Finding the right answer: it’s Symplur with tweetchats
January 25, 2012
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Brilliant Andrew! A fantastic demonstration of the wealth of knowledge there is in the #hcsmeu community and how generous people are with that knowledge (I for one am a very grateful recipient of that information)
It’s also a logical progression from the kind of thing I was attempting to demonstrate from the Storify stream I recorded around adherence last march.
Hi Dan
Thanks for the comment, always good to see you here
Communities are only capable of conveying such information as their members possess. Luckily – although I didn’t want to labour the point in the Storify piece – the #hcsmeu community contains many varied and knowledgable participants who are able to speak to a variety of health-related topics with authority.
Yes, I remember your Storify piece on adherence further to the question you asked. It was a model of best practice, and it would be great if more people followed your example in this regard.
I wish I had taken part in last week’s #hcsmeu. If you’ll excuse my abandoning all modesty, I think that my experience with http://www.SharingStrength.ca | http://www.fortesensemble.ca would have added a lot to the conversation. We did many things right in establishing the patient community. But, as you know one can always learn from what could have been done better. (Note: in 2006, patient communities were not yet subject to regulation scrutiny.)
Here are a few things that I recommend imitating when initiating a sponsored, unbranded patient community.
Be transparent
We said who we are (http://www.sharingstrength.ca/index.cfm?page=home.aboutWho) and clearly stated the pharma sponsorship on the footer on every page
Clearly state your policies
http://www.sharingstrength.ca/index.cfm?page=home.aboutPolicies
We laid out a governance framework (http://www.sharingstrength.ca/index.cfm?page=home.governance) and an editorial policy (http://www.sharingstrength.ca/index.cfm?page=home.editorial).
Moderate
Moderation is key to the success of any community. It won’t succeed without a community manager. I recommend low-level moderation, but you need someone to listen, connect and communicate when necessary. The moderator(s) needs to be a genuine person who is easily accessible.
What do I wish we had done better?
Ensured sustained funding and improved our reporting mechanisms.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. I really need to write a post about this. @MattHut I’d be happy to tell you more.
Hi Colleen
Thanks so much for having added such a great deal of value to this post with your comment.
Far from your having foregone modesty, you have merely offered an excellent synopsis of some key learning around sponsored, unbranded patient community management.