Social Media For Doctors Office Help!
-
I have a client that I am doing web-work for...I recommended for him to claim his Facebook Place page as well as create a twitter account. He's a little skeptical and doesn't think that a doctors office needs a Facebook and twitter page. I strongly disagree with him and would like to show him some facts. Has anyone ever done social media for a doctors office before or know where I can get some good information?
Thanks in advance!
-
why not do a search on facebook and other web 2.0 media websites find pages from other doctor's offices or even similiar "professional" professions like laywers ,accountants etc. and show him those pages as examples. These pages do not have to be local doctors, lawyers. They can be from anywhere - even thousands of miles away. Show him what others are doing.
-
At a bare minimum this is a "Brand Grab" issue. As some people have mentioned here already, you want to have your name, and you want to get it yesterday. I have seen clients who waited to long, and now they have to settle for some string of characters that does not match the business name very well and is far from optimal.
As far as data goes, check out this article from earlier this year:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/facebook-twitters-influence-google-search-rankingsBeyond that, it just comes down to creativity so far as how to use it.
Example: Ask them if they could they benefit form filling a slot where someone calls in a cancellation short notice (for most offices, that is just lost money). If the answer is yes, then note how if that slot opening was to be announced on Twitter and Facebook accounts, where clients were explicitly told is the place information like this will be announced in the future, someone might see it and call in "Hey, I saw the opening, can I bring my kid in today?". Happy clients, happy doctors. Now ironically, even if no one uses it, the fact that you offer it would make some people say "yet another reason why I like the doctors office I go to".
Brian
-
Grab appropriate social sites to gain control of the real estate.
Post all valuable content on the main website. If you believe that people will like for a doctor in the SERPs then that should be the focus of best content. If you think that they will get a doc from social media then it might be worth doing.
If the physician has bought into social media and has a practice that would look engaged there then you might try it. However if the Doc is an old fart like me he might look out of place on social.
-
Even if your client is not actively trying to build his practice, grabbing his social media sites is still recommended. What happens if another person grabs those names and begins using them? It can cause a headache for your client to explain to his/her patients the social media site is owned by someone else.
Worse, what if the owner of the social media account offers bad advice or otherwise acquires a negative reputation. A facebook or twitter page with the same name as the doctor's office could build the page to rank higher then the doctor's website is SERPs.
Another consideration is connecting with patients. You can reach out to patients via phone, mail and e-mail but people move and many may not remember to update contact information with their doctors. Social media allows patients to connect with the doctor rather then having the doctor's office to connect with the patient. A doctor's address/phone number change, vacation and other information can be communicated once via social media and reach many patients who otherwise might be missed.
-
I think everyone needs a social presence regardless of the the niche your in. I have worked with a number of orthodontists who have and understand the importance of social media. For example being there to remind followers about the importance of appointments, the best way to brush, what food to eat etc and the beauty of this is it can be done at a local level and find people who are within there catchment area.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
The relationship between Social Media and SEO?
I have read mixed reviews about the relationship between these two in the past. Are there any ways Social Media can improve SEO?
Social Media | | sophiecrosby970 -
Tool to get all the Social Shares for a Domain
Does anyone know of a tool that can get you the total, or close to it, social shares an entire domain has received? I know of... http://www.sharedcount.com/ - but this only gets shares for the entered URL not the entire domain. http://www.pagesort.com/ - this seems to dig a little deeper but not deep enough. I know opensite explorer gets some data as well but still seems very limited.
Social Media | | eyeflow0 -
Does a 301 retain social actions
I just changed the domains on one of my largest and oldest sites for branding reasons. I have the 301 set to keep the page structures and all. My question is will the "likes" and shares and etc be kept via the 301 or will they have to be reacquired?
Social Media | | Atomicx0 -
Implementing Pinterest On Site and Social Snippets
Hi can someone confirm, does Pinterest use Open Graph Protocol? If you use the Pinterest Widget builder - http://business.pinterest.com/widget-builder/#do_pin_it_button Will the image you place in the widget replace the image Pinterest selects if it does use the Open Graph Protocol? The site already uses Open Graph Protocol for Facebook and Google+. It also uses Twitter cards for twitter. It would be good if we don't need to add more html (such as from the Pinterest widget builder) for Pinterest. -- Matt
Social Media | | Mattcarter080 -
Lost social share count after migrating blog
Hi, Yesterday I migrated our blog to a new domain. It seems it went smoothly and all 301 redirects were implemented and are working properly, however, the social share count was lost across all posts and has returned to zero. Is there any easy way I can recover our social share counts across the board? I am using the **1-click Retweet/Share/Like **plugin for Wordpress. Any help on this would be much appreciated. Thank you, from Russell in South Africa.
Social Media | | Shamima0 -
Recommended/Convenient Social Share Plug-In for Agencies w/Multiple Accounts!
Hi! What is a recommended social media share plug-in (SEO-friendly) to implement across multiple websites (desktop & mobile) for an agency? Also, does the suggested social share plug-in provide a dashboard to review multiple accounts via one location?
Social Media | | RezStream80 -
Do i direct traffic to all social platforms or not?
Hi ...I have a brand that is very strong socially..specifically facebook and twitter and this is where we have directed all strategy and traffic. We recently wanted to establish a presence on google+ and have done so. My feeling at this point is to maintain a presence on google+ but only direct social traffic to facebook and twitter from the brands website....so we can keep the focus here aswell as the stronger community. I have noticed other brands doing something similar.....is this a good strategy or should we be directing traffic to all the platforms from the site?...bottomline should we be linking to all our social platforms from the brands website or keep it linked to the stronger platforms and just maintain a presence on the others? thank you
Social Media | | nomad-2023230 -
Outsourcing social media optimization
Is it a good idea to outsource social media optimization or is it something that has to be done in-house? I understand the question is kind of vague, but what I had in mind was to have an offshore contractor post daily about individual products and try to increase our following on twitter/facebook (i.e "social footprint").
Social Media | | inhouseseo0