The Value of Good Healthcare Reputation Management
With the shifting market dynamics to patients as consumers, it is critical for healthcare facilities to maintain a positive reputation. Here’s a look at the importance of maintaining a good online reputation and how healthcare leaders can assess their facilities’ reputations.
How Online Reputation Management Influences Patient Decisions
A negative reputation can lead to a loss of public trust and highly qualified staff, negatively turning resource management and clinical operations. On the contrary, a good reputation attracts new patients and great candidates, and vice versa; hiring efficient and capable staff improves patient satisfaction through the high quality of care.
Healthcare industry trends expect consumer spending to reach $10 trillion by 2022, with the U.S. topping around $10,224 per capita—double the expenditure in other countries. Professional and word-of-mouth referrals have been replaced by online reviews that are crucial elements to the organization’s standing and growth.
Most healthcare organizations strive to make continuous improvements. By prioritizing the patient experience, organizations can improve their online reputation to lead the way into this new digital era. Healthcare leaders can leverage the internet to build awareness, gain authority, grow revenue, improve the quality of patient care, as well as attract more clinicians.
Prioritizing Patient Care
When choosing between two hospitals or healthcare providers, patients look past the convenience features offered by the facility and instead focus on the quality of care other patients have received. That knowledge is obtained through reading online reviews.
Almost three-quarters of Americans (74.6%) search online for their health care needs. Two-thirds (66%) of online browsers state the more positive reviews an organization has, the more they trust it. Prioritizing patient care and maintaining a positive and updated online presence will give new patients an idea of what to expect and boost the organization as a trusted healthcare provider.
A negative reputation can cause an organization to lose exceptional talent, leading to problems with continuation and quality of care. It’s challenging to maintain an efficient staff-to-patient ratio if the organization has a lot of negative reviews. In 2016, Glassdoor performed a U.S. site survey that found 70% of people look at a company’s online reviews before accepting a position. They will turn a job down if the company’s online reputation is poor.
How to Evaluate Your Organization’s Online Reputation
Leveraging the digital market with online reviews should be a high priority for all healthcare leaders. Therefore, leaders should analyze their current online reputation by visiting common review sites like Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Healthgrades to get a sense of their current standing.
Social media platforms and online review sites have become one of the most critical elements to a facility’s position in the community. A gated healthcare reputation management program is a reliable way for leaders to monitor their facility’s online reputation. These online management programs automate the review request process after the patient’s visit or stay. It stops bad reviews with tailored feedback forms before they go public, allowing the organization to save their reputation and do right by the dissatisfied patient. It also makes it easy for satisfied patients to leave a positive review on the platforms that matter most to the organization.
No matter whether your business objective is to attract patients or qualified clinicians, online reputation management is important to any organization. In addition to online reputation management tools, companies like CareerStaff can help overcome the hurdle of negative reputations regarding employment.
CareerStaff Is Here To Help
At CareerStaff, we help healthcare facilities by providing high-caliber, well-qualified healthcare professionals. Our staffing solutions relieve the administrative burdens of maintaining a consistent, reliable, effective, and economical labor force. Our healthcare professionals are a cut above the rest and can assist in virtually any medical setting, including emergency rooms, operating theatres, hospital floors, or clinician offices.
In need of contingency solutions for your facility or interested in learning more about how healthcare MSP can help you ensure continuity and quality of care? For more info, contact us today, or request contingency staff now.