you’re also laying the groundwork for future social media posts. Each
tidbit can become a tweet or a Facebook update. For example, a
list about reducing acne breakouts
can turn into a week of social media tips and be recycled in other ways.
Pick a purpose
One of the advantages of working as a health care communicator is that you
can find an almost endless variety of niche awareness days, weeks or
months. Use these to your advantage when posting by jumping on widely-used
hashtags and sharing relevant information. If you work with a neurologist,
for example, you might use August—Spinal Muscular Atrophy Awareness
Month—to
post about SMA awareness
, fundraisers, treatments and resources. Pick a new, specialty-appropriate
condition to post about on a regular basis.
Reach patients and caregivers
For most products, marketers
rely on different buyer personas
to craft messaging, allowing content developers to create variations on
similar content—how to use the same software for several different
industries, for example. In health care, however, it’s harder to break down
content in this way because everything is already carved into specialties
and sub-specialties. One division most specialties still contain, though,
is the one between patients and caregivers, or in the case of products,
between consumers and providers.
Make a point of developing content between these core groups no matter how
they break down in your corner of the health care world. You’ll want to
avoid any jargon
in patient-oriented posts, while those targeted at caregivers might use a
more advanced vocabulary. Similarly, you might take a different angle when
discussing a condition with a caregiver than with a patient, or when
providing resources for a child as opposed to an adult.
Mix your media
Finally, to stretch your health care content as far as possible, make sure
you’re sharing information in different forms. Link to the same article
using different images, or
share a video instead of an image
. Make use of infographics, quotes and questions. Especially when working
with short-form content like tweets and Facebook updates, small changes can
extend your basic material for a long time.
Regular social media posts are the best way to expand your reach. These
strategies will boost your professional presence without eating away at
your time.
Anna Johansson is a freelance writer, researcher and business
consultant. Follow her on
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LinkedIn
.