How Doctors Can Make Use of Social Media?

The following is a guest blog post by Alex Tate.
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By using the right strategy doctors can gain a lot by making a proper use of social media to market themselves, share their rich experience and knowledge and carry out discussions with the colleagues in the industry.

Many of the doctors are afraid of the unknown and thus decide to remain silent over the social media due to privacy concerns. It is possible to create a good balance between having a transparent communication and matching to the necessary limitations of the industry.  Around 24% of physicians use social media at least once a day to post, share and seek medical information. The use of social media is still in its early years and it is a great opportunity to take advantage of these digital platforms and build credibility for your career as a doctor or a physician. The medical industry is very less saturated online as compared to other industries mainly due to the fear and apprehensions of health care organizations and professions as they would want to avoid liability issues related to social media related platforms.

As a doctor it is possible to make an effective and profitable social media strategy to market your practice and career. It will require a lot of time and effort but the results can have a far reaching effect for the long term success. If you are a physician or a doctor there are many ways you can make yourself stand out among others and effectively reach the right people in your social media.

  1. Set up personal account in Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn

Having social media accounts is one of the ways to increase your social footprint and expand it. Make a personal profile in all these three networks and optimize them to the fullest.

  1. Make Use of Visuals

Visuals are more effective in engaging people than text therefore include more pictures in your social media profiles on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. This is one of the important things to implement on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. When you are sharing content make sure you use original and non copyrighted photography in order to boost your engaging posts. Another way is to make use of photos in the blog posts, videos and articles when you are posting things on these networks.

  1. Share the knowledge

It doesn’t matter that which platform you are sharing your content on but make sure you whatever you are saying is helping you to make connections, followers and friends. Make use of your unique expertise and share the relevant information about what you know best.

Apart from joining the existing twitter chats, LinkedIn groups and relevant online discussion related to your area of expertise and industry, plan and start your own sharing hub on social media in order to bring the depth of knowledge to your professional interests.

Whether your knowledge hub is a LinkedIn Group, Twitter chats, Google plus profile or other relevant discussions online related to your industry, it is an important way of sharing what you know and build your credibility as you educate others.

As doctors it is important that you follow the rule of thumb to make sure you are providing the value to others and making use of your time spent on the social media networks. Doctor’s job is to make sure they share their expertise and execute their advice.

  1. Frequency of posting on LinkedIn

As one of the largest network of professionals online LinkedIn allow doctors to highlight each aspect of their career path using text and visuals. LinkedIn can offer lots of benefits to doctors because of its professional nature and a large network of likeminded people sharing and connecting with others. Begin by sharing the content from your profile that reflects your expertise and knowledge as a healthcare professional.

On LinkedIn content needs to be of a professional nature and little more reserved than the one shared on Facebook or Twitter. Share the links to those articles and other information that can be of some value to your connections and at the same time adding your own perspectives through commenting on posts.

  1. Follow other Healthcare Professionals on Social Media

Using Facebook and Twitter you can reach out to existing network of your contacts that you already know and you can find them by searching for colleagues, peers and friends working in the healthcare field. Follow and make connection with these individuals. After that you can use each networks search feature for to look for individuals in the similar role or industry. By connecting with a large number of people on these platforms you will have the like- minded people to interact with and share your views and experiences.

  1. Participate in conversations on twitter

Twitter is the best social media platform for having a public one to one conversation at the basic level. Start your conversation with doctors and medical professionals and discuss current trends in healthcare industry or new findings.

You can also find the conversations from other you have followed by searching through hashtags or keywords related to your interests a physician

  1. Join Useful Twitter Chats

In twitter chats, on particular topics and hash tags occurs weekly, monthly or quarterly. Search and discover what chats Twitter chats are available for medical professionals and join these conversations with other participants and learn new things. When participating in the twitter chat answer some of the questions asked by participants or posted by moderators by adding your views and opinions. Follow other participants and moderators in the chat and include proper hash tags in all of your tweets.

  1. Go For Accuracy

There is a large amount of misinformation online when it comes to medical field that confuses consumers and dilutes the effectiveness of accurate medial insights. As a doctor it is important that you act as the voice of reason when sharing important information about healthcare online. Go for accurate coverage of information on social media that could affect your credibility for the long term.

Spend a limited time on social media at a certain part of the day or few times a week to help you make your efforts to be more accurate. Again it needs to be quality over quantity when it comes to content sharing and the discussions that you are having online.

  1. Ask Questions

One of the benefits of having social media is the ability to have actual conversations online with your friends, family, peers and other connections in your network. As a doctor you should ask questions from your audience in order to get their feedback on some decision or a perspective on industry news.

As you will ask questions you will be able to learn the insights of your network. No one knows everything but still someone has something to share with others. Make use of your network on social media to get more insights and establish your credibility as respected and reputed doctor.

About Alex Tate

I am a health IT consultant with experience in management and training consultants across private and public sectors. I frequently write on Health IT for various blogs and websites. I am currently managing ehrsoftware.info website that helps practices and physicians select the right EHR. If you wish to connect with me follow me at https://twitter.com/alextate07

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1 Comment

  • The first very basic thing is to have a good website for doctors. where doctors should maintain FAQs for their specialties. FAQs should be on the basis of questions asked by patients to doctors. They are most common questions. Doctors should also have video section on their website regarding their infrastructure and how they manage their day to day practices. Physicians should also take part in online physicians platform to be part of ongoing discussions

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