In this television spot for the Memorial Medical Center (Springfield, IL) Orthopedics department, designed as part of an overall campaign, six adults use their hips and knees during various everyday activities. They get some multitasking in as well. While the activities are performed, each person explains why Memorial Orthopedics is the most experienced in the region.

Consumers like to think that they make buying decisions with their heads.  Some are adamant, even without provocation. But advertisers know better.

While at dinner parties and social business events, I’ve had more than one fork of food stall on its way to my open mouth as I tried to digest a stinging comment from someone I didn’t even know about how my chosen profession is “full of bad art without any real purpose”.  “C’mon, you got a couple in separate bathtubs . . .out in the woods . . . holding hands . . . why would anyone in their right mind think that a commercial like that could sell a pill for Erectile Dysfunction?”  My lack of response, coupled with raised eyebrows, is misunderstood as signs that I’m actually looking for another example.

“Or that gecko . . . selling car insurance. . . I know people like the little creature, but how many stupid people are there who would buy insurance because some lizard says they should?” (click this link to see the type of person I’m describing).

Well, a lot of people.  And they’re not stupid.  They’re, well, people.  They’re human, and they react to human things that appeal to the most persuadable parts of their minds — their emotions.  Rarely do we buy based on our intelligent minds.

Successful advertisements aren’t trying to win debates.  They’re not even trying to be logical.  Instead, they’re trying to cut through all of the clutter that has filled a viewer’s mind, connect with a need the viewer has, and associate the product or service with the successful fulfillment of that need.  Logic has nothing to do with this, and neither does passing along valuable knowledge. Indeed, as proven in the medical community, having a whole lot of knowledge about a subject has nothing to do with how a person views the subject.

In research published by the Journal of Internal Medicine titled “Healthcare and Lifestyle Practices of Healthcare Workers: Do Healthcare Workers Practice What They Preach?”, it was shown that the lifestyles of healthcare workers were basically no different than the general population when it came to important medical concerns like weight control, binge drinking, and cigarette smoking.  Amazing, right?  Despite all of the facts and knowledge they have on these subjects, and all of the deadly reminders they see daily, healthcare workers act, in general, no different than those with much less knowledge of the dangers of these lifestyles.  They’re fat, drunk and stinky just like everyone else.

Clearly, knowing the facts doesn’t sway people.  Knowing that 60-something % of smokers will, in fact, die from smoking doesn’t stop people from smoking — not even healthcare workers.  These people are choosing to follow unhealthy lifestyles, despite knowing clearly the risks they are taking.  The decisions they make have nothing to do with knowledge.

What persuades people, what overrides all logic and rationale thinking in the minds of all people, is when a clear message gets wrapped up in an emotion that resonates within the population. How else can you explain a brand of flavored carbonated water selling for five times the price of a no-name brand?  Logically, it’s just a drink; but emotionally, it’s so much more.  Indeed, it’s “The Real Thing,” whatever that means.

“We’ve taught over 10,000 people how to play the piano in just three months!” has nothing on “Everybody laughed when I sat down at the piano, but then I began to play . . .”  One gives facts — big, ho-hum facts.  The other hits an emotional nerve — “man, I’d love to impress people by playing the piano.”

All advertising, including healthcare, connects better with the audience when it involves emotion.  “Our Retina Center Has More Modern Technology Than Anyone In The State” cannot compete with “Jimmy’s Parents Feared That He Would Never See Again. Then They Saw Us.” I was able to add even more emotion, and thus more power, to the second headline by simply adding a child.  “More Technology” is a brain phrase for “better”.  However, “Fear” is an emotional word for “do something”, which really is the point of the ad.  The first headline explains.  The second headline gives hope. People react to hope.  They want opportunity.  They don’t want knowledge because they really don’t know what to do with it.  And I think the health habits of our medical community prove this fact.

Maybe the next time I’m confronted at a dinner party, I’ll point out that the Erectile Dysfunction ad was aimed at men, giving them hope by talking to their pleasure centers.  I’ll then ask my “friend” if he would prefer that the ad say honestly and factually,  “This pill has thrilled millions of men and, at the same time, aggravated millions of wives”.

Nah.  Let them believe they buy using their brains.  We advertisers know better. I’ll just try not to choke on my food when the subject comes up.

UPDATED 9/18/12:  IF YOU READ THE POST ALREADY, SKIP TO THE UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM.

Many healthcare marketers like to throw things at the consumer wall to see what sticks. It’s not a bad practice, especially when you really analyze what sticks in order to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of your marketing. In fact, we do the same thing.

Let's see: Recipes. Hair styles. Inspiring quotes. And hospitals?

One marketing idea we threw at the wall was a video about the day in the life of a therapy dog. The question at the time, and this was a few years ago when Flip Cameras were just starting to gain in popularity, was whether videos drew people to our clients’ websites, and whether this subject matter had any traction. Well, this video stuck better than we expected, quickly turning into one of the more popular videos we produced at the time thanks to our posts in social media and our eblasts linking to the video, and drawing not only the local market to our client’s site, but people from around the country.

What we threw at the wall those many years ago took some time to coordinate, produce and market. It wasn’t easy, which made it important for us to know whether this activity drew a strong enough response to warrant future attention. But from the results, it was clear that videos needed to be a big part of our social media future. And to this day, they are.

And now we have Pinterest which is, like videos years ago, still in its infancy and still being analyzed to see if and where it fits into a marketer’s toolbox–regardless of what industry is being marketed. Some businesses seem to fit perfectly with Pinterest (like our client Seigles, who sells kitchen cabinets and has beautiful photos that are desirable to anyone looking to create a new kitchen), so it makes perfect sense to continue to throw their images on the Boards at Pinterest (even though it is very hard to tell if there’s any real success). But Pinterest for hospitals–who in the world thought this was a good tool for hospitals to use to promote their services?

Well, based on all the information I’m seeing, just about everyone thinks Pinterest is great. The site is so sexy, so trendy, so attractive, and so easy to work with, that it doesn’t matter to most if those Boards that healthcare marketers are throwing at the wall are actually sticking. Healthcare marketers are creating Pinterest accounts in droves, joining webinars to learn how to capitalize on it, and pinning whatever seems to fit both the site and the hospital’s purpose. Clearly, nobody fears their jobs will be in jeopardy if they have a board on Pinterest.

While posting to Pinterest will almost certainly not harm a hospital’s brand, there’s no proof that anything hospital marketers pin is adhering to the wall strong enough and long enough to warrant the effort. My own professional opinion is that until they develop a geographic angle on the Pinterest site, or a way to track and work with users, it’s simply not worth the effort for healthcare marketers — even though their female, 25 years and up, demographic is highly desirable.

Right now, a Board on Pinterest is the equivalent of placing an ad in a national publication, but without the media cost. So although a hospital’s Pinterest board might be seen by thousands of (mostly) women and gain followers, the great majority of those followers likely are well outside the hospital’s service area. Quite simply, these pins are appealing to many people who almost certainly cannot be patients at the hospital. Hospital marketers are giving helpful recipes and exercise ideas to people who cannot impact their bottom line!

Oh sure, it doesn’t take a lot of time for healthcare marketers to pin anything they want, so it might not be seen as a total waste. In fact, that’s the defense presented in this article from American Medical News.

“Holly Hosler, marketing coordinator for LifeBridge Health, a hospital system in Baltimore, said that when several people in the hospital’s marketing department found they were spending a lot of time on Pinterest, they decided to start some on-the-job experimentation. They launched a board in March.

Their activity has mostly consisted of re-pinning content from other places. The content that has done well — and in Pinterest-speak “well” means that several people re-pinned the content — has been educational information about breastfeeding, especially posts that feature a picture of a cute baby to lure users. Hosler said she hopes to add more original content if interest in the site continues.”

But pinning does take a mindset. It requires marketers to have this website in the front of their minds in order to find and pin interesting and relevant subject matter. The Pinterest mindset comes at the expense of other, likely more time-consuming strategies and tactics, that are much more worthy of a healthcare marketers attention. To Ms. Hosler’s credit, her hospital seems to have a very active social media program, including a well fed blog, so this minor effort might be worth the test because it doesn’t come at the expense of other, more important, activities. But most hospital marketing staffs are taxed for time, barely getting to the tasks that really deserve attention. For those professionals, Pinterest should be low on their lists.

Video interviews with specialists, pay per click campaigns, mobile websites, service-line oriented discussion groups, segmented and targeted eblasts, and even basic blogs have already shown that they are permanently stuck to the wall, as they provide excellent returns on the hospital’s investment. But these activities require more thought to conceptualize, more cooperation among staff to coordinate, and more diligence to produce. Sadly, we see very few healthcare marketers tackling these trickier activities with a level of energy and enthusiasm that is worthy of the return they produce. It’s easier to pin, or to look at the pins from others. And few people in the C-Suite have enough knowledge of the marketing value of the Pinterest website to overrule the time that the marketing staff is devoting to it.

Further into the same article, you’ll find this nice summary from Jessica Seilheimer, senior vice president of digital strategy and planning for Euro RSCG Life Metamax, a health care marketing firm:

“Because of this narrow focus, Pinterest isn’t to a point where people are using it to seek out physician practices, Seilheimer said. But others say potential patients could stumble upon a practice’s website because of something that caught their eye on Pinterest.”

“Potential patients could stumble upon a practice’s website”?  I don’t think any client of ours would like to read that statement as the goal in a Creative Brief.  Not while other marketing efforts exist that are proven to actually lead people directly to the site.

So healthcare marketers, skip the hype and skip Pinterest for now.  Instead, take a clear look at the marketing wall and focus your efforts on the things that are clearly glued to it–especially the things that you are currently not doing.

UPDATE:

Okay, I’ve heard from quite a few people who agree with the point of this post, but I also heard from a few who fully subscribe to the whole “we’re just trying it out” idea.  When I ask how many hours a week they devote, they say it’s very little, like 1-2.  When I ask about the results, they say it’s hard to measure. Soooo, I measured for them.  On average, the great majority of hospitals I know who have a Pinterest page have 5 boards with one to five pins in each with maybe 1 or 2 repins of a few pins in each board (and usually those repins are things the hospital has repinned).  Even worse, they average less than 15 followers.

Then along comes this gushing review of the potential of Pinterest when you simply add a human touch.

“Rex Healthcare has been on Pinterest since the first of the year. He said it’s something that everyone in his marketing department is paying attention to. Papagan pins a few times a week. .  .  .  The organization’s goal is to increase its followers, likes and repins. Its Pinterest page has been cross-promoted on Twitter and Facebook. The hospital’s website and blog have navigation buttons for Pinterest. In addition, a Pinterest button will be added to the company’s email signature, along with its other social media platforms.”

Phooey.

So nine months, 18 boards and 358 pins later, Rex Healthcare’s Pinterest page has netted 91 followers.  But a video they posted on YouTube just one month ago already has 1,026 views, and they have a nice active blog and social media program (although I would push to get email addresses much harder on both the main site and the blog, and I wouldn’t allow someone to get an RSS feed of their blog since I cannot track readers through it).

I just don’t get the interest in Pinterest in the healthcare world.  And I’m not the only one.  Marissa Chachra, a a senior advisor with Jarrard Inc., has come to the same conclusion in this recent post, though she still holds out hope that there will be some value.  I do too, but I think it will be more in the area of consumer research rather than marketing to consumers.

Oh, and for the record, I truly enjoy Pinterest — personally.  Pinterest can be used to sell me watches, gardening tools, sports stuff, kitchen cabinets (which we do for Seigles), etc. easily.  But not healthcare.

I’ve grown very familiar with the U.S. healthcare system due to a variety of reasons, my work with hospitals being one of them. But the biggest reason is that I’m spending increasingly more time in hospitals and around doctors now due to the failing health of two of my relatives. While their situations are very different, the end result is oh so similar and not very pretty.

First, my mother’s situation.

My mother has been dying for the last ten years. But before I dive into this, please don’t feel any sympathy for me or my family — she’s been dying all these years because that is the only thing she has believed, regardless of what any family member or doctor told her to the contrary. For all we know, she could live ten more years which would probably scare her more than us.

It all started in 1996 when my mother’s life began to quickly lose meaning after my father passed away. While that in itself is sad, it has really been her choice. She has four grown children and eight grandchildren along with a good handful of friends, yet she has made little to no effort to be involved in any of our lives. Instead, she lives in the past, talking about how good it was and how happy she was. And she fears the future.

Then ten years ago my mother found out she had emphysema after being admitted to the hospital because she was convinced she was dying of lung cancer. While relieved at first that she was okay, she couldn’t believe she was fine and quickly became obsessed with her health. Each time she spent a week in the hospital, she would leave in a better frame of mind because “she made it”. But within a few weeks, she would be wondering again if that slight cough she just experienced meant she was coming down with something deadly. And after a week or two of working herself into a tizzy, she’d be back in the hospital, getting drugs and attention until she calmed down. Each time she was told she was still fine. After a few years of this cycle (including one lengthy stay in a drug rehab facility to get her off the pain medication she demanded from her doctor), I noticed her outlook for the future became even more dim every time she was discharged.

As time went on, my mother would tell the doctors that each breathing episode was worse than the last, and they would believe her. This frustrated all who knew her well because we could see that some days she was fine and that she certainly wasn’t on death’s doorstep. But our views didn’t jive with my mother’s view, so she grew frustrated with us and instead of improving, made it her mission to convince others that she absolutely was getting worse. She became very good at this game of manipulation. So good, in fact, that in one case her lung doctor told me after visiting with her that she had only six months to live. I replied that she was being fooled by my mother’s exaggerated antics and would certainly live much longer. The doctor told me I was “rude” and “selfish” because I knew nothing of her physical condition. While that was true to some degree, I knew far more about her mental condition and wanted to stress to the doctor that I knew her better than she did. Things got tense between us when I told the doctor that she was the one who was selfish for patronizing her with constant appointments and for feeding my mother all the drugs she requested. “We’ll see who is right” was all I mumbled as I walked away. That was six years ago. Funny, but that doctor is no longer in practice.

My mother’s decade long battle with emphysema has been turned into a long and sad journey for everyone, including her, almost from the beginning, with really no end in sight as far as everyone other than my mother can tell (and she has always thought the end was tomorrow). While her lungs are worse now than before, doctors tell me they aren’t so bad that they should be causing the type of problems that constantly drive her into the hospital. I believe her stress is the cause for her “related, but unrelated” problems, not her lungs.

You see, my mother uses the healthcare system to deal with her fears rather than her health. She says she’s suffering, so our medical professionals do all they can to help by prescribing drugs, running tests, and pursuing all angles to find a solution. Plus, my mother knows well the Medicare system. She knows how many days she gets in a hospital, and how to complain just right to get an extension. And she spends her time at home on the phone complaining to anyone who will listen at Medicare or the doctor’s office about the price of “her drugs” until she gets a reduction in the price or free samples. If she put all this energy to work in a positive way, she could have made a fortune. But this is a woman who, on average, earned about $14,000 per year for ten years. Her contributions to our healthcare system were minimal — yet her expenses are astronomical, and there is no end in sight that I can see. She is costing all of us hundreds of thousands of dollars, yet is still critical of those who try to help. She hates Medicare and Medicaid. She hates “being rushed out of the hospital”. And she hates the cost of everything. For support, she listens to the likes of Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, and all the rest of the fear mongers who play victim and insist that the government is out to get them. And she thinks they’re right.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’d love for my mother to live a long and happy life. And I would do everything in my power to give her that. But she doesn’t want it.

In the amusement park of life, my mother hasn’t ventured far from the exit. She hasn’t enjoyed one ride, or even enjoyed watching others enjoy the rides for the last ten years. Instead, she stands there, staring at the dark exit day after day fearing that it will call her forward. She even thinks she hears her name being called until someone shows her clearly that the door is locked and nobody is leaving.

It might sound mean for me to say about my mother, but the “problem” isn’t medical. Instead, the problem is in her head, and it’s exacerbated by doctors and hospital staff who wait on her hand and foot when what she really needs is a psychiatrist (yes, I suggested this many times and always got an “absolutely not”). But I don’t blame the doctors at all. They took an oath to do their best to help, and that’s what they do. Plus, the medical wold is now a competitive business, so doctors and hospitals want patients. They want the billings. And they want the satisfaction of helping people get back to normal. But all of this has a cost. And that cost is being paid by all of us.

Now I’m fine with paying my share to help those who want to live. But why pay for those who don’t? I know my mother would rather not be alive. She knows it too, and has even told me. But she fears death more. So she stands on guard, analyzing every ailment and every breath just waiting for “the one” to take her away. And as I wrote, she wants a physical solution, not a mental one.

It’s not fair that anyone lives a life that is lifeless. But that’s her choice. The only way that I, and all of us, are affected by her choice is that we’re forced to pay for it in time, dollars, responsibilities and heartache. And I don’t think that’s fair to anyone.

Then there’s my father-in-law. He too is dying, although for very different reasons. He’s 86 years old and has been struggling the past few months with his health. Until these recent setbacks, he was the ideal patient because he always got his checkups, always followed doctors orders, and always knew he’d improve. His struggles the past few weeks though changed all that. As if in disgust with his health and his seemingly impossible chances of recovering to a normal life, he gave up on dialysis in the middle of this past week. From what I’ve learned, he has a week or two left. And that’s sad, not just for him, but for all who love him.

You see, he never wanted to live in an Assisted Living Facility, or be a burden, or be resuscitated if God called him. But when he was brought into the hospital with some life threatening problems (yes, more than one) that had him almost, but not quite unconscious, the doctors saved the day. And that was great — kind of.

While recovering a few weeks ago, the doctors asked him if he wanted to go on dialysis to prolong his life. “What other option is there?”, he asked. “You can just let nature take its course, and you’ll pass peacefully” is what he was told. Being a dedicated, life-long Catholic, my father-in-law saw this second option as suicide. At 86, he feared this choice would get him booted from heaven. So he opted for dialysis.

While all of his children understood it was his choice, they also knew that dialysis was really not what he wanted. They warned him as tactfully as they could about the difficulties he faced by making such a decision, but at the time his mind was too clouded by drugs and too tired from the whole ordeal to understand the path he started on. His fear of committing suicide was far stronger than his ability to know what he was doing.

It surprised no one that my father-in-law wanted to keep trying, simply because he had no idea what he was really trying to accomplish other than to not kill himself. Yes, he could talk and yes, his words made sense. However, if you talked to him, then left the room for five minutes and returned, he would act as if you just got there. Even worse, he had no concept what the “future” was, much less how dire his situation was at the time. He really had no clue what he was getting into.

So why did the doctors ask him to make a choice and not his family? First, it’s their oath to do all they can. Second, doctors fear lawsuits, and rightfully so. Too many people claim too often that doctors made the “wrong” decision, so they are always going to do what the patient wants — even if it’s futile. This isn’t a slap at our doctors. Hardly. They are committed to extending lives, not ending them; therefore, they should not be put in the conflicting position of recommending death over life, especially when the patient is coherent.

But I think somebody should. And that’s where a so-called death panel comes in (on a side note, I must admit I despise that name. How about “Life Panel”?).

In my mother’s case, a Life Panel could ultimately help relieve her of a decade long bought with severe depression as well as clear all who care for her of the guilt and burden that comes with trying to satisfy her insatiable appetite for an elusive, if not altogether impossible happiness. In my father-in-law’s case, a Life Panel would have relieved him of the burden of committing suicide, while relieving his family of the guilt and burden that comes with caring for someone who doesn’t know what he is doing here and really needs to end his misery in a respectable way.

I know all of this might sound harsh, especially to those who haven’t come close to finding themselves in similar situations. But I also know others who have been or are in my spot, and most are of similar mind. I’m not saying anyone should be given a death sentence if there’s still hope, or if anyone close to the patient wants to keep their hopes alive. I’m not a fan of Dr. Kevorkian (those people could still live and function). All I’m saying is that the idea of a Death Panel should not be seen as taboo.

So could a Death Panel/Life Panel be an answer to these unusual situations? Wow, tough question, and I really don’t have an answer. Everyone’s situation is different, so I know there isn’t one answer. All I know is that the subject shouldn’t be taboo. Healthcare is so complex, we must be open to all ideas — even when they’re not pretty.

So I say “start the discussion” and don’t fear. We cannot live forever, and unfortunately too many people are living long after they have died.

Despite proven success, only 10% of U.S. hospitals and health systems are involved in social media (California HealthCare Foundation).   Even worse, few of the 10% really take advantage of the “social” side of this medium, instead preferring to simply push out messages about services, classes, and general news.  In fact, per the study, only 6% of all tweets (in the sample) were social interactions; therefore, 94% of all hospital and healthcare tweets were simply information.

This needs to change.

For social media to work, hospitals must be social.  Rather than just tweeting news, or uploading press releases to Facebook and LinkedIn (which, by the way, is still important), why not post discussion points, such as “how can we improve our Emergency Department?”, or “we’re redesigning our waiting rooms and would like your opinion regarding the furniture, carpets and wallpaper.”

This article has great information to help, so click the link below for a more thorough read:

Tactics for Achieving ‘Socialness’

From one of my online alert accounts, I was sent this link to a video about our client’s social media program.  In the video, Josh McColough, Marketing Communications Manager at Sherman Hospital, explains the broad picture of the program and what it has meant to their hospital.  He also discusses the future subjects for our tweets, blogs and eblasts.  It’s been a great pleasure working with the Sherman staff on Social Media.  They are always eager for us to try new things and explore new ways to keep them at the forefront of healthcare communication.  Plus, it helps to work with a client that understands well what we do for them, how we do it, and how it benefits them.

Everyone knows where babies come from — hospitals. Well, at least those that can wait!

But few hospital websites have fun with what is the most beautiful time in a future parent’s life. So next time your hospital is going to run an ad campaign for expectant mothers, think about sending them to a page in your site that will encourage them to come back often. One way to do that is with “pregnancy tracking” software or widgets. Below is a perfect example. If you embed this into a specific page on your site that encourages the sign up and gives more information about your service, you’ll be building a market base of names with whom you can communicate, plus you’ll likely draw more people back to your site to track a loved one’s pregnancy.

Here’s the widget. It’s embedded here in a blog, which you can also do. Or simply put it in your site:

Here’s a live one for a friend of mine to show you how it works:

More about babies and free baby samples

UPDATE 11/18/08 — Livescribe has a similar product (pen) as below; however, unlike the Mobile Digital Scribe below, the Livescribe will work with Macs. Click this link: Livescribe Digital Pen

——————-

Mobile Digital Scribe is the first device ever to capture natural handwriting from any surface, and store it in the receiver for future use. Based on a revolutionary electronic pen that uses ordinary ink refill to write on any paper, the Mobile Digital Scribe stores handwritten notes, memos or drawings for easy upload to any computer at your convenience. No special digital notepad is required.
Additionally, if the Mobile Digital Scribe is connected to a computer, handwritten text and drawings are displayed directly on the computer screen.

The first device ever to capture natural handwriting from any surface, and store it in the receiver for future use.
No special notepad, digital pad, or ink is required
Included handwriting recognition software (OCR software) turns your handwriting into digital text
Full editing capabilities allow you to easily modify your notes
Export notes via JPEG format and share notes with other users via E-mail or Instant Messaging
Write on any paper up to Letter or A4 size
12 Language OCR Support (English, Spanish, Traditional/Simplified Chinese, French, Dutch, Italian, German, Portuguese, Swedish, Korean, Japanese, and Russian)
Great for Legal and Medical professionals
Students don’t need to carry their laptops to class, write on paper and upload your notes when you are back in the comfort of your room.

Go Digital

Requirements:

Microsoft Windows® 2000, XP or Vista (boo, no macs?)
Minimum 128MB RAM
50MB available hard disk space
Minimum 32-bit color quality
Office XP, 2003 or 2007
USB Port

Go to this link:

Mobile Digital Scribe

According to new research from Enid Burns at The ClickZ Network, blogs can have more impact on purchase decisions than social networks. Blogs create a conversation and trusted resource that influences purchase decision.

The study, “Harnessing the Power of Blogs,” sponsored research by BuzzLogic and conducted by JupiterResearch, a Forrester Research company, looks at the evolving influence from the reader’s perspective. “What we wanted to do was look at the reader’s side of the coin, look at reader patterns and how people are reading blogs…and drill down into the content impacting other media platforms,” said Valerie Combs, VP of corporate communications at BuzzLogic.

Readership of blogs is on the rise. JupiterResearch noted a 300 percent growth in monthly blog readership in the past four years. Readers look to links and multiple blog sources to extend the conversation: 49 percent of blog readers, defined as someone who reads at least one blog a month, and 71 percent of frequent readers all read more than one blog per session. Multiple blog sources offer more opportunities for consumers to see blog ads. A quarter of readers say they trust ads on a blog, compared to 19 percent who trust ads on social networking sites.

Advertisements on blogs are an opportunity for marketers to reach consumers. The findings said 40 percent of people reading blogs have taken action as a result of viewing an ad on a blog; and 50 percent of frequent blog readers say they have taken action. Of those actions: 17 percent have read product reviews online; 16 percent have sought out more information on a product or service; and 16 percent have visited a manufacturer or retailer Web site.

“More and more publishers are become extremely savvy understanding the game and becoming better at monetizing, which is great for the advertiser as well,” said Combs.

The survey also finds consumers are influenced by blogs at the moment of purchase decision. The channel plays a greater role than social networks, likely because bloggers establish themselves as an authority on a topic, particularly in niche areas, and create a relationship with the consumer.

“One of the things that’s so great about them is the personal, specific information,” said Combs. “Thorough, useful, honest creation, create a level of trust with the reader.”

We at Demi & Cooper just love blogs for our clients (heck, you’re reading our own blog now!). In healthcare, websites simply cannot be written for discussion purposes — they are reference tools designed to get the viewer the information he or she seeks quickly and easily, such as where are you located, how do I find a doctor, what services do you offer, etc. In homebuilding, websites show what the builder offers, where it’s at, and what it cost, plus a whole bunch of other biased info.

But blogs can go deeper into each subject, explaining medical procedures (even using video), new facilities and procedures, etc. in health care. In home building, testimonials go in blogs, as do local events, new hires, new techniques in building, etc.

But the most valuable thing you can do with a blog is tag it (digg, delicious, etc.) and link it so that the topic of the blog will come up in searches. We even Twitter our clients’ blogs and feed it to Facebook, getting the social community behind our work.

So just blog it. It won’t hurt and the results will be very impressive.

All of us who work in or with health care companies are well aware of the number of “clinics” popping up that offer basic medical care, including administering flu shots, conducting sports physicals, etc. While these facilities certainly are stepping on our toes, the problem is that we’re not in a unified position to thwart their efforts.

Health care systems typically have a small service area, and many of us are in direct competition with those who are closest to us. So banding together to fight these clinics is a long shot. Also, these clinics focus on one of the biggest problems people have with traditional health care organizations — convenience. We simply take too long for the average consumer.

But something must be done. While we’re fragmented, chains like CVS and Walgreens can blanket a large area and make the public believe that they have the solutions people need, namely speed and convenience. But when it comes to caring for someone’s health, convenience should not out weigh quality.

Look at this video for an example (professionally done for CVS and Minute Clinic), then the second video which was made by a woman on her home computer.

Obviously this pharmacy doesn’t instill a lot of confidence in this woman. And they shouldn’t. Lacking doctors and records, these facilities are like McDonald’s for healthcare — they’re fast and convenient, but the quality is suspect. Should any parent trust their healthcare to a “Fast Health Clinic”?

Of course, there are exceptions — but they are few and far between.

So what’s our industry to do? Well for one, we must educate. Consumers need to know what these clinics are and what the risks are to their health. But more important, traditional health care companies need to realize that the days of calling all the shots in your service area are long gone and that we must respond to the needs of our patients. Competition is increasing, and it’s not even coming from those who offer what we offer.

Some Immediate Care Centers (hospital owned and/or managed) now offer online “waiting times” to help consumers decide where to go for help. Others offer 30 minute guarantees. And others even send email reminders about annual physicals, follow ups and flu shots with online appointment schedulers. But sadly, those who are actively maketing their “convenience proposition” are also few and far between. And this cannot continue.

As hospitals deal with this weakening economy and the reduction in procedures, we must find ways to reduce the growing leak of patients who are going elsewhere. Our future depends on it, and the health of our service area also depends on it.