social media basics for orthodontists
TRANSCRIPT
TECHNO BYTES
Social media basics for orthodontists
Greg JorgensenRio Rancho, NM
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One of the most common buzz words in today's online world is “social media.” This article defines social media,explains why it is important to practicing orthodontists, and provides information about how doctors can incorpo-rate it into their practices. Five of the most useful social media tools are described in detail, outlining thestrengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and risks inherent in each. (Am J Orthod Dentofacial Orthop2012;141:510-5)
Every time we open a web page, look at a magazine,or see a commercial on television, we are bom-barded by invitations to “like us on Facebook”
or “follow us on Twitter.” Articles by practice consultantsin our own professional magazines advise us that ourpractices cannot survive without a ubiquitous socialmedia presence. Many doctors, however, report puttinga lot of time and effort into social media campaignswithout seeing much return on their investment. Whatis social media? Of what value is they to our practices?Which forms of social media are really worth our timeand effort as busy orthodontists?
In the 1980s and 1990s, the Internet was basically anonline collection of digital brochures that consumerscould access to read what companies had to say aboutthemselves in hopes of attracting buyers to their prod-ucts. It was essentially an electronic version of the pam-phlet racks commonly found in the lobbies of hotelsadvertising local theme parks, outlet malls, and othertourist traps. Internet surfers could read only what com-panies wanted them to see. It was a one-way street. Inthe early 2000s, there was a fundamental shift in theway that we perceived the Internet. People in the indus-try referred to this evolution as Web 2.0.1
Web 2.0 is a catchphrase used to describe the newInternet characterized by a proliferation of web applica-tions that facilitate collaboration between users. Theseinteractions occur as reviews, comments, user-generated content, and content sharing. If the oldInternet was like a brochure rack, the new Internet is
e practice, Rio Rancho, NM.uthor reports no commercial, proprietary, or financial interest in the prod-r companies described in this article.t requests to: Greg Jorgensen, Jorgensen Orthodontics, 1401 BarbaraSE, Rio Rancho, NM 87124; e-mail, [email protected], August 2011; revised and accepted, January 2012.5406/$36.00ight � 2012 by the American Association of Orthodontists..1016/j.ajodo.2012.01.002
more like an office water cooler where friends gatherto discuss events, products, and people. No longer areconsumers limited only to the self-serving informationprovided by the companies selling their products. Theynow have access to the opinions of their peers whomthey trust overwhelmingly more than the advertisementsof marketers. The Internet is now a two-way street.
Another change in the way that consumers shop forproducts and services can best be described as a shiftfrom outbound marketing to inbound marketing.2 Ad-vertising is everywhere. You cannot pick up a newspaperor magazine, listen to the radio, or watch a televisionprogram without being exposed to advertisements. Ad-vertisements that flow outward from a vendor tryingto sell a product are considered “outbound marketing.”Consumers do not like to be interrupted, however, andhave found ways to avoid advertisements in almost allmedia. Music lovers can now subscribe to commercial-free satellite radio to avoid the nonstop advertisementson conventional radio stations. Television viewers cannow skip over commercials using digital video recorderssuch as TiVo (TiVo, Alviso, Calif). Newspaper and maga-zine subscriptions are plummeting as consumers now goonline for their news and entertainment.3 The heyday ofMadison Avenue advertising is over as consumers findways to avoid the interruptive messages.
Today's consumers do want information about theproducts and services they need. They just want it onlywhen they are ready to buy, and they care more aboutwhat their peers think than what advertisers wantthem to believe. Enter the era of inbound marketing.Unlike advertisements that interrupt all consumerswhether or not they are interested, inbound marketingfocuses on providing help and information to buyerswhen they want it. Examples of inbound marketing in-clude websites, blogs, videos, and Really Simple Syndica-tion (RSS) feeds with updates about products andservices that interest the user. (RSS refers to web-based
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technology that allows subscribers to automatically re-ceive updated content.) There has been a shift from find-ing ways to interrupt consumers to providing usefulinformation that is easy to find when it is needed. Thescience of making our online content easier to find iscalled “search engine optimization” or SEO. SEO and so-cial media help consumers find what they want whenthey want it and, more importantly, allow them to seewhat their peers have to say about it.
Social media are web-based sites and services that fa-cilitate collaboration between users. Although there isno rigid classification system for social media, thereare some undisputed categories. These include socialnetworks, blogging, microblogging, content sharing,and product and service reviews. All forms of socialmedia have one thing in common—user collaboration.
Perhaps the most recognizable of all types of socialmedia are social networks. The most popular servicesin this category are Facebook and LinkedIn. A social net-work is a group of people who come together becausethey have something in common. This might be family,friends, hometowns, hobbies, or employment. Socialnetworks allow users to interact via texts, photos, mes-sages, and chatting. Networking sites also allow friendsto post, view, and comment on shared information. Notonly can we keep informed about events in the lives ofour friends, but we can also stay informed about busi-ness activities and opportunities.
Blogging is the online publishing of information. Theword “blog” is derived from the phrase “web log.” A blogis an online journal about any topic that an authorwishes to share. Some common blogging services in-clude Blogger, Wordpress, and Typepad. Before Web2.0, publishing required training, talent, and money. To-day, anyone with a computer can publish his or her ownblog with no money and little knowhow. Some featurescommon to most blogs are constantly updated content,archived articles, a way to interact with the author, andthe ability to subscribe to new posts via e-mail or an RSSfeed. Blogging provides user-generated content that at-tracts consumers (inbound marketing) and encouragesuser interaction.
A microblog is a small blog. Think of this service asa global text-messaging system. Users post thoughts,links, statuses, and photos that they want to sharewith the world. Other microbloggers can search forthese posts or, more commonly, follow or subscribeto them. Twitter and Tumblr are two of the most com-mon services. Twitter posts, called “tweets,” are limitedto 140 characters because that is the maximum lengthof a mobile-phone text message. Although websiteand blog updates occur on a monthly or weekly basis,Twitter messages are usually updated several times
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each day. Microblogging is regarded as more of an“as it happens” service.
Media-sharing sites allow users to share and ratevideos (YouTube), recommend and discuss music (Pan-dora and iTunes), and show off photos (Flickr andPicasa). At first glance, it might seem like a stretch to cat-egorize content sharing as social media. The key, how-ever, is that these sites allow users to collaborate asthey share links, make recommendations, and commenton the content. This social component allows users tomore quickly find content that is entertaining or useful.Media-sharing sites can also be combined with othersocial media services such as Facebook, Twitter, andblogs to allow the inclusion (via links) of content thatmight not be easily shared in those applications directly.
Sites that review products and services are growing inpopularity. Although most consider Amazon.commerelyan online shopping mall, every product it sells is accom-panied by consumer reviews that are influential to onlineshoppers. Sites such as TripAdvisor and UrbanSpoon re-view hotels and restaurants. Angie's list, Yelp, Dr. Oogle,and Google Places provide venues for reviews aboutprofessionals such as doctors and lawyers. Reviews byformer patients carry much weight when viewed byprospective patients.
SOCIAL MEDIA AND NEW PATIENTS
The ultimate purpose of our social media campaignsis to bring new patients to our practices. This happens intwo ways. First, social media can directly attract newpatients. Once a family realizes the need for an ortho-dontist, the concepts of collaboration and inbound mar-keting come into play. Whether the family finds ourpractices via referrals or on their own, today's patientswant to know more about us and the experiences ofothers in our offices. Even if a new patient receives a re-ferral from his or her dentist or a friend, it is common forthat person to go online to see whether there are any rec-ommendations or complaints from former patients.
The second way that social media can attract new pa-tients is by increasing the understanding and loyalty ofcurrent patients. Regular interaction, contests, and in-formational posts help to keep our current patientsand their families “on board” when it comes to recom-mending future treatment for their families and friends.Social media sites also give our current patients a placeto post testimonials and reviews that help to attractnew patients.
Although the influence of the traditional web is wan-ing as more users turn to applications on their mobiledevices, the hub of your entire online presence will stillbe your main practice website.4 It is here that you can
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best provide information about yourself and your prac-tice for prospective patients. Therefore, before kickingoff any new social media effort, make sure that your cur-rent website is up to date and social media friendly. Placeprominent links to your social media sites so that visitorsand patients will go there to read your reviews, writetheir own reviews, or just participate in your socialmedia campaign. Conversely, link all of your socialmedia sites back to your main website, where visitorscan find the information they need to contact your officeand become new patients. Although we do not haveroom to elaborate here, improving your main websitealso includes implementing the before-mentioned SEOtechniques so that it can easily be found by Internetsearch engines. A beautiful website is worthless if poten-tial patients cannot find it.
FIVE SOCIAL MEDIA SITES FOR ORTHODONTICPRACTICES
Since there are hundreds of social media services onthe Internet, where should we begin? Developing andmaintaining a successful online presence requires timeand effort, so we want to limit our effort to a few ofthe best services. To help you get started, I have selectedfive that I believe will give you the best return for yourtime investment. A case could be made for a different or-der or five different sites altogether, but as of 2011 hereare my recommendations.
Twitter is my choice for the fifth best social media sitefor your orthodontic practice; it is a microblogging site.Think of Twitter as a way to text message all of your pa-tients at the exactly the same time.
One major advantage of Twitter is that it is quick andeasy to use. Twitter users love this venue because it issuccinct (140-character limit) and well suited for useon a mobile phone. The service is free and easy to setup. Websites associated with active Twitter accountsalso fare better in Google searches (SEO). Google as-sumes that a website associated with a 2000-followerTwitter account has more relevancy than a site withonly 20 followers.
The biggest weakness for Twitter is that only 10% ofAmericans have Twitter accounts, and it is estimatedthat less than 3% actually use them.5 Another weaknessof Twitter is that the 140-character limit does not allowmuch content (although this can be overcome in severalways).
The Twitter platform provides an additional way ofcommunicating with your current patients. Some ideasfor useful Tweets include announcements about
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available appointments, practice events, contests, andbad weather. Using Twitter successfully in this mannerrequires that your patients are aware of the service.This can be promoted at patient registration, on all prac-tice correspondence, with a link on your website, andwith specific Twitter registration contests or promotions.
Users of Twitter expect frequent updates from thepeople whom they follow. If you begin a campaignand then fail to keep it up to date, your followers willlose confidence and will not use the service as you wouldlike. On the other hand, if you or a staff member gets car-ried away with tweeting, it can become a drain on yourtime. Because of the small percentage of your patientswho are actually using Twitter regularly, it should onlybe used as an adjunct to a much larger social mediacampaign.
YouTube
YouTube is my choice for the fourth best social mediasite for your orthodontic practice. YouTube is a video-sharing site that is now owned by Google.
YouTube is huge. More than 13 million hours ofvideo were uploaded in 2010, and 48 hours are uploadedevery minute. Over 3 billion videos are viewed each day.6
YouTube is free and easy to set up. Making videos withtoday's video cameras and uploading them to your“channel” can easily be done by any of your current staff.YouTube's integrated search engine is used more thanany other on the web except Google, and your videocontent can provide information that could leadprospective patients to your practice.
YouTube's greatest strength is also its greatest weak-ness. With such an enormous number of videos availableon YouTube, getting yours found by prospective patientsin your community is difficult. As with website SEO, se-lecting the best key words and appropriate descriptionsis important in helping the right people find your content.
YouTube can perform two important functions inyour social media campaign. First, it can provide search-able content that can attract new patients directly toyour practice. Your instructional videos might come upin searches by prospective patients. Fun videos of prac-tice events might also pull new patients your way. Sec-ond, YouTube can serve as a video “server” or hub foryour main website, Facebook, Twitter, blog posts,e-mails, and other practice correspondence.
Patient privacy laws (HIPAA) are easily violated bypractices that innocently post videos of their patientswithout their consent. Practices should also be carefulto make sure that the content they post on their site islegal and that they have obtained appropriate consentto post videos showing any patients.
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Practice blog
A practice blog is my choice for the third best socialmedia service for your orthodontic practice. A blog isa chronologic journal or log of content that is of interestto your current and prospective patients.
Search engines love new content. Google's search al-gorithm has two major objectives: 1) return the most rel-evant search result, and 2) block as many irrelevantresults as possible. Google considers a dynamic, con-stantly updated website to be more relevant than onethat went online a year ago and has not been updatedsince. Properly configured, each new blog post is seenby Google as updated content, and your site will gaincredibility in search results.
Unlike other easy-to-use web-based social mediaservices, an onsite blog will require setup expertise(with the associated costs). Configured incorrectly,your blogging effort will only benefit the credibility ofthe site hosting your blog. Additionally, a well-doneblog requires much time and effort. Topics must be se-lected that will be of interest to patients and written inlanguage that they can understand.
In addition to the search engine optimization creditthat you will accumulate by systematically adding newcontent to your site, blogging provides useful contentfor your current and prospective patients. It gives youa venue to explain your treatment philosophies and“park” answers to frequently asked questions. In time,the volume and scope of your online content willmake you an expert in the eyes of those who read yourposts.
As with YouTube, you must be vigilant about thecontent that you post on your blog. Make sure that itis original or that you give credit to the original authorsif you are using their work.
My recommendation for the second best media site isthe social-network giant Facebook. Facebook is an on-line community of family, friends, coworkers, fellowchurch goers, former classmates, and almost every othertype of relationship that you can imagine. When peoplethink of social media, they think of Facebook.
An old marketing slogan says “fish where the fishare.” Facebook is where the fish are! Facebook is farand away the biggest and most popular social mediasite in the world. As of August 2011, there were an esti-mated 750 million users worldwide, 50% of whom logon daily.7 It has been estimated that 65% of our patientshave Facebook accounts.8 Facebook is easy to use andhas tools that make promoting an orthodontic practicesimple. It provides a place to post information about
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the practice, events, pictures, and videos. Business pagesare easy to set up and manage, and they can be linkedback to your main website.
There are few downsides to Facebook. One issue,however, is that Facebook users do not want to be inter-rupted by solicitations while they are socializing (out-bound marketing). Practices need to be careful not tobe blatant in their marketing campaign in either contentor frequency of posts. Facebook is a community offriends who did not join to be inundated with salespitches. Appropriate posts should provide interestingcontent and be relationship builders (inbound market-ing). Practices that get too aggressive will see the num-ber of users who “like” their practice start to shrink ifposts are too frequent or are just obvious solicitations.
A Facebook presence for your practice allows you tointeract and become friendlier with your patients. It isa chance for them to stay informed about things happen-ing at the office between visits. It is also a chance for youto congratulate patients when you catch them doingsomething right. Like all social media, you can use thisvenue to enhance relationships between you and your pa-tients and solidify their loyalty to your practice.
The biggest threat posed by Facebook or any socialnetwork is the loss of privacy. Depending upon howyou set your privacy preferences, your “friends”will learnthings about you. Every consultant who speaks aboutFacebook has a different opinion about howmuch infor-mation should be shared and with whom. Some encour-age accepting all patients and parents as friends. Othersare adamantly against it. This is a matter of personalpreference. Regardless of which side you support, justremember that whatever you post can end up all overthe Internet. Never share or post something youwouldn't want to be posted on the wall of your office.
Other Facebook threats have to do with your staff.Before implementing a Facebook site in your office, besure to have a Facebook policy in place for your practice.Social networking can be addictive. There should be spe-cific policies about whether staff members can accesstheir personal accounts from the office or during workhours. There should be specific instructions about HIPAAand slandering patients, coworkers, the doctor, or thepractice on their personal pages.
Google Places
If the largest social media service in the world onlycomes in as number two in my countdown, what couldpossibly be number one? The answer is Google Places,which is a directory of profiles automatically createdby Google for every business that has a physical addressor phone number. Places listings are included in the
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results when users do a search that includes a physicallocation, region, or phone number (a local search). Afterit has been created, it is up to the business owner to “ver-ify” his Places listing, edit the automatically created con-tent, and add additional information that will be usefulto visitors.
Unlike Facebook, Twitter, and most other socialmedia sites, patients do not have to be your friends orhave an account to see your Places listing. It pops upwhen anyone searches for your office. Once verifiedand edited, your Places listing has a wealth of informa-tion that complements your practice website and Face-book profile. There are pictures, videos, your logo,maps, directions to your office, links to your website,and descriptions of the products and services you offer.Google Places qualifies as social media because one ofthe most prominent features is the inclusion of reviewsfrom customers (patients).
Although you can do many things to improve yourPlaces listings' position in a local search, there are somethings you cannot change. One is distance to your “citycenter.” A practice located closer to the physical centerof town will search higher than one farther away.9,10
Another weakness is that Google favors the Placeslistings of practices actually located in the searchedmunicipality. So, although your practice might belocated just over the border of a city where most ofyour patients reside, Google will give preference topractices with addresses actually located in that city.Lastly, Google sometimes creates multiple Placeslistings for the same business. This is a problembecause reviews, citations, and other SEO factors arethen diluted between the multiple listings. If youdiscover that you have several listings for yourbusiness, you should take steps to merge them into one.
Your Google Places listing gives your practice yet an-other opportunity to be found by prospective patients.The information on your Places listing can distinguishyou from other practices in your area. Additionally, pa-tients who are happy with you can share their experi-ences with potential patients right there in the resultsof their Google search. Positive reviews are what socialmedia are all about, and the reviews on Google Placesare front and center.
Unfortunately, Google Places posts bad reviewsalong with the good ones. These reviews can comefrom anyone, including disgruntled patients, employees,or competitors. Because anyone with an e-mail accountcan create a Google account (whether or not they've ac-tually been a patient), fake reviews are also possible. Forthis reason, practices must verify and monitor theirPlaces listing so that they are aware of what is beingsaid about them.
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GETTING STARTED
As with any other new office procedure, developinga successful social media campaign will require planningand effort. Start by updating your current website sothat it is easy to find and has links to and from all ofyour social media sites. Verify your Google Places listingand check it for accuracy. Add additional informationsuch as pictures, logos, and descriptions. Set up your re-maining social media profiles and link them back to yourmain website. Make an update calendar that includeswho in your practice will be responsible for each site.YouTube and your blog should be updated at leastmonthly. Facebook should be updated weekly. Twittercan be updated several times each day. You shouldalso assign one staff member to monitor the reviewsthat appear on your Places listing once every week.
You don't need to have everything perfect before youstart creating content. You can update your Facebookstatus right away and post some practice pictures. Youcan start jotting down ideas for topics and write someposts even before your IT people have your blog config-ured on your website. You probably already have somevideos that you can post to your newly created YouTubechannel. You can send out your first tweet in less thana minute. Don't feel that you have to do it all yourself.Assign staff members to take pictures and videos. Con-sider hiring technologically savvy patients to help you.They are naturals!
Finally, get the word out. After you've got your sitesall up and have started creating content, let your pa-tients know. Incorporate social media icons into yourwebsite, blog, practice correspondence, and marketing.Use one form of social media to promote another (ie, an-nounce your latest blog post on Twitter and Facebook).Set up a kiosk computer in your reception area to en-courage parents to “like” you on Facebook or “follow”on Twitter while they're still in the office.
CONCLUSIONS
Social media is already affecting our practiceswhether or not we choose to participate. Patients aretalking about us. They always have. Now they just havea more efficient way of doing so via the Internet. Incor-porating social media into your current marketing cam-paign will allow you to participate in the discussionand will eventually mean more patients for your practice.
REFERENCES
1. O'Reilly T. What is Web 2.0: Design patterns and business modelsfor the next generation of software. Available at: http://oreilly.com/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html. Accessed on September28, 2011.
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2. Halligan B, Dharmesh S. Inboundmarketing: get found using Goo-gle, social media, and blogs. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons;2009.
3. Benjamin C. Newspapers and magazines still showing decline incirculation. Available at: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id5109435. Accessed on September 28, 2011.
4. Anderson C, Wolff M. The Web is dead. Long live the internet.Available at: http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/08/ff_webrip/all/1. Accessed on September 28, 2011.
5. Facebook vs Twitter 2010 statistics. Available at: http://digitaldrums.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/facebook-vs-twitter-2010-statistics/. Accessed on August 12, 2011.
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6. YouTube statistics. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/t/press_statistics. Accessed on August 12, 2011.
7. Facebook: Company info: Factsheet. Available at: http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics. AccessedonAugust12,2011.
8. Facebook vs Twitter 2010 statistics. Available at: http://digitaldrums.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/facebook-vs-twitter-2010-statistics/. Accessed on August 12, 2011.
9. Garner J. Answering Google Places questions. Available at: http://seo-factor.com/answering-google-places-questions/. Accessed onSeptember 28, 2011.
10. Reviews vs ranking. Available at: http://blog.demandforce.com/tag/local-search-ranking/. Accessed on September 28, 2011.
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