Blogging is not for everyone. It takes time, effort, and most importantly passion to talk about your particular area of expertise.Bottom line, if you’re not someone who likes to write a lot, blogging feels more like work, right?
But what if you didn’t have to write? What if you’re constantly on the go, and are at your desk/in front of your laptop for a precious few hours a day? What if you’d rather talk than write?
Well, a good friend in the space, Aaron Strout,(who heard from another friend Bryan Person) just turned me on to a terrific new platform call ipadio, where essentially, you can blog from your phone or broadcast live to the world. Virgin Media uses it to communicate with their staff of 20,000 people, and Oxfam used it while recently in Haiti during earthquake relief efforts.
The concept is very simple: Get the ipadio app- simply fire up your iPhone or Droid, and speak into your phone. You can either record an audio blog/podcast for use at a later date, or simply broadcast to your company, employees or friends. And to get really technical, there are great data collection, interactive, voting, and transcription services.
I’ve put ipadio to the test, and it works amazingly well. Listen to the podcast below for 3 more reasons why I think this is a great tool for businesses.
P.S. I’ll be using ipadio in the future for brief 2-3 minute updates on Social Media, so stay tuned, or subscribe to the feed. :-)
Bill and I finally met face to face at this year’s SXSW AllHat Party (thanks to Armano and the good people at Dell). Bill is one of those lucky social media/community evangelists that get to call Sonoma, California home. Imagine that. While he’s not managing communities, building social media strategies for clients, and running great conferences, he’s basking in wine country.
So, on to interview #28 in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Social Marketers Series.
About Bill
He’s JUST about to join the Dell Social Media/Community team down in Austin, TX. (I’ll let him fill you in with more details)
7. Habit you want to form for 2010
Becoming a better (and smarter) information consumer, curator and producer. Specifically, this means being more discerning about the content streams I pay attention to, being more systematic about how I save and share “the good stuff” and become more disciplined about producing content (specifically: blogging).
It’s still a great time to talk about healthcare and social media.
Just like every other industry, healthcare has changed dramatically in the last 15 years with the abundance of information available to patients beyond their physician. Docs might not like it, but patients are going to continue to come in with questions about something they read online. More importantly, they might be reluctant to ask doctors at all, instead relying on “experts” on the Web.
Doctors need to accept the fact that patients are going to the Web first for information on their health just like information on big purchases, entertainment, and so much else. They’ll start with Google and their network of friends and families. Then they’ll sift through the most effectively search-engine optimized sites for those they trust the most. The best way to combat misinformation from these resource is first to have an online presence and second to embrace in two-way conversation with patients.
The conversation is going to take place with or without you. A physician should adopt social media to communicate with patients more effectively and publish reliable information their patients can use in their independent online research. Right now in healthcare, the most widely used tool is email -A doctor or nurse can answer questions and dispense advice by replying to emails to give patients immediate, actionable information. But the future can be so much more efficient. Hospitals could have a team online, acting like customer service representatives and chatting with patients to determine when a child’s fever warrants more concern than a cool wash cloth and Tylenol. Imagine if 10 hours spent online with patients can avoid 20 hours in the doctor’s office?
There are lots of tips and tricks out there, but Dr. Bryan Vartadedian from the Better Health blog network has it right when he says “90% of social media is just showing up”:
“I took a lot of heat when I posted this quote on Twitter a few months back,” he said in a post last week. “But I think there’s something to it. Everyone wants to believe that social success comes from deep, ‘meaningful’ relationships. These descriptors are relative in the virtual world. Social media isn’t rocket science and simple visibility has real value when you’re starting out. Find socially active doctors. Be present. Be real. See how things evolve.”
