“How do your customers identify providers in your network? Your answer could be very important to your organization’s success,” posits Noel Coleman, president of Doctor.com Enterprise (formerly Connect Healthcare). Here’s why: “Today, Find-a-Doctor tools (such as a physician directory on your website that is optimized to meet your patients’ needs and search habits) are an important part Read More
Part 1: Make Sure You Achieve These 5 Strategic Goals // By Noel Coleman // How do your customers identify providers in your network? Your answer could be very important to your organization’s success. Here’s why: Today, Find-a-Doctor tools (such as a physician directory on your website that is optimized to meet your patients’ needs Read More
Winners of the 2017 eHealthcare Leadership Awards were announced today at a special keynote presentation at the Healthcare Internet Conference in Austin, Texas. Over 200 organizations, representing a broad industry spectrum, received recognition for their outstanding websites and digital communications. A total of 116 individuals familiar with healthcare and the internet judged the entries. See Read More
For Jonno Boyer-Dry, creating a chatbot for cancer patients wasn’t a project based on financial goals or institutional efficiency. It was something that emerged out of personal experience. “Part of what is maddening about being a cancer patient is that resources and information are incredibly disaggregated,” says Boyer-Dry, who was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma three Read More
From small operations to large-scale providers, human-first is the key to a successful chatbot platform // By Melanie Graham // For Jonno Boyer-Dry, creating a chatbot for cancer patients wasn’t a project based on financial goals or institutional efficiency. It was something that emerged out of personal experience. “Part of what is maddening about being Read More
Community benefit reports have been an important component of hospital communication strategies for many years. For nonprofit healthcare systems, this reporting mechanism is required to demonstrate the positive impact they have had on community health to retain tax exemptions and other benefits. But as consumers’ information consumption habits have changed, the format and role of Read More
// By Ahava Leibtag // In the spring of 2016, the marketing team at Aurora Health Care (Aurora) turned to Aha Media Group (Aha Media) to help it enhance and optimize its Heart and Vascular website content. The heart and vascular content, while warm and friendly, did not include the standout differentiators—such as nationally renowned Read More
// By Lisa D. Ellis // Community benefit reports have been an important component of hospital communication strategies for many years. For nonprofit healthcare systems, this reporting mechanism is required to demonstrate the positive impact they have had on community health to retain tax exemptions and other benefits. But as consumers’ information consumption habits have Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Hospitals and health systems think of their websites as the digital “front door” to their organizations, but before consumers get there, search engine results could steer them away to competitors with higher star ratings and more positive reviews. Reputation is everything. The sheer number of places consumers post information Read More
Ask the Expert, with Kathy Divis // By Jane Weber Brubaker // What keeps chief marketing officers up at night? We asked Kathy Divis, president and co-founder of Greystone.Net, to weigh in on the top concerns of marketing executives in healthcare organizations. While acknowledging that there are many and diverse challenges in today’s complex environment, Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Your brand is the sum of the experiences a customer has with you, says Matt Gove, chief consumer officer at Piedmont Healthcare in Georgia. This definition goes beyond the conventional scope of patient experience, or as Gove consistently refers to it: customer experience. Patient experience historically has been a Read More
“The robotic yet charming voice of Alexa can help you find a good movie, make a payment on your credit card, get airline fares for a trip to Dublin, or see how many calories are in the banana you’re eating,” notes Shawn Gross, Chief Digital Strategist at White Rhino. “With an estimated 11 million devices Read More
// By Shawn Gross // The robotic yet charming voice of Alexa can help you find a good movie, make a payment on your credit card, get airline fares for a trip to Dublin, or see how many calories are in the banana you’re eating. With an estimated 11 million devices sold, the Amazon Echo Read More
Advances in technology in recent years have made it possible for health systems to streamline their efforts on many levels, from evaluating and monitoring patients remotely to sharing medical information among multiple sites in real time. Some medical centers are also creating audio podcasts to educate patients, the general public, and even clinical staff, according Read More
// By Lisa D. Ellis // Advances in technology in recent years have made it possible for health systems to streamline their efforts on many levels, from evaluating and monitoring patients remotely to sharing medical information among multiple sites in real time. Some medical centers are also creating audio podcasts to educate patients, the general Read More
Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic are ranked #1 and #2 in the country respectively by U.S. News & World Report. But that doesn’t automatically mean that their websites will live up to their stellar clinical reputations. But they did, according to the 2016 eHealthcare Leadership Awards judges. These institutions were the only two to garner Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic are ranked #1 and #2 in the country respectively by U.S. News & World Report. But that doesn’t automatically mean that their websites will live up to their stellar clinical reputations. But they did, according to the 2016 eHealthcare Leadership Awards judges. These institutions Read More
Insights from New Study of Healthcare Consumers’ Digital Experience // By Becky Barney-Villano // Retail has done it for years. Restaurants have, too. Even the banking industry is now meeting consumer expectations for on-demand services with such capabilities as mobile deposits, and complicated mortgages are being closed with a few clicks from a smartphone. Healthcare Read More
“Reputation management has never been more important for healthcare providers and organizations that are actively seeking new patients. Why? The increase in high-deductible health plans has created a new breed of healthcare shopper,” says Becky Barney-Villano, healthcare writer and marketing specialist. “The rise of insurance exchanges where consumers pick their plans has resulted in more Read More
// By Becky Barney-Villano // Reputation management has never been more important for healthcare providers and organizations that are actively seeking new patients. Why? The increase in high-deductible health plans has created a new breed of healthcare shopper. The rise of insurance exchanges where consumers pick their plans has resulted in more robust and careful Read More
Managing change is hard, even for innovative organizations like Boston Children’s Hospital. “That’s something I hear in all the businesses I’ve worked with, from GE to Cigna to here,” says William Gagnon, senior director of global digital strategy and customer engagement at Boston Children’s. Digital transformation at Boston Children’s is laser-focused on making the shift Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Managing change is hard, even for innovative organizations like Boston Children’s Hospital. “That’s something I hear in all the businesses I’ve worked with, from GE to Cigna to here,” says William Gagnon, senior director of global digital strategy and customer engagement at Boston Children’s. Change is risky, and healthcare Read More
A growing percentage of consumers with employer-sponsored health insurance are choosing high-deductible health plans that have lower premiums. Citing data from the Kaiser Family Foundation, Becker’s reported that 24 percent of employees enrolled in high-deductible health plans in 2015, up from just 4 percent in 2006. The downside of HDHPs is that out-of-pocket costs are Read More
This leading awards program, which drew over 900 entries last year, recognizes the very best websites and digital communications efforts of healthcare organizations, online health companies, pharmaceutical/medical equipment firms, suppliers, and business improvement initiatives. Now in its 18th year, the awards program is presented by Plain-English Health Care, publisher of eHealthcare Strategy & Trends and Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // The nature of our health system in the U.S. is that it is massively complicated, with many variables that impact price. It’s extremely challenging for health systems to give an answer to a patient who asks a seemingly simple question: How much will this cost me? First a provider Read More