I’m a sucker for contests. I absolutely love them and I enter them all the time. Contests are not only a great way to win something cool or gain some extra cash…they are a great way for the company who is running it to advertise themselves or their product. Lets be honest, we all remember the Doritos contest winner from last year’s Super Bowl. Why? Because Doritos did some serious marketing to promote their contest last year, therefore leading to crazy amounts of brand awareness for them all over the internet. I mean, if you see something you like or you have a friend who submitted a commercial and you want to help them get votes, where are you going to post a link? More than likely you will post it on Facebook or tweet it to get exposure from the widest audience all at one time without having to know everyone’s email address.

Some friends of mine recently entered a submission in this year’s Doritos Crash The Superbowl Contest. Within days of posting their video, it is one of the most viewed commercial submissions on the whole site. This proves two things. One is that the use of social media can spread the word rather quickly and two is that Doritos just got oodles of exposure without spending money on media placement. Think about that. Someone just created a commercial for them for free and even if it’s not picked, about 1,400 people have seen it without them even having to do anything. That is excellent marketing! Of course, they are offering the winner 1 million dollars and the chance to work with The Lonely Island, but your prizes don’t have to be so extravagant to get people to participate. Let’s be honest, we all like free stuff.

Our client, Sherman Health, is currently running a contest for Movember. If you don’t know what Movember is, it’s a month long event where men grow mustaches. For Sherman, the mustaches symbolize men’s health and through their Movember Contest, one lucky guy sporting a sweet ’stache will be taking home some Blackhawks tickets. If you haven’t heard about the Movember contest, take a look at the Sherman Health Blog and see what other fabulous prizes we are giving away! Don’t forget to start growing out that mustache .

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.

Sherman Hospital will be featured on ABC’s Good Morning America
on Thursday, April 16th, 2009 at 8:05am CST.

The surgery that we helped Sherman Hospital simulcast on Twitter and Facebook has helped a lot of people better understand the benefits of Sherman’s high-tech surgical robot and how they have become a leader in advanced medicine. Possible candidates for surgery in the community followed along and became more comfortable with the procedure. Even the patient’s family was able to watch on a Blackberry from the waiting room! We’ve helped Sherman get featured on TV, websites, blogs, medical journals, magazines and newspapers across the country and as far away as India and Australia. But tomorrow morning we’re proud to announce that they will be featured on ABC’s Good Morning America at 8:05am CST! Check your local guides for channel information.

Background

With getting media attention, timing is everything. The press seemed to be primed for a great story about how Twitter and Facebook could be used for a practical purpose. We did some research and came up with the idea have Sherman become the first ever hospital to simulcast a surgery live on Twitter and Facebook. Not just any surgery, but a high-tech robotic surgery. It takes a lot of courage to do something like this, and we would officially like to thank some very important people at Sherman Health:

First we would like to thank Sherman’s patient (who of course remains anonymous) for graciously agreeing to let her surgery be Tweeted. Secondly, Doctors Rajah Chatterji and Humberto Lamoutte who headed up the six-person, robot-assisted surgery team. And let’s not forget the marketing team at Sherman:

Christine Priester | Follow on Twitter @cpriester
Transition Director, formerly Marketing Director

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Josh McColough | Follow on Twitter @joshmccolough
Marketing Manager

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Michelle Howe | Follow on Twitter @michellehowe27
Marketing Specialist

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Of course, you are also welcome follow myself @marcbattaglia and Walter Ottenhoff @wottenhoff — we work here at @demicooper and ran the simulcast for @shermanhealth.

A close associate of mine recently spent five minutes explaining why she hated Rush Limbaugh. I asked her how often she listens to him and wasn’t surprised by her answer. “I’ll catch him two to four times a week” she said, adding for emphasis “it’s horrible.” Rush claims 20 million people listen to his program, but I wonder how many of them are just like my associate.

So why does she listen? Why does she make an effort to tune into a program she admits drives her crazy?

I believe it’s because in areas where people have strong, sound opinions, they want to express them positively and debate with those who they believe are “wrong”. And now, thanks to the ubiquitous nature of blogs and forums, those opinions can be expressed.

In meetings about social marketing, negative posts against the client are the number one action they fear. I understand that. After all, nobody wants to see something negative written about them, especially in a place where everyone and anyone can see it, and certainly not in their own blogs.

But I tell our clients that negative posts are going to show up anyway, and I’d rather know about them and handle or respond to them than let them go unchallenged. In many cases, those who post negative comments write them in such a way that anyone who reads them will recognize the irrational logic behind them. Take this example of a comment Sherman Hospital received after “Tweeting” a surgery (by the way, the patient agreed to do this and her family followed the surgery via the tweets while sitting in the waiting room. Also, this story was picked up by every major newspaper in our area, WGN TV news, Huffington Post and many other media outlets).

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“An advertising employee from Demi and Cooper in Illinois is texting tweets about a surgical patient undergoing hysterectomy and oophorectomy at Sherman Hospital with the da Vinci robot.
Gee, I guess just about anybody can get in the surgical suite these days
and send out live messages and pictures while they’re at it…. How would
you like 2 advertising execs witnessing your surgery and tweeting and
snapping pictures about it to send outward to just about anyone in the
world? Am I truly the only person who finds this a wee bit wrong?

Since neither Dr. Raja Chatterji or Dr. Humberto Lamoutte see to be
oncologists, it’s so refreshing to learn that over 1,000 people on Twitter
got to read and see images of what may well have been a completely
unnecessary oophorectomy, as well. Lovely.

Can any hospital sink lower? Yeah, probably. I can hardly wait…

In the meanwhile, thank you Sherman Hospital for providing me the most
disgusting media story of the day.

(name removed for privacy)

p.s. If this is the kind of medicine the “next” generation would like to
see…heaven help us all… It’s bad enough that so much technology of
today has removed the REAL human aspect of person-to-person contacts (while
providing us a quick tool for ease in “communication”), but when virtual
reality replaces reality and voyeurism stoops this low, well, it’s not for
anyone’s education. It’s just sick voyeurism. Ask yourself this — how
many of those unknown entities who signed up for the tweets on these
surgeries are secretly waiting for ‘the mishap’ to occur that makes their
time all that more memorable and well-spent? I bet it’s more than one…”
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Wow, how’s that for a tough comment? This reminds me so much of my friend’s interest in Rush and her inability to just ignore what she doesn’t like.

So why did this woman take so much time to tell us how disturbed she was by the tweeted surgery? Obviously we hit a nerve. But her comments were totally inaccurate. As I mentioned, the patient approved of the tweets and her family loved the communication. As for voyeurs, she’s right. People were fascinated in a good way, and I’m not just talking about the many medical students who followed the procedure, but also the many women and men who have this type of procedure on the horizon. Their feedback was great.

So the bottom line is that Sherman Hospital took a chance and saw some tremendous positive media coverage because of it. But with it came some negative responses which were expected.

Was Sherman right to open themselves up to criticism while trying to further their mission? Of course. Life is all about taking calculated risks, otherwise we’ll all just remain stagnant. Passing up an opportunity like this because you fear negative comments shackles you to the status quo — and that’s not where any forward thinking company should be.

So go ahead, take chances. And when you get some negative comments, relax. You cannot please everyone, and unfortunately, many of those who you cannot please would rather write you to complain rather than just ignore you (like my associate who cannot ignore Rush).

Get ready for surgery in the 21th century! On Thursday, April 2, at 7:30 a.m., Sherman Hospital will be the first hospital in Illinois to provide live “Tweeted” updates of a surgery — but not just any surgery — it will be a high-tech robotic surgery using Sherman’s da Vinci surgical robot. And we at Demi & Cooper are proudly running the program. Through the social-networking site Twitter, Sherman officials will provide a running commentary, updates of activities and photos of the procedure. Twitter users will continuously receive messages of 140 characters or less, called “Tweets”, by following Sherman at http://twitter.com/shermanhealth. It’s just one more example of some of the cutting-edge things we’re doing as part of the robust social media services we offer to our clients.

“Sherman Hospital is committed to becoming one of the best community hospitals in the nation,” says Christine Priester, Director of Marketing and Public Relations, Sherman Health. “This is an example of our forward thinking and dedication to educating and connecting with the community.”

The procedure, a hysterectomy, will be performed using the da Vinci Surgical System, a sophisticated robotic platform designed to expand surgeon’s capabilities and offer a minimally invasive option for major surgery. For the first time ever, future hysterectomy candidates will be able get an idea of what is involved with the procedure in a way they would never have been able to before.

Raja Chatterji, M.D., and Humberto Lamoutte, M.D., both OB/GYNs and surgeons on the medical staff at Sherman Hospital, will be performing the operation, slated to last two hours. Both Drs. Chatterji and Lamoutte received extensive training with the da Vinci Surgical System before receiving certification in 2007. Dr. Chatterji received his medical degree from the University of Cincinnati College Of Medicine, and Dr. Lamoutte received his medical degree from the Louisiana State University. Both physicians had residency at Charity Hospital in New Orleans.

Be sure to follow @ShermanHealth on April 2nd to watch the live hysterectomy. And while you’re on Twitter, why not follow Demi & Cooper too? Then you’ll know about events such as this one, as well as learn about the many different ways we use Tweets, blogs, eblasts, and other social media strategies to help our clients.