Over the past few years, the Internet and social media have had a great influence on all business segments including healthcare. Both social media and the internet are now being used by businesses to stay connected and communicate with targeted consumers, and to market or buy/sell products or services. Social media marketing plays a crucial part in healthcare digital marketing and healthcare businesses are also aware that social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc are important for reaching out to potential patients and healthcare customers. A good social media strategy helps to reach out to a large number of targeted audiences and boosts your business’s visibility with both existing and new consumers.
In 2016, LinkedIn found that 90% of top-performing sales people use social media as part of their sales strategy. The way of selling your services and products has changed over time. The traditional method of selling has changed to social selling. Social selling refers to making use of your social networks to find the right prospects to build a trusted relationship and achieve your sales goals. It ensures better sales, lead generation, and sales prospects. Social media marketing and social selling are distinct. Social media marketing uses social media channels to attract qualified leads, and they use email marketing and calls to action to transform these leads into clients. Social selling leans more towards conventional sales process, connecting with leads on social networks. Social selling puts the traditional sales process on social media channels and connects with leads on social media platforms. They would comment on their posts on LinkedIn and Twitter or share or retweet them. These interactions act as sales touch points.
Today healthcare businesses are moving towards social selling because a greater number of people use social media. Tools to track social selling helps healthcare marketers keep up with leads and understand what strategies work. The healthcare industry requires social selling due to the following reasons:
- Difficult sales cycles selling a complex product
- A high level of difficulty identifying the right buyers for your medical device/solution
Businesses that want to begin with social selling can follow some useful steps:
- Businesses should have value-driven social networking and they must also know which social media channels are valuable; for B2B companies, LinkedIn is ideal.
- Marketers should have built-out pages, posting schedules and followers.
- They should post valuable content and not just promo content about their products/services.
- You can find groups that have relevant topics and add insights to those. There are many groups active on Facebook and LinkedIn. Find the prominent groups, join those groups and start connecting with them. Posting useful content on these groups will increase the number of followers.
- The next step is to connect with prospective clients. You can begin by sending a message in LinkedIn or any other social media channel, which is a polite way to start a conversation. Begin the conversation by providing something useful to the prospect, such as an informative/relevant article. Otherwise, answer a question that a person must have asked. After building a rapport you can start marketing your sales materials.
Just as in conventional marketing, it is important to measure efforts. Most social selling platforms have built-in analytics that will help the marketing team understand what works and what doesn’t. Social selling is a new concept, but businesses are already realizing its significance and those organizations that have implemented social selling already know how useful it is. It is essential to identify the platforms wherein the targeted customers spend most of their time. Your marketing team should be educated regarding what it means to provide real value, be helpful and engage in constructive networking via social media. Social selling also signifies that a business hopes to gain footing as a helpful resource and expert in their particular niche.
Social media plays a crucial role in healthcare digital marketing. Social media marketing is the ideal solution for reaching out to prospects and retaining existing healthcare customers. A Medical SEO company provides effective social media optimization, social media marketing and selling solutions that will ensure your business better online visibility, increased traffic and conversions.
