Taking the first step to engaging with your audience through social media can be a daunting undertaking for any brand. But with the regulations and restrictions that many healthcare brands face, starting conversations in a social arena can be considered an even bigger challenge.
More and more, healthcare brands are questioning where their audience really is, and whether traditional channels are actually still the best way of reaching them. Until now, a press campaign in a Nursing title, a targeted mailer, or an exhibition stand at an industry event have been just some of the ways brands have been able to speak directly to healthcare professionals. But with the ever-expanding social sphere presenting more opportunities to engage with highly targeted audiences, is the scepticism around the union of healthcare with social media all set to change?
One such online community which has proven itself a driving force in this revolution is WeNurses. Set up by registered nurse Teresa Chinn with the aim of uniting the nurse community through social media, WeNurses hosts weekly live Twitter chats across a spectrum of industry topics and encourages nurses all over the country to get involved and have their say. This inclusive community not only provides opinion on important issues within healthcare, but also creates a valuable resource of support and knowledge sharing, from career advice to social media tips. It has even evolved into specific channels for different healthcare specialisms, from WeMidwives to WePharmacists, helping to facilitate conversation streams with increasingly relevant content. And with WeNurses boasting a Twitter following of over 24,000, and over 63,000 tweets to-date, this online phenomenon is dwarfing the circulation of some of the UK’s leading nursing publications, and proving that when it comes to social, healthcare professionals are certainly not lagging behind.
But with the waters still muddy around what is and what isn’t appropriate behaviour from a healthcare brand on social media, how can healthcare brands take advantage of this very valuable new audience environment? In our view, it’s not about disrupting these communities with an unwelcome branded agenda – the real value is in listening to their conversations in order to gain insights that can create competitive advantage and inform your brand strategy.
At Foundry Healthcare, we understand the importance of listening in gaining a better understanding of any audience. By understanding the challenges that healthcare professionals face, we can work with brands to develop communications with true audience insight at their core. And this audience certainly isn’t shy when it comes to saying what they think! By using social media monitoring tools to evaluate what is being said and shared around specific topic areas, we can paint a very honest picture of the issues in the marketplace, and use this to better inform the work we produce for our clients.
Find out more about how we listen on behalf of our clients
