The consumer revolution is still spreading. It’s already upended a whole slew of industries . . . publishing, media, entertainment, consumer goods, retail . . . but until now it’s left healthcare relatively untouched. But that’s changing.
Yesterday I wrote about the growing phenomenon of online communications forums (aka “Twitter Conversation Communities”) based in Twitter.
Today I wanted to talk about one of those communities that’s of particular interest to me – a group that’s focused on using the power of social networks to help people to get healthier and create a system that works better than the one we have today.
There are over 500 people following the “official” twitter account of the Health Social Media group (@healthsocmed). Inspired by @PRSarahEvans ‘ #journchat group, a PR student from the University of Alabama named Dana Lewis (@danamlewis ) founded the Health Social Media group in January of 2009. The group meets every Sunday night at 9 p.m. EDT, and it’s easy to follow along using the hashtag #hcsm .
Sometimes the topics are predictable. HIPAA, privacy and data security. Health care reform. This past Sunday, we strayed into some new territory – territory that got a lot more exciting and interesting for me. We tackled questions such as:
- Who owns social media inside an organization?
- What’s the role of the IT department in social media?
Both of those are subjects that I feel passionate about, and had a great time debating – always respectfully – with my colleagues. As to who owns social media, refer back to Chris Hall’s post on Humana’s Social Media Chamber of Commerce (”Meeting of the Minds“). As to the role of IT . . . let’s just say that I’d love for that role to be different from what I see in most companies today. In healthcare, it’s been my experience that the IT department is concerned with data security (which is as it should be) and little else (which is NOT as it should be).
But I digress (please, come digress WITH me next Sunday night!). I spoke yesterday with Tom Stitt, who has helped Dana Lewis to moderate and bring some order to the conversation (it’s a big job for a single person – especially one who’s working and going to school!) Tom is a longtime healthcare pro (he’s currently working on a fascinating project called http://patientcast.org) who’s helped Dana to manage lots of the action that happens between Sunday meetings.
On any given Sunday, there are 50-100 active participants on #hcsm. But there are a lot more “lurkers” who are watching the action, and are often unsure of the rules of engagement. Many of them will contact Tom or Dana after the meeting to ask how to participate. The funny thing is that, while this might look like a committee meeting where one shows his or her credentials before entering, it’s really an open forum. Anyone can participate at any time. The only rule is that there’s no “pitching” allowed during the hour of the forum – a rule that seems to be taken quite seriously.
So what do I get out of it?
- First, I get access to a network of people who care about many of the same things I do. I’m now following most of the people who are following @healthsocmed.
- Second, I get to hear what things those people are concerned about, working on and wondering how to begin. That helps me both to learn things I didn’t know before, but also to contextualize my own work a little better
- Third, I have a forum of true experts on whom I can test my ideas and thinking, and be referred to the best thinking out there.
So I think that we’re going to be seeing more communities like this showing up . . . in fact, if you know of other Twitter Conversation Communities, I’d love to see your comments here.
And if you’re interested in Health and Social Media, I suggest the following:
- Join in the next conversation on Sunday night at 9 p.m. EDT
- Follow @healthsocmed on Twitter
- Check out the web site at http://healthsocmed.com
- Follow along in the HealthSocMed friendfeed room
See you Sunday!
Popularity: 3% [?]
DISCLAIMER ALERT: The ideas expressed in this post came out of my own head, were researched by my own eyes and were expressed by my own hands. They are not intended to serve as medical advice in any way, shape or form. And they do not reflect the views of Humana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. I take full responsibility if you think this post is awesome or not awesome.
Every Sunday night an interesting group of people gets together . . . except that we’re not really together, and (almost without exception), we’ve never actually met one another.
That interesting group of people are in a “Twitter Conversation Community.” What that means is that, at a predetermined time each week, a group of 50-100 people who are interested in health and social media will arrange to be on Twitter. A designated moderator will then ask a question:
. . . and the conversations begin.
Sound like a free-for-all? It is. At any given time, there might be 10 conversations going on. And the only way that things hang together at all is that all of the participants use a hashtag to identify themselves. If you’re asking, “what on earth is a hashtag,” you’re probably in good company. A hashtag is a unique identifier that allows you to aggregate a conversation happening between multiple participants – most commonly on twitter. Specifically, you add a “hash” sign (#) in front of an identifying code (like #hcsm for “health social media”).
Using a hashtag makes it easy to run a Twitter Search on the tag . And once you’ve generated a twitter search, you can run a live feed from that search into any feed reader. And that’s how all of these disparate twitter users can follow all of the action.
While twitter doesn’t allow for tremendously deep conversations, twitter conversation communities can be really valuable:
- They allow people with similar interests to find each other
- They promote conversations and the spread of ideas and best practices
- They form the basis for new communities that can work together for mutual benefit – whether that’s by increasing their collective knowledge base, crowdsourcing new ideas, or just through the value inherent in having an expanded network
The most significant conversation community (and as far as I know, the first) was #journchat, a “weekly conversation between journalists, bloggers and PR folks.” It was created by Sarah Evans, the Director of Communications at Elgin Community College. Over just a few months, journchat has grown to several hundred weekly participants – and each session lasts for three hours.
For anyone interested in participating in a twitter conversation community, journchat has posted a nice “how to” document on their web site.
Greg’s Want Ads:
- An index of Twitter Conversation Communities
- A new name for Twitter Conversation Communities, which is both too long and too boring. Although admittedly fairly descriptive.
Up Next: the Health Social Media conversation community
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DISCLAIMER ALERT: The ideas expressed in this post came out of my own head, were researched by my own eyes and were expressed by my own hands. They are not intended to serve as medical advice in any way, shape or form. And they do not reflect the views of Humana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. I take full responsibility if you think this post is awesome or not awesome.
It seems like everyone just can’t stop talking about social media. Just last week my wife received the American Council on Exercise’s (ACE) bimonthly newsletter and sure enough the cover story is “Marketing Your Fitness Business with Online Social Media”. (So yes, she now has homework to do!) It’s no wonder that sole-proprietors in the service industry have caught on. Times they are a changin’, and this economy is a catalyst for finding new ways of doing business.
But if you’re new to social technologies, as I was not so long ago, it can seem seriously overwhelming—not unlike those remote controls above. Blogs, micro-blogs, social networks, aggregators, feeds, sharing, and privacy issues, does it ever end? There’s a flurry of these tools and it seems like a new one catches my eye every time I fire up my laptop or iPhone. My first experience came when I finally gave in and created a basic MySpace page last year. The first time someone “dropped by” my page to “leave some love” was my cue to skedaddle out of there. I deleted my first invitation to Facebook and I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to read the ranting and raving of us common folks in a blog. I just didn’t get it at that time.
I started in the Innovation Center in January of 2008. Since social media was on our horizon, I decided that it was time for me to tiptoe in again. I am happy to report I’ve found what I consider to be the right tools for my needs. This might help if you find you’re overwhelmed.
First things first: limit your time online on any social media/networking site. Set a limit and stick to it. I spend no more than 30 minutes online and usually at night. Some of these actually allow me to be more productive.
Facebook – Sign up, build a profile, add a photo, find friends, and share. It’s that easy. Thankfully, it has enough privacy settings to lock your profile down like Fort Knox. We ought to know—Fort Knox is just down the street. AllFacebook has the must-read, skinny on privacy as well as how to get the most out of the social networking flagship. (Thanks @chimoose)
Google Reader – you can search the blogosphere for blogs centered on topics of interest to you and then read them all in Google Reader. First get a Google account and then simply look for the RSS feed on a website or a blog and click subscribe. I don’t browse to news sites anymore. I let them come to me in the reader. I can share the articles I like with my Gmail contacts.
Blogs – there are several ways to start blogging. You can create your own blog, or contribute to other blogs by posting comments. There are about a dozen of us who are taking our blogging baby steps right here on Crumple it Up. I have found Guide to Blogging very useful.
Twitter – this micro-blogging tool is the latest rage in social media. Messages are limited to 140 characters yet millions of people are using this. As far as I’m concerned, the key to Twitter is that it’s all happening in real time. Want to know what people are thinking about a brand right now? Check. You’ll find out. Also check out what our social media guru @naimul wrote about the rise of the health tweeple.
LinkedIn – this is an online resume and networking hub all in one. If this economy has you down, LinkedIn must be part of your solution to get back up. I hear it’s being used as a really inexpensive recruiting mechanism. It’s ideal for networking and connecting with hard to reach people. You really never know who’s in your network. In my experience, your profile on this page should be kept professional. Save the socializing for other sites.
Delicious – if you’re like me, you have a computer at home, a computer at work, and now a mobile device with a browser. Delicious is social bookmarking. What I love about it is it doesn’t matter which computer or device I am on because all my bookmarks are stored here. I can share them or keep them private.
SlideShare – this is like YouTube but only for presentations. The first three times I used it I found what I was looking for within two minutes. Priceless.
There’s no shortage of social media tools. I haven’t mentioned any video sites like YouTube or 12seconds.tv because I haven’t had much use for them other than entertainment. The theme here is utility. Hone in on what you need, try out a few tools, and keep the ones that make your life easier.
For further reading, our social media buddies Jason Falls, @jasonfalls, and David Finch, @davidfinch, have written extensively about all these topics on Social Media Explorer. Their motif is to embrace possibilities, and these guys know their stuff. Regardless of whether your desire is to build a personal brand or to learn something new, don’t be afraid to wade in.
What did I miss and more importantly, how are you using these tools to make your life easier?
Popularity: 9% [?]
DISCLAIMER ALERT: The ideas expressed in this post came out of my own head, were researched by my own eyes and were expressed by my own hands. They are not intended to serve as medical advice in any way, shape or form. And they do not reflect the views of Humana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. I take full responsibility if you think this post is awesome or not awesome.
I recently spent some time in Chicago, where I attended Blogwell, a program designed to highlight how large companies are using social media. Those of you who’ve been reading these pages know that I am a newbie in this space. I’m not in PR and I’m not a marketer*. But I have become a believer in the power of social media to change the way businesses work.
This conference was unique in that we actually got to hear from some other companies rather than just agency folks (not that I don’t love you – don’t get me wrong!) I’ve been hearing a whole lot of agencies and consultants puzzling over how to engage with their clients who "just don’t get it." And I think that there is an answer, but not many have really found it yet.
One of my colleagues, who is not a social media zealot, put it really well.
"You implied that corporations aren’t getting social media despite how obvious it is. My take is that it isn’t blatantly obvious . . . the value will have to be defined, articulated, proved and communicated about 6,298 times . . . If you tell me about being more efficient and reducing service costs, be prepared to articulate HOW the efficiencies will be achieved, WHY you think so, and show me your plan to track and measure your progress. Because if you fail to show the results of those efficiencies, we’ll just make up the difference out of your budget . . . Doing [social media stuff] because everyone else is doing it or because some blogger I’ve never heard of says we’re stupid for not doing it will only get you thrown out of the room."
The interesting thing is that there aren’t many agencies that have the relationships and reach to be able to do all of that heavy lifting inside the corporation . . . at least there aren’t any in my company. And that means that it’s going to fall to the evangelists inside the company to do that manual labor – which, perhaps, is as it should be. If we’re smart (and lucky) we’ll be able to band together with others inside the company who think like we do, try some small and not-too-risky things, and start making our case. And be prepared to articulate what we’re doing and why – even if we have to do it 6,298 times.
* I am familiar with the argument that "everyone is a marketer" – but for the sake of this argument: I have no training in marketing, am not employed as a marketer, and no interest in marketing except as a part of what it takes to create and sell a product.
Popularity: 6% [?]
DISCLAIMER ALERT: The ideas expressed in this post came out of my own head, were researched by my own eyes and were expressed by my own hands. They are not intended to serve as medical advice in any way, shape or form. And they do not reflect the views of Humana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. I take full responsibility if you think this post is awesome or not awesome.
When we launched the Horsepower Challenge this past spring (see video/more info) in 5 Louisville middle schools, we learned a lot of interesting stuff. For example: More than 50% of the kids playing this exergame included their families in their exercise program. AND, 45% of the kids ate better during the competition.
So what?
Well, the first reason those stats are interesting is that neither activity was explicitly or implicitly encouraged, or even mentioned, as a part of the program. The kids did it on their own. The second is that it points to something important: kids can help their families be healthier.
If you’ve been reading this blog, you know that one of our core design principles is that we focus first on what’s fun – and use that as a way to get to what’s healthy. And we’ve had a big week. The Battle of the Bulge launches on Facebook today (December 24) and the Freewheelin Cycle Challenge has now been launched at Humanagames.com.
Why am I telling you all this? Because I need your help with the Freewheelin Cycle Challenge. And it involves a contest. With Prizes. For YOU. As a parent, I know that having kids at home, with a month off, in lousy weather and stuffed full of sweets makes for kids with short attention spans. And we want for those kids to play the Freewheelin Cycle Challenge. We think it’s a fun game that can teach kids some healthy stuff.
So my challenge for YOU is to reach as many parents as you can, and convince them to get their kids to play the game (which, by the way, is easy and fun for all ages. OK, maybe all ages over 5. My infant nephew thought it was lame).
I’m going to give away a bunch of iTunes gift certificates to the contestants who:
- Reach out to the most people to tell them about Freewheelin Cycle Challenge
- Come up with the most creative ways of reaching out to people about the Cycle Challenge (that might include a creative communication channel and/or a creative and persuasive message)
The legal rules of the competition are: There are none. At my sole discretion, I will determine how many winners there will be, what the winning criteria are, and the value of the gift certificates. I reserve the right to be arbitrary and capricious. But I will DEFINITELY give public props to the people who impress me. How to play? Simple.
- Create a strategy for getting your message out.
- Do it.
- Tell me what you did (and if possible, how it worked) by commenting on this blog post.
The contest will run between now and Friday, January 2. I’ll announce the winners on Monday, January 5. So tell your friends! Share this post on your web site! Tell your neighbors! Write letters to the editor! Shout it from the rooftops! Whatever works for you. Just tell us about it here, and help some kids alleviate their holiday boredom – while they learn a little bit about health.
Popularity: 4% [?]
DISCLAIMER ALERT: The ideas expressed in this post came out of my own head, were researched by my own eyes and were expressed by my own hands. They are not intended to serve as medical advice in any way, shape or form. And they do not reflect the views of Humana Inc. or any of its subsidiaries. I take full responsibility if you think this post is awesome or not awesome.
