Most of the big brands and industries such as the retail sector use social media as the primary platform for reaching and engaging with their audience. Social media provides an unrivalled platform for driving engagement around products and messages. As a platform social media is a significant tool for increasing brand awareness and more recently global brands use social media to drive specific social media campaigns that encourage interaction. Pepsi’s live for now campaign is a good example. Social media tools are also becoming more sophisticated which allows the return on engagement to be better measured. The potential reach of social media is also significant as the average user on Facebook has an around of 130 friends. With smart phones making digital communication almost mandatory, there is no doubt that digital engagement platforms such as social media are helping businesses and organisations to get their messages out more effectively and improve brand awareness.
Digital Engagement and Healthcare
Digital engagement can provide a real opportunity for healthcare organisations to better communicate with their target audience. There is no doubt that presently healthcare messages within the UK are failing to reach the people that matter. With over 15% of 2 to 15 year olds confirmed as clinically obese, the population’s health is a growing concern. The NHS is already under increasing strain and the cost to the taxpayer for treating health related issues is billions something which the government has already declared is not sustainable.
Prevention is the best cause of action through ensuring parents and children are educated on the risks of poor health. Traditional media channels such as TV and radio have failed to make any impact. The population needs to aware of the effects of poor health on themselves and their family. The main problem for healthcare organisations has not been the messages but more the advertising channels they use. We now live in an ever-changing digital world and Smartphone’s make digital communication instantaneous no matter where you are. For many people now, hanging out in social media chartrooms or communicating online is really a daily part of life. As a result, healthcare organisations need to have a real presence in these communities.
Social media is particularly popular amongst children many of whom spend several hours a day communicating across social media chartrooms. For healthcare organisations, it is necessary to have a stronger presence within these communities which can ensure that messages are communicated and received. Social media also provides a platform to reach a far greater audience as the average person has around 130 facebook friends. Messages can be shared across the web in seconds. Digital engagement platforms also provide an opportunity to lead conversations online and improve brand awareness.
There is no doubt that digital engagement is crucial if better positive health outcomes are to be achieved. Many healthcare organisations are still slow to adapt to digital communication and there is growing evidence that important messages will fail to be delivered if digital communication avenues are not utilised. If your audience is online then effectively delivering positive health messages through digital engagement platforms will see much more success.
This post was brought to you by Daryal Begley at Magnetize PR. They are a digital engagement agency provide digital marketing, social media services, content marketing and conversion rate optimisation.
