Maximize the Value of Video in Healthcare Marketing

By Lisa Bowen

In the healthcare industry, it’s important to be able to measure your ROI to continue to get the budget you need. However, when the numbers are down, patient volumes are low, and the census is not where you want it to be, the marketing budget’s the first thing that gets cut. Yet that’s when you need marketing the most. 

As you’re beginning to think about your 2022 marketing plan and the budget, you’ll need to help support it, I want to talk about one tactic that’s super important to include — video.

There are some great statistics out there that show the increasing value of video in your marketing efforts. By 2022, online videos will make up more than 82% of all consumer internet traffic. That’s 15 times higher than it was just in 2017. A third of online activity is spent watching videos. 

The use of video marketing is important in any industry, but in healthcare where you’re trying to build trust, set yourselves apart as the expert, and differentiate yourself between lots of other providers out there, it’s critical. It’s one way to authentically connect with your consumers. Doctors’ offices and hospitals can feel cold and scary and not a place you want to be. People don’t want to think about healthcare or even deal with it unless they have to. Videos can play a great role in helping to humanize healthcare and offer a more personal and comfortable interaction.

There are lots of different ways to use video and the first is your website. It’s a critical space for video to be utilized. The average user spends 88% more time on a website that has video. As healthcare providers, you have a multitude of information to share, to help woo those new prospective patients, from provider information to specialties you offer, and hours of operation. That means we need to keep people on your page longer and find ways to engage them. And video can be the solution. 

Another reason you should have video on your website is it also helps with your findability. A website’s 53 times more likely to reach the first or front page of a Google search if it includes video. Video also increases your organic search traffic; some say by up to 157%.

So how can you use video on your website? The first thing you can do is you can do a welcome video. It’s a great way to tell patients and prospective patients about your hospital or clinic through video in a less intimidating way. You can let them know what they can expect if they entrust their care to you, which is important to patients. We can use video to help with patient testimonials or use it as a tool to let your biggest fans who are your current or past happy patients, and even your staff tell their experience and help tell your story. Video is the most compelling and authentic way to get the biggest bang out of your patient testimonials. Sharing a text quote with a first name and a last initial just doesn’t give you as much traction as a video.

Another way that every healthcare provider should use video is for their provider introductions and bios. Consumers always do their homework, especially before selecting a healthcare provider. Video bios are a great way to let your provider showcase their expertise, but also their personalities. That’s the key to creating long-term relationships with your patients. If you can create a relationship with your patients, that’s engaging and they can relate to their provider, it’s going to be more of a long-term relationship and those patients are going to continue to come to you for their care.

There’s an abundance of need for education in healthcare, whether it’s procedures or conditions or courses you can offer. People are more proactive in researching before they choose a provider and before they go to the doctor. And if you ask most providers today, they’ll tell you that a lot of patients come to them with a self-diagnosis in hand and looking for validation and a treatment plan. So people are looking for information. 68% of consumers prefer watching videos to learn about products and services and care as compared to articles, infographics, eBooks, and presentations, which have all been used effectively too. But with the trends we’re seeing today, video is so much more effective.

Education helps build trust and demonstrate that expertise in your area. One of the ways to do this is you can do online video courses, which can also serve as a lead capture tool. Before you have a surgery or procedure, you can complete a course online and learn in detail about what it is and lead to a new visit or a new patient.

The other great thing about video is it can be repurposed. Once you create those educational videos, they can be transcribed and repurposed into blogs or broken into shorter segments that can be used to enhance digital and social media efforts. It takes a some effort to create videos, but they do have a lot of use.

Social media is another great place to use video. It stands out in anyone’s feed, and we’ve already talked about the trend of people preferring to watch content over-read it, so that’s true in social as well. People are twice as likely to share video content with friends compared to any other type of content. And we all know that people go to their friends and their families when they’re looking at where to receive their care. That’s where people are getting a lot of their referrals for physicians.

Live video is also becoming increasingly popular on social media. It can be used to promote events, offer education, or just show a day in the life of your hospital or clinic. There’s nothing more genuine than live video. Anyone can do it. This is something that any practice can do regardless of your budget too which is great. Live video doesn’t need to be edited. It doesn’t need to be highly produced. It just puts yourself out there and allows you to connect with your audiences and tell your story.

The other benefit of live video is it can be archived so prospective patients can watch it whenever they want. Most views won’t happen during the live broadcast, so don’t be offended if no one’s watching. It’s been shown that 93% of marketers say they’ve landed a new customer from a video on social media. So people are looking at videos on social.

If you’re going to invest in creating a video strategy and putting some great content out there, it’s important to have a YouTube channel to house that information, organize it, and make it available to the masses who are looking for the information you’re sharing. YouTube has the second largest reach (the first is Facebook!), but more importantly, an average session time on YouTube is 40 minutes — much, much longer than any other platform. In healthcare, you have a story to tell and lots of information to share, so video is a great way to capture that attention.

This just barely scratches the surface of how video can be used, especially in healthcare. It’s a powerful tool that if used correctly can show the personal side of healthcare, enhance your patient experience, and most importantly, boost that engagement leading to long-term relationships. Using the right video at the right time can keep patients and prospective patients engaged no matter where they are in their journey. 

If you’d like to learn more about KidGlov, our expertise in healthcare, or any other industry we touch, you can visit us at kidglov.com.

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