Saturday, January 23, 2010

Healthcare and Social Media Survey 2010

(click here for a quick four question survey, hosted on surveymonkey.com)

Almost a year ago, I kicked off a survey designed to gauge the adoption of social media among healthcare professionals and the healthcare industry. (Read my original blog post here.)

In March 2010, I announced the full results and published them here. Here is what I wrote at the time:

We all can be susceptible to hype, so it's a good thing to try and gather empirical evidence from time to time to challenge one's notions. Even if you think you are in great shape and have the body of a 20 year old Olympic athlete, it's probably a good idea to step on a scale once in a while and confirm that this is actually true. -ahem-

Everyone is talking about the impact that social media is having on the healthcare industry. But is it really? There are plenty of patient and doctor social networks and lots of hospital twitter accounts. But is any of this obvious activity actually engaging these disparate audiences? Are we all confusing motion with progress?

The main takeaway last year was that the prognosis was negative for social media in the healthcare industry. As I found last year,


96 percent of respondents said the industry is not using social media enough to communicate, share information and engage with patients.

However, as we've learned, 12 months is a long time when I comes to the adoption of social media technologies. Has any of this changed? I'd sure like to know.

SO...I'd like to ask any readers of this blog post to click here for a quick four question survey, hosted on surveymonkey.com. When I get a decent sample size, I'll post the results, note any change in sentiment and we can talk about what needs to be done to drive adoption more effectively...

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Bill Wagner, CMO of Vocus Shares His Marketing Expertise

Hi all! Time for another episode of my periodic podcast series, Straight to the Point. I was really excited to host Bill Wagner. Bill is the Chief Marketing Officer of Vocus - a leading provider of on-demand software for public relations management, helping organizations of all sizes fundamentally change the way they communicate with the media and the public, optimize their public relations efforts and measure their impact.

An accomplished marketing executive with more than 17 years of experience in marketing and sales management in the technology industry, Bill was generous enough to carve out some time to share his insight and experiences with me in a 20 minute Q&A session.

Click here for the show: http://bit.ly/6XPMeG

Or you can just listen to it here:




What do you think? Is Bill's approach to corporate marketing correct? Would you take a more aggressive approach to social media?

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Wrapup of CES 2010

Like most people, I can get a little gadget crazy. I almost never get to the point of actually shelling out real money, but I love to see and read about the latest, coolest gadgets. So last week was a fun week for me as I followed the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES), held in Las Vegas.

For those of you that don't know, according to Wikipedia, CES is
"The International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is a non-public trade show held each January in Las Vegas, Nevada, and is sponsored by the Consumer Electronics Association. At the show, many previews of products are introduced, and new products are announced. The show is held at the Las Vegas Convention Center with additional venues used for some specific technologies. The CES is considered one of the major technology-related trade shows, after Comdex was cancelled.The International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is a non-public trade show held each January in Las Vegas, Nevada, and is sponsored by the Consumer Electronics Association. At the show, many previews of products are introduced, and new products are announced. The show is held at the Las Vegas Convention Center with additional venues used for some specific technologies. The CES is considered one of the major technology-related trade shows, after Comdex was cancelled."

This year there were an especially cool assortment of new technologies and products announced. Here a few that caught my eye:

Lots of people have been talking about Google's mobile operating system, Android, over the past few months. But Do You Really Need a Microwave or a Washer-Dryer Running Android?

Samsung announced a new LCD TV, the C9000, that's "ultra thin." What does this mean? Oh, it's no thicker than a pencil. Really. No, seriously, check out the photo here if you don't believe me. I. Must. Have. One.

Except I might not and save up for Panasonic's new 152 inch 3D TV. Yep, a 152 inches. I have a 55 incher, I thought myself pretty cool when I bought it too.

Everything is going to be 3D TV this year. Olympics, the World Cup, etc. DirecTV announced three new 3D channels (which I'm sure they'll charge $10,000 a minute to watch).

In the end, I can't argue with Gizmodo. "If you only watch one four minute recap video of CES this year, make it Joel Johnson's four minute recap video of CES." It is a really good recap. LOL. I'll just stop here and let you just watch the video...

Monday, January 04, 2010

Happy New Year!! Five Trends to Watch

I'm back in the office working my way through two weeks of emails and I find myself excited. It's 2010- a year that for folks my age conjures images of Roy Scheider on a spaceship heading for Jupiter. It is the future and, space travel aside, there are so many exciting trends happening this year. I hope to share my viewpoint and the opinions of some other thought leaders here on this blog over the next 12 months.

Here are a five things I find fascinating:
  1. the integration of cloud computing, enterprise software and social networking to improve sales, marketing and PR business applications and create real, measurable value
  2. the continuing impact of mobile computing on businesses and their customers
  3. the economic recovery- will it be fast or sluggish
  4. will traditional media evolve and save themselves or will they continue to diminish in influence
  5. how will the mammoth health care reform bill impact the long delayed computerization and modernization of the healthcare industry
A lot of moving parts for one year! How will it all shake out? Stick around and we'll find out together...

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Social Media but...

Last Monday was the last Webinar in the four part series on social media that I organized with the Software and Information Industry Association. The goal of the series was explore all the business applications that you can use social media for and show real world examples of how this was being done. We gathered a impressive line up of panelists to share their insight and best practices, including marketing executives from BurrellsLuce, Deloitte Services, Jigsaw and Vocus, among others.

If you are curious about how companies today are integrating social media into their overall marketing programs for applications like:
  • Lead generation
  • Enterprise sales support
  • Competitive intelligence gathering
  • Deal capture
  • Distribution partner identification and cultivation
  • Search engine optimization (SEO)
  • Executive visibility and thought leadership
  • Reputation management
  • Employee recruitment
  • Team, culture and morale building
...then I highly recommend that you listen to the discussions and check out the slides from the Webinars below.

Overview of Business Applications of Social Media (Audio | Slides)
Social media has already begun the transformation of how we interact, and has the potential to transform the way we do business. Understanding and effectively implementing a social media strategy can have a major impact on how businesses are perceived and how they interact with their customers. Nowhere is this more evident than the PR, marketing and sales departments. In this 90-minute webinar, you'll hear how social media tools can be used in lead generation, enterprise sales support, competitive intelligence management, employee recruitment, team culture & morale boosting, and branding & awareness

Moderator:
Karen Leavitt, CEO, Marketing Fusion

Panelists:
Angela Lauria, CMO, AppAssure
Gail Nelson, SVP, Marketing, BurrellesLuce
Jeff Majka, Director of Marketing and Business Development, Strategic Communications Group

Enterprise Sales Support - Using Social Media to Support the Enterprise B2B Sales Cycle (Audio | Slides)
With new service-based models and the rise of "freemium", the sales cycle is getting complicated -- and every advantage counts. Social media has the potential to connect these new models to the customers that want them, but how do you implement it? Where do you start? Hear how social media can transform the way you approach lead generation and sales cycle support.

Moderator:
Ian F. Strain-Seymour, Director of Product Strategy & Development, Apogee Search LLC

Panelists:
Steve Lunceford, Director, Public Sector Strategic Communications, Deloitte Services LLP
Adam Mertz, Product Marketing Manager, Jive Software
Jay Hallberg, Co-founder & VP of Marketing, Spiceworks

Using Social Media to Target the C-Suite and Close Deals (Audio | Slides)
Many of your customers are using social media to communicate with THEIR customers. How can you tap into their social media programs? The first step to closing the deal is to conduct a social media audit of your principal prospects. How can this be completed efficiently and comprehensively for a large number of prospects? How can you facilitate social media for deal capture?

Moderator:
Jeff Majka, Director Marketing & Business Development, Strategic Communications Group, Inc.

Panelists:
Steve Ressler, Founder, GovLoop
Jim Fowler, CEO, Jigsaw

Social Media for Brand Awareness, Thought Leadership and Other Traditional PR Activities (Audio | Slides)
Social media should be an integral part of your PR strategy, not just your sales function. To run a successful campaign Marketing, Sales and PR need to be integrated using today's popular social media tools. How can you effectively integrate your social media strategy across the enterprise?

Moderator:
Robert Carroll, VP Marketing, Clickability

Panelists:
Jeff Majka, Director of Marketing and Business Development, Strategic Communications Group
Kye Strance, Director of Product Management, Vocus
Richard Dym, CMO, OpSource, Inc.