San Francisco Public Relations
The American Heart Association has released a video promoting the ‘hands-only’ CPR method using comedic actor and physician Ken Jeong.
This is another great example of how health care marketing and communications doesn’t have to be so darned SERIOUS. After all, the phrase “serious as a heart attack” exists for a reason. Yet, taking a chance on comedy made a memorable message that people will actually watch and remember. Kudos to the American Heart Association!
An article in The New York Times (“Chefs, Butlers and Marble Baths: Hospitals Vie for the Affluent“) describes the trend toward lavish accommodations and premium services to attract wealthy cash-paying patients. Is this what really attracts those patients? Would money be better-spent in simply improving basic customer service (examples: a real person answers the phone, improved food and “room service” for patients’ guests, etc.)?
Some hospitals struggle just to keep floors clean and paint un-scuffed.
Hospitals have a lot to learn from top hotels like Ritz-Carlton and The Four Seasons, but I’m not convinced it’s interior design tips. While those luxury hotels offer wonderful getaways, it’s the overall experience and dedication to customer service, staff training and the prioritization of customer convenience that really differentiate those hotels from others.
A study in this month’s issue of Academic Pediatrics shows that only seven percent of cafeteria food in California children’s hospitals are considered ‘healthy.’
If you wouldn’t sell cigarettes in the hospital gift shop why would you sell high-fat and high-sugar items? Then again, an argument can be made that tobacco is always bad for you, whereas the occasional cookie or potato chips can still be integrated into a healthy, well-balanced diet.
What do you think?
Wall Street Journal article today on nonprofit hospitals being under increasing financial pressure, with revenue growing at the slowest rate in at least two decades.
A study out (caveat emptor: by an interactive marketing agency) says within two years, hospital marketers are predicting that digital marketing will overtake traditional marketing channels in getting their messages out.
Looks like the sign of things to come. Quantifying, measuring and reporting quality is more than a PR move. Now it’s worth real dollars:
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that WellPoint Inc. is raising the stakes for reimbursing about 1,500 hospitals across the country, cutting off annual payment increases if they fail to deliver on the big health insurer’s definition of quality patient care.
News that public relations firm Burson Marsteller was retained by Facebook to sling mud at Google has the PR world abuzz, atwitter, and aghast.
Ethical concerns aside, it will be interesting to see how a company that advises others on how to handle communications crises will handle this one themselves.
The president-elect of the American College of Surgeons, Dr. Lazar Greenfield, has announced his resignation after a firestorm of criticism after he published a column suggesting semen as a mood-enhancer for women. Seriously.
The publication, Surgery News, has pulled the publication from its online archives. But you can find the editorial in its entirety here (in the interest of “judge for yourself.”).
Dr. Greenfield broke the first rule of communications in a professional environment – no jokes. In all our presentation skills coaching and media training sessions, we remind our clients that “warming up an audience” with a joke is ill-advised at best, and a catastrophe at worst.
This doesn’t mean, of course, we must be humorless. But we must be very careful to understand our audience and the situation very clearly before venturing into what Dr. Greenfield characterized as “light-hearted” comments.
Having a sense of humor and telling a joke are dramatically different things. Stand-up comedian is a painstakingly difficult thing to do well, even for the professionals. Our general recommendation is not to give up your day job.
Having humor, however, can engage an audience. Tell a personal anecdote. Use a humorous quote. Whatever you decide to do, make sure it follows these three rules:
Remember, no one ever had to resign from preventing a tasteless article from running in a professional journal.
Growing up, I was compelled to re-arrange the furniture in my bedroom every few months. Moving the desk and bed around gave me a new perspective. So it is with our new Web site. We have added this blog, for example, which will allow us to share with you insights on what is happening in communications in health, wellness, lifestyle and sustainability.
We will soon launch a newsletter, too, with tips for presentations and media interviews or other nuggets we pick up along the way. We hope you will visit again soon. Or connect with us on Facebook or Twitter or Linked In.
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