Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Observations from HIMSS 2011 - First Up "Social Media"

I attended the annual HIMSS show, which was held in Orlando this year.  I'll post some of my observations from the show.  First up, Social Media!

Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media

 I attended a Mayo session in which the Lee Aase discussed how Mayo has executed their social media strategy.  Here’s a link to his presentation.  Lee is the director of the Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media

10-20-30 Rule for Presentations

Guy Kawasaki, who was previously a leader of Apple, recommends the 10 20 30 rule: the 10 represents no more than 10 slides, that 20 represents no more than 20 minutes and the 30 represents no text at less than 30 points shall be presented.  Good recommendations to live by!

Use Flip Video – Not Blogs

Lee also recommended that healthcare should not start in social media with a blog, because blogging is a written skill and requires hard work.  Instead, use what you already have and then use that content across many channels. 

Why Video?

Lee recommended the use of voice and video; specifically conducting 20 minute or so interviews.  He was a big advocate of the use of the Flip phone for capturing both voice and video when conducting an interview of your personality.  Not only is the video produced by the Flip device acceptable, it's tremendously less expensive than professionally produced video.  Additionally, the video that's created tends to have greater value in the eyes of the viewer because it’s not professionally developed.  Lee detailed the following as key reasons for voice / video:

  • ·       Nimble alternative to news releases
  • ·        TV producers can “try before you buy”
  • ·        Sound & motion instead of word pictures
  • ·        Lowers the threshold for “news”

Why Social?

Lee also pointed us to his “35 Social Media Theses,” two of which I found particularly compelling:
“Paying for advertising while not taking advantage of free online opportunities isn’t particularly astute.”
“You can save enough using free social tools in your current work to pay for your expanded efforts in social media.” (Aase, 2011)

Unholy Trinity:  Legal, IT, & PR

Lee also had a humorous reference to those that prevent the use of social media tools within an organization and he referred to them as the “Unholy Trinity:” Legal, IT, and PR.  When he was asked about how to address legal concerns, he had several recommendations:
  • ·        Provide a standard disclaimer: the purpose of the disclaimer is to point out that the material presented is general in nature and tailored to a condition or disease, but specifically is not addressing an individual patient's situation.
  • ·        Provide lots of content:  the purpose of lots of content is to develop credibility and drown out mistakes.  In other words, if you have lots of content, and one particular video has a mistaken it, the mistake is more easily accepted by the public when it is surrounded by a sea of positive content.  If you make a point of acknowledging your mistakes quickly and those mistakes are drowned out by all of the positive content, then the mistakes become much less dangerous.  Perhaps a different way of looking at it is this: If the only content you have presented through social media are mistakes then you’ve got as a crisis;  on the other hand, if you have lots of content, and one mistake, then it's really not a serious problem.
  • ·        Faux Paux Fridays: the purpose of the “Faux Paux Fridays” e-mail is to continue educating those that produce content about mistakes that people make.  As an example in a recent Faux Paux Fridays e-mail he sent out a story about a surgical nurse who had taken pictures during surgery and posted them to her Facebook account.  That was obviously a mistake and it was an easy way to reinforce the fundamental restrictions protecting health information, PHI and HIPAA.