Establishing, Managing and Protecting Your Online Reputation: A Social Media Guide for Physicians and Medical Practices

As the digital era inevitably invades the medical cocoon, there is a vital unmet need for physicians to adapt, especially to new challenges such as dealing with one's online reputation. Kevin Pho, a leader in the convergence of social media and healthcare, with Susan Gay, provide a comprehensive and extremely useful roadmap for doctors…Instead of default, sitting duck status, this information and perspective enables physicians to take charge.

With new technology comes new challenges, and that’s especially true for medical practice managers as they look to evolve their practices in innovative and responsible ways. Social media channels, physician-rating sites, and other digital communities can directly affect your practice’s online reputation – and reputation management is now within the purview of the practice management profession. But where do you start and how do you go about influencing something as nebulous, fast-changing, and splintered as online reputation? This book provides practice managers with the tools they need to feel more informed and equipped to take actionable steps recommended by some of the industry’s leading experts.

An insightful and thought-provoking examination of the changing landscape of medicine, filled with practical advice for clinicians.

This book gave me a new perspective on the relationship between doctors and social media. For those of us who feel timid, the authors remind us that we already have online profiles - written by other people. The authors give us easy, practical advice to help us manage our profiles and prepare ourselves to interact with our patients in a virtual community within which we already live.

Abraham Verghese MD, MACP Professor and Senior Associate Chair for the Theory and Practice of Medicine Author, Cutting for Stone Stanford University School of Medicine Stanford, CA

This book is sensational. It provides an argument that wins hands-down on how doctors no longer have the luxury of ignoring social media and its impact. This book will help physicians understand and prepare themselves for social media’s impact on their future.

Establishing, Managing, and Protecting Your Online Reputation: A Social Media Guide for Physicians and Medical Practices is a primer on the essentials about why your medical digital footprint is important and how to best manage it. This must-read book also chronicles the path of Dr.Pho from the beginnings as an internal physician and patient advocate from New Hampshire to today as social media’s leading physician voice via his very popular website,KevinMD.com.

Medical practice reputation and branding by social media has been on my high-priority list. This book will be significant for every healthcare executive, physician leader, and governing board member! The content is clear, concise, and highly informative. It summarizes benefits, business opportunities, and threats, and provides specific go-to resources. The content calls out social media influences, both positive and negative, generating an awareness of the need to address the opportunities and risk immediately. The case examples are brief and resonate the must do implementation of policy and guideline structure within the practice and for physician members. This implementation planning guide responds not only to the ‘business’ of medicine but to the progression regulatory mandated transparency.

Every physician and practice marketing manager will find value in this book—from the techno-skeptic to the sophisticate. You’ll get perspectives and references that will help you form your own online strategy. I know I did!

A doctor's greatest strength is his or her reputation. We spend our entire professional lives creating and protecting this valuable asset. Dr. Pho and Ms. Gay have provided the necessary steps and techniques to guard and protect your online reputation. I highly recommend their book and believe that everyone who reads it will have the tools and techniques to keep their reputation polished and pristine.

Social media is here to stay! Establishing, Managing, and Protecting Your Online Reputation is a must-have book for every physician and/or medical practice involved in social media. Dr. Pho (KevinMD.com) has once again proven that his knowledge is valuable in today’s technology-driven world. I would highly recommend every medical office manager and physician read this book before getting heavily involved in social media!

Physicians want to succeed. They often adopt new technology very quickly if it will help them do their jobs better and faster, and especially if it generates new revenue. If not, they wisely drag their feet. They became rapid adapters of Internet 1.0, one-way communication, rapid digital access to the world literature. But physicians have been very slow at adopting Internet 2.0, bi- and multi-directional messaging. They like to speak; to listen, not so much. To judge, a great deal; to be judged, very little.

Establishing, Managing, and Protecting Your Online Reputation: A Social Media Guide for Physicians and Medical Practices is written as both an educational and instructional tool to help medical practitioners understand and manage their online reputation in the medical sector. In today's world, this is absolutely crucial and these authors have simplified the process. This is a must-read for medical practitioners and all others in the medical field.

Social media is the wave of the future in medicine, and I can't think of a doctor more qualified to write about this phenomenon than Kevin Pho. This book is essential reading for any doctor or medical practice looking to establish an online presence.

In this new online social media age, it is imperative that everyone, but most especially professionals looking to build, grow, and maintain a business or a practice, establish a good reputation online. And even more importantly, to make sure that their online presence is properly monitored and maintained, as this can be the life blood of their business and can truly provide a ’make it or break it’ opportunity. I would recommend that all physicians, no matter where they are in building their practice, or even for those who already have a well-established practice, read this book and strongly consider the excellent ideas and direction it could take their practice.

Dr. Kevin Pho is a modern legend of healthcare-related social media. His website, KevinMD.com, is the go-to physician blog for healthcare information. Dr. Pho has compiled his years of experience and knowledge into a fantastic book that should be considered required reading for all doctors. Social media is the future of doctor–patient communication, and this book provides a comprehensive guide to navigating the social media arena. From LinkedIn to Facebook, to Twitter, to Google+, readers will learn how to become the maestro of their online reputation, marketing, and communication with patients. Very highly recommended!

As one of the most prolific practitioners in the world of social media, Kevin Pho's insights for doctors and other health professionals are soundly based on experience. His ability to demystify this arena for others comes from a clear and concise exposition of what is fact and what is fear. His book is an important contribution to creating a more patient-centric healthcare system that is also highly respectful of the knowledge and good intentions of physicians and other clinicians.

This book provides valuable insight to physicians and their staff… a virtual roadmap to navigate the digital age of establishing a positive online presence, developing marketing strategies, and addressing social media identities. It’s a must-read for today’s 21st century digital medical practice!

The insights that Dr. Pho and Ms. Gay share in their book are instrumental in learning how social media will impact an outpatient practice and more importantly the physician’s reputation. They provide great content and examples to help physicians have a strong and positive Internet presence. A must-read for healthcare administrators and healthcare providers.

For private practice physicians, reputation management is here to stay. In this ground-breaking book, Kevin Pho and Susan Gay provide you with the language, the players, and the smart techniques to take control of your reputation online. The energy of these authors (and their purpose) translates into winning techniques you can use in your own practice. The book includes practical stories and up-to-date references. It is beautifully researched and edited. Take control of your own reputation now!

Establishing, Managing and Protecting Your Online Reputation: A Social Media Guide for Physicians and Medical Practices could not have come at a better time. Dr. Kevin Pho and Susan Gay have written a book that will be a great service for practice administrators and business managers. Administrators know physician reputation has an impact on the success of the practice. We also know that monitoring and managing the physician reputation is a growing concern for all medical practices. Patients don't look for doctors in the Yellow Pages like they used to! Now it is all online. Read this book and you'll have the both the inspiration and a blueprint to help your doctors with this new element of medical practice. The case studies of how other physicians manage their reputation are particularly useful, as are the extra resources in the Appendix.

Social media is a powerful tool to help you build relationships with new patients and deepen relationships with people who know you. This book shows you ‘online bedside manners’ that will get you off on the right foot.

We live in a very interesting time – a period of rapidly accelerating change and transformation in how human beings communicate in fundamentally different and infinitely more powerful new ways. Dr. Pho and Ms. Gay demonstrate a deep understanding of how this phenomenon is affecting medical practitioners and offer a clear-eyed approach with specific strategies to empower doctors to use these new media to build and support their personal brands in their markets. In an age when most doctors are not even aware of the critical need to manage their reputation online, and some are even being extorted with threats of reputation attacks, Establishing, Managing, and Protecting your Online Reputation: A Social Media Guide for Physicians and Medical Practices offers the most comprehensive and positive approach to managing and protecting our precious online reputations that I have seen. Managing your online reputation is not something physicians can opt out of. This new work is their guide to ensuring they protect their good name now and in the future.

Social media and online information are embedded in our culture and getting more so every day. Informed consumers, including payers and patients, use the Internet to research potential providers. This book will take you from an understanding of the basics to developing usage strategies. It will also help you recognize the negative aspects, including damage to provider reputations and what can be done to prevent and repair this when it occurs.

Dr. Pho’s book provides great insight into online reputations. For those who are uncertain about an online presence, he suggests methods to become more familiar with social media, such as lurking. The book is very well laid out and covers almost anything you could want to know about social media and your online reputation. It’s a good read for those who are new to social media as well as to those who want to take it to the next level!