Now, I know mom always said it wasn’t right to brag on yourself, but go ahead and do it just this time. You deserve it. After all, we all know how hard you work and without many resources. So nominate your hospital or healthcare system for a Best in Class award.
Yesterday, while eating a leisurely breakfast in San Diego before our Webmaster Workshop, with some fun and a little amazement, I watched crowds of people head toward the last day of the 2010 Comic-Con. Many of them – young, old and every age in between — were in ”extreme costumes” that were hard to believe. Who knew so many people actually dressed-up like the Green Hornet or Thor on any given day? Not me.
One of my responsibilities here at Greystone is to assess hospital and healthcare system Web sites. When we complete an assessment, we use a grade system to determine the quality of a Web site. Thirty-one categories are evaluated using a consistent and quantitative scoring system, and we assign grades to each category ranging from an A to a D-. You may be wondering, why no F’s? Giving an F to a client is like wearing high heels on a hiking trip: you just don’t do it, unless you want to endure the repercussions.
Do your physicians actively participate on your healthcare organization’s Web site? We all know a Web site can be a powerful tool for our organizations. Unfortunately, getting that message across to certain areas of the healthcare organization can be a difficult task. Even for those who are lucky enough to be working in a Web savvy environment, finding physicians to participate can be an even larger challenge.
You know we think the world of Shel Holz, one of the leading social media and communications experts in the business. After all, we’ve had him as a keynote presenter at our Healthcare Internet Conference three years running, and have done joint engagements with him. And usually we agree with him right down the line.
I heard a comment the other day that if your site is well organized and nicely designed that the internal search function doesn’t matter. Really? As you can tell, I’m skeptical.
Only a few short weeks ago, I sat in my office combing through over 125 entries for the 2009 Best In Class Awards. In our office we each painstakingly read and analyze every nomination in search of a short list of finalists for each award category — and 2009 was clearly the most difficult year for us, in terms of narrowing the field. Others in our office also comb through that same list and then we all converge in the conference room to begin our annual ritual — a litigation process to lobby for our favorites and create the consensus list of finalists.
It’s barbeque season, and there are few things I like better than a good barbeque. But what happens if you are at a neighborhood barbeque and you realize a group of neighbors is talking about your hospital or health system. What do you do?
Okay, please forgive the butchering of the age old adage that a picture is worth a thousand words. But the point is that physician videos are worth the time and effort.
What I’m talking about are video profiles of physicians in your “find a doctor” section. Like those found on the University of Wisconsin Health site.
Adherence to best practices on the Web is critical. You’ve heard me quote Jakob Nielsen before on his #1 rule of Web usability: “99% of the time your users spend on the Internet they spend on sites other than yours.” That suggests that if you create a user experience that is vastly different from what your site visitors are likely to get at places like Yahoo or Amazon, you’re setting yourself up for problems.