Social Media...What Does That Even Mean?

Webster tells us that Social Media is “forms of electronic communication through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content”. That sounds well and good and that definition makes sense…but what does Social Media have to do with your practice and why should you care?

Times, they are changing. Gone are the days of Direct Mail Marketing and News Paper and Yellow Page Advertising. Knowing this, you may have already stopped and asked yourself, “How on earth am I supposed to promote my practice?”  The answer is Social Media. Ok… so now you’re thinking, “I have a FaceBook Page for my practice, I’m golden.” Not the case. Social Media is more than just having a FaceBook Page.

There’s Blogs, Twitter, Instagram, Google+…and that’s just the tip of the Social Media iceberg. And knowing when to post is just as important as knowing what to post. While most practices think of the kids when it comes to posting on their FaceBook Page and Blog, the kids are not the people who actually make the decision as to which practice they are going to select for their treatment. “Mom” is your target marketing and “mom” is who you should be thinking about when posting.Shareability is the driving force for all content. The beauty in people sharing your content is once they share it, they feel an emotional ownership and loyalty to that content, because it has helped enhance others. Their loyalty to your content generally mirrors their loyalty to your practice.

While professionals in the orthodontic industry may find FaceBook Posts and Blog articles on Oral Hygiene, Invisalign and Eating Tips interesting, the majority of the general public does not and typically will not follow practices whose social media is heavily loaded down with this type of content. And if “mom” isn’t following you, “mom” isn’t sharing your practice with her friends. Finding the right mix of posts and articles on patient education and fun stuff to insure “mom” will keep sharing is key to a successful Social Media Marketing Program.You have an amazing practice, your patients and their families are thrilled with their results. Now it’s time to spread the word. Your Goal…put together a Social Media Program. Get yourself a FaceBook Page and a blog and start building your likes and followers. Post content at least once a week, if not more. And stay on top of it…cause believe us when we say, the practice down the street is already doing just that.

Not sure where to begin or how to manage your Social Media? Give us a call. Many practices have turned to us to manage their Social Media Program because of our unique formula. Our practices have had great success because of the research we have done on the content your target market is interested in following.

SEO Isn't a Minor Part -- It's the Whole Machine

Many of our clients don’t fully realize how important SEO is, or how big a part it plays in the whole scheme of things. They view SEO as a minor part in a much larger machine when, in fact, it is the whole machine.

And like most machines, it takes a lot to maintain it and each part must work in unison with all the others for maximum efficiency. If just one part isn’t working correctly it can have a detrimental effect on the whole machine.

SEO’s parts are things like social media, inbound links, site structure, and quality content, among others. If you remove one of those parts, or refuse to fix it when it no longer works, your SEO suffers and its effectiveness is called into question.

Clients must maintain an active role in helping to ensure all of the parts of SEO are in place and functioning properly. For example, social media is a big part of SEO now and it’s vital to keep current with Facebook posts, YouTube videos, Google+ pages, and online reviews. If a client doesn’t devote enough time to this part, SEO is bound to suffer.

Another important part is the website content itself. We build each site with optimization in mind, setting the foundation for effective SEO. But sometimes a client will want changes made that can undermine the effectiveness of our SEO. Even changes as simple as tweaks to the navigation, or additional paragraphs of text, can have dramatic consequences if not done properly.

Search engine rankings tend to fluctuate, sometimes daily, but if all parts of SEO are working as they should, these fluctuations can be minimized. All it takes is a good maintenance program to keep the SEO machine running smoothly.

bLink News

  

As with all technology products… change is constant.  Changes in operating systems, browsers, practice management applications, security software are almost a weekly occurrence and require continual support. Combining this dynamic environment with the fact that we continue to add features and functionality to bLink to enhance the user experience, requires top-notch communications.  Thus the introduction of “bLink News”. Our goal is to distribute information on each of our products monthly so you are aware of any new features, bugs and fixes as well as tips on what other practices may be doing to maximize the impact of using our product.

What’s New with bLink

 

We have added several new features to bLink this past quarter including:

• Appointment Confirmations from emails…confirmations from text are on their way!

• The Mass Email Feature was pushed out in January and in seeing the volume of use worldwide… an appreciated feature.

• A Resend Feature was added to allow you to have an instant response to your patients that say they didn't receive an email reminder.  A simple push of a button will resend the email and confirmation that the patient is indeed receiving messages and that each has provided the correct email credentials and has set his or her settings properly.
  
  We are also adding this to the Text feature in the next update.

• Dolphin 5.5 Integration…this was a challenge due to the varied table structures in the new version of Dolphin Management. This was pushed out in April and seems to be working fine.

• Split Email and Text Distribution Times were requested from several of our clients.  This was developed, tested and released last quarter as well.  Now patients can have varied times for text or email notifications.

 

Technical Notes and Information

You should have received a notification that we had a glitch in May that caused a backlog and timeout on emails.  This issue was resolved.  The reason was due to the massive volume of emails being generated worldwide by bLink.  The queries overlapped causing the conflict.

Tips: If you are a tops user, please remember to leave the server on 24-7.  We still receive a few calls per month on syncing issues that are caused by a doctor or staff-person turning off the Mac that contains bLink Sync.

 

In the Works

bLink Aire (bLink 2.0) will be introduced this fall at the fall meetings. bLink Aire is a complete rewrite of bLink Pro and will offer many, many new user features as well as offer integrations with Cloud Based Versions of your management software. We are adding a complete suite of management tools to provide instant messaging to our users advising of any missed syncs, or conflicts or errors.

You have probably heard about our new bLink E-toons, animated cartoon messaging.  This is an add-on module that is sure to put a smile on the faces of your patients. We are developing a series of 11 E-toons which will be located under the Appointments, Patient Education and Events tabs.

bLink App!  Is finally just about ready to go.  We have a large number of orders for this so product we are thrilled to finally push it out.  Look for its release along with bLink Aire in the coming months.

You can review information on these changes and new bLink related products on our website at www.solutionsbydesign.com