Prioritizing the patient’s journey has always been a focus for UCHealth and it’s what sets them apart from their industry peers. They’re continuously looking for new ways they can help the patient by exploring the types of care and services they can offer.
During the last year and a half, engagement on healthcare social media platforms nearly doubled as consumers turned to social media for answers and resources around COVID-19.
While much of UCHealth’s social content focuses on the patient’s journey, they also made it a priority to highlight healthcare workers and showcase front-line workers during the pandemic.
A caring approach to community management
Social media plays a significant role in the hospital or doctor patients choose. In fact, 41% of people said social media would influence their specific choice of doctor, hospital, or medical facility. This is why UCHealth started to focus on online reputation management, which feeds into community management. Their biggest goal is to answer every question that comes in, so they set up a process for categorizing every comment received and can escalate those to the appropriate teams as needed.
"It’s important because patients know they can come to us with their questions and they’re going to get a response," said Kimberly Irwin, Social Media & Digital Marketing Strategist at UCHealth. "It helps us build a relationship with patients and they begin to trust us because they know they can rely on us."
UCHealth has almost 600 location pages with their own Google reviews and nearly just as many Facebook pages, so posts are coming in at all times, around the clock. Emplifi’s Publisher tool helps UCHealth work collaboratively to stay organized with prepared answers to every question.
"Emplifi Social Marketing Cloud is a vital resource that allows us to streamline our publishing process and provides valuable insights in one platform," says UCHealth’s head of digital and social media marketing, Vincent Serio.
UCHealth has an online reputation representative that sorts through and responds to every review that comes in. They also have a three-tiered system that routes urgent posts to an escalation team. Meanwhile, a patient representative team can open a case with the state if necessary. Finally, customer service queries are handled by the social media team and UCHealth’s local clinics. The UCHealth leadership team also assists the social team by offering access to medical professionals who can provide answers to any questions the social team is unable to answer. It is a well-oiled communications ecosystem! With Emplifi's Dashboard tool, UCHealth can also see the sentiment behind every post or comment to understand what content causes their audience to react positively or negatively and why.
Overall, the growth in engagement on social media during the last 12 months has helped UCHealth’s leadership team see the value in social media and the potential it has to make UCHealth a resource and thought leader for the public.
Connecting with competitors
UCHealth is also utilizing Emplifi for Competitive Analysis. "We actually just expanded it to include a couple more local competitors and that’s been a game changer," said Irwin. "It’s great being able to see what’s performing for other healthcare systems, what questions are coming into them, and discovering how we can relate. It’s nice that even as competitors, we’ve really come together locally during this pandemic to help each other out. It unifies all of us while also helping us to better our strategy and share best practices."
Boost brand visibility with influencers
More and more people are turning to social media influencers for their expertise in a specific product or industry. People are focusing more on their health, so they’re turning to TikTok and Instagram to find nutritionists, infectious disease experts, and fitness influencers, which has led to an increase of these types of spokespeople on social media. Two in five consumers (42%) use social media to view health-related content and consumer reviews.
Emplifi gives brands the ability to compare hundreds of influencers quicker than ever before and shortlist the ones that suit their requirements and best align with their audience. UCHealth has specifically used influencers to speak at their healthcare events in the past, including fitness-focused and women’s health events, which has helped drive sales. It’s also been helpful for UCHealth to work with influencers they know to engage with their audience, as well as micro-influencers who are familiar with the local communities.
"When sourcing influencers, it’s important to thoroughly vet them and research the backend of their profile such as follower demographics so your message meets the right audience," said Irwin.
The takeaway
It’s important to know why you’re on social media. Is your goal to educate and raise awareness? Are you trying to become a thought leader and engage with customers? Maybe it’s both! No matter the reason, you should have an approval process and guidelines in place to ensure accuracy. When doing community management, it comes down to processes and procedures to route the right inquiries to the right teams efficiently. From thought leadership to industry influencers, grow your impact with your audiences by expanding your approach.
If you’d like to learn more about how you can improve your community management, work collaboratively with your teams, or boost brand visibility with influencers, schedule a walkthrough with an Emplifi expert today.
