Why Does Social Media Matter to the Health and Wellness Industry?
With a flood of health and wellness marketers and providers in the market, standing out from the crowded space is essential, even for well-established health brands. As social media platforms have exploded by 93% over the past five years, leveraging the marketing power of social media is a must.
The boom in social networks alongside the rapid increase in wellness searches as a result of the pandemic has opened a massive window of opportunity for digital healthcare marketing strategies that use social media marketing to launch new products and services.
Here are the top five social media and health branding benefits that make right now the best time to deploy a detailed social media marketing strategy.
Benefits of Social Media In Health and Wellness Business
Navigating health and wellness crises
Many consumers use social media as a news source to stay on top of current events happening in the world. And, the COVID pandemic was no exception. During the pandemic, sharing key safety guidelines, tips, and statistics related to coronavirus are all highly effective ways to increase engagement and traffic to your website through social posts.
Engage and Educate
As health and wellness providers, consumers often use social media as a way to manage their health and/or get support for chronic conditions. Posting information about symptoms, how to get medical help when needed, or even sharing resources related to staying healthy during the pandemic can be highly shareable content.
Raise awareness for events, new treatments
Many social media users scour their social media timelines to learn about new events, trends, and treatments. If your health and wellness brand offers cutting-edge services, posting them on social media is a great way to quickly differentiate yourself in the market.
Making yourself a staple in the community
One of the fastest ways to increase credibility as a health and wellness provider is by having a social media presence. Hosting live events, allowing patients to post questions, and sharing your expertise as it relates to medical conditions should all be parts of a health and wellness social marketing strategy.
Highlight Staff Accomplishments
Patients are naturally drawn to health and wellness brands that can highlight the human element of the work that they do. Showcasing staff that has achieved accomplishments, gained training accolades, or won awards helps illustrate your services’ credibility.
If social media is an integral part of any successful health and wellness marketing plan, then the natural question becomes: what are the best platforms to use?
The Best Platforms for Health and Wellness Social Media Marketing
Facebook for Health and Fitness Products Marketing
With 37% of Facebook users being over the age of 40. This is a great platform to reach Boomers and others who may be managing health care for an older parent or family member. The key with this and any social platform will be in posting regularly and in a way that will resonate with your target audience.
Twitter For Health and Wellness Branding
When it comes to short marketing messages that can capture your target patient’s attention. Twitter is the best platform to use. Couple concise messaging with high-quality images and Twitter could become a winning component of your organization’s health and wellness marketing strategy.
LinkedIn for Health and Wellness Branding
The average annual income of a LinkedIn user is $75,000+, making it the platform to leverage if you’re trying to reach an upper-class market. In addition, by posting research-based articles. LinkedIn can also be a great place to increase your health and wellness brand’s awareness, reach, and credibility.
Youtube for Health and Wellness Branding
Video is king with over 1 billion hours watched every day. By sharing educational and highly relevant health-related video content, health brands can quickly reach a larger audience. The important thing to consider is how to make the videos engaging. While also leveraging them as mini sales machines for your business.
Crafting a successful social media marketing strategy is often easier said than done. To effectively tap into the incredible healthcare marketing power of social media. You’ll want to take time to plan out content, research your target audience. And craft engaging posts that are well suited for the platforms you will be using.
Here are the best practices you’ll want to follow to ensure that the time you invest in producing content will be worth the investment.
5 Best Practices to Guide Your Content Strategy in Social Media
Publish educational content to keep patients in the loop
Whether it’s FAQs related to a common illness, daily health tips, or free resources for patients. That is helpful to learn more about specific symptoms, conditions, or general news. These are great ways to teach and engage followers.
Use inspirational content to motivate your followers
People regularly read and share motivational content posted on social media. This is a highly effective way to uplift your followers. Also, establish your health and wellness brand to provide support to its customers.
Post infographics for increased engagement
Infographics are great visual pieces to share and educate followers on a wide variety of relevant topics. It will be important to pick which topic areas are most of interest to your target audience. And center infographics around these content genres. If you’re creating blog content, this is an ideal starting point for repurposing content. And getting more value from your existing marketing assets.
Harness the power of health-related hashtags
Keep in mind that many users search social media platforms based on hashtags that are relevant to their interests. By adding these same hashtags into your health and wellness social media marketing strategy, then you can ensure that your content will be seen by the right followers.
Publish patient shout-outs to spread positivity
Testimonials can go a long way in helping to establish any health and wellness organization. Whenever possible, post customer testimonials as a way to both provide credibility. But also to humanize your brand and show its impact.
Final Words
Social media marketing is one of many digital marketing strategies health and wellness brands must use to reach a larger audience. However, crafting a winning health and wellness social media campaign is not as easy as it may seem. From picking the appropriate social media platform(s) to use. To the right content to post to engage followers to a specific call to action. Launching a successful social media marketing strategy takes a highly detailed and organized approach.
If you’ve been considering launching a paid social initiative, there are a couple of ways I can help. I am currently offering a limited number of short consultation sessions. As well as a VIP half-day session with me and my team for a deeper dive. If you’d like to set that up or have any questions, just send me a quick email.