Before social media, health communications professionals heavily relied on mass communication -- television, radio, print media and billboards -- to disseminate health messages. This meant the same radio listener would hear messages about prostate screenings and messages about prenatal Vitamin C – two clearly different target audiences.
With social media, health communications professionals can more efficiently reach those interested in particular messages by engaging people using specific social platforms. Engagement takes place when recipients of information become participants in conversations about that information.
How is Engagement Measured?
Measuring engagement on the Web is a complex undertaking. Health communications professionals may mistakenly attempt to measure campaign success based only on web site traffic; but true engagement requires interaction, rather than the number of “hits” or amount of traffic to a site. Additionally, measuring engagement effectively requires an understanding of different types of Internet users.
Josh Bernoff, co-author of Groundswell, divides Internet users into five categories: creators, critics, collectors, joiners and spectators. Engagement is measured differently according to the type of Internet user.
* Creators contribute content to the web. To measure their engagement, health communication professionals can measure the number of blogs authored about the online campaign, or the number of videos or articles posted as a result of the communication.
* Critics post reviews and ratings online. Health communication professionals can review comments on blogs and online forums to measure their engagement.
* Collectors gather Internet information. To measure their engagement, communication professionals can calculate “tags” to web pages and photos, RSS feed subscriptions, and social bookmarking.
* Joiners use social networking sites. To measure their engagement, communication professionals can monitor fans, friends and followers on social networking sites.
* Spectators observe what’s happening on the Internet. This is where it can helpful to monitor the traffic to blogs, forums and websites since these users will simply watch, read or listen.
By remaining mindful of the different types of Internet users and their respective methods of using the Internet, communications professionals can more accurately assess whether their information is reaching the desired audiences.
Kaynak
http://community.pathoftheblueeye.com/wiki/health-communications-about-engaging-right-audience
