Ten reasons healthcare marketers give for ignoring social media (and thus their audiences)

Here are ten reasons I’ve heard and read over the past couple of weeks about why healthcare marketers aren’t engaging their audiences through social media:

1. our new hospital project is weighing us down
2. it’s the end of the year and we’ve put off any decision about social media until 1st quarter
3. we (actually being the marketing department) don’t have resources to dedicate to social right now
4. this is a senior leadership decision, and they’re not yet comfortable with the tools
5. social media doesn’t have much strategic significance for us right now
6. social media doesn’t fit with our marketing priorities
7. we’ve already allocated our budgets across media vehicles for next year
8. social media isn’t in line with our key service line goals and strategies
9. it’s more important, next year, for us to focus on our strongest potential business development opportunities across key service lines
10. we’re not yet equipped to handle direct interaction with patients and our communities

What’s fascinating about this list is that all of these reasons are about “we.” As if patients, families, communities, care providers, employees, etc. are waiting for 1) “you” to decide you’re ready to engage “them” in ways they want; and 2) you to give them the green light to be broadcasting and talking to each other about your organization.

Are any of these reasons holding your organization back from participating in social media? Do your goals and strategies really do justify participation (at least monitoring the conversation), but there are artificial internal force fields holding you back? Want to talk about it?

11 thoughts on “Ten reasons healthcare marketers give for ignoring social media (and thus their audiences)”

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This is very interesting indeed. I think the focus on ‘we’ is the key here. I’m very surprised to learn that they are not focused on ‘you’. They are a business, after all, aren’t they? I hope that they will see the light and dedicate the resources necessary to jump on the bandwagon. I’m sure they could really do a lot within their communities and that their respect level would grow in these times of economic and health care crises.

Cheers,
Eric

Thanks for taking the time to stop by and for your comments. Totally agree with you that there’s so much real good that the healthcare community could do. Just a matter of time before they decide to take part, and hopefully lead, in the conversations that are already going on around them. Regards, Eric