For U.S. citizens, Presidential elections can be a very exciting time. For healthcare communications professionals, they can also be exciting…but for very different reasons.

The healthcare industry is used to being in the spotlight. However, shifting media attention in 2012 will present unique challenges for successfully delivering messaging to the masses. What can we do to help ensure EHR, HIE and ACO initiatives remain front-of-mind during this Presidential election year?

There’s no way to guarantee your message will be heard by the right people at the right time. But, if you follow these tips, you’ll help increase your chances.

1. Pay attention to what the media is covering and how they are covering it. A journalist, who might have been solely focused on one beat last year, may be responsible for covering something all together different for the publication in 2012.
2. Try to become part of the discussion. Timely thought leadership articles, white papers and op-eds are great tools to help spread your message. Be sure these communications don’t come across as self promotional – you want to position your company as one who understands the issues and is providing a product or service that helps address those issues.
3. Utilize social media tools such as Twitter, YouTube and blogs. Traditional media outlets will be consumed with covering the hot issues and their editorial direction may change at any given notice. That’s where social media plays an important role. For example, use Twitter to help spread your message. Follow relevant people discussing healthcare issues, tweet daily, use hashtags for discussion topics (#ACOs, #HIE, #healthcarereform, etc)

What have you done in previous Presidential election years to help make sure your message is noticed? What actions do you plan to take this year? We’d love to hear them!

I just returned to my office in Atlanta after spending some time this week in sunny Orlando for the Annual HIMSS Conference. Ok, I was on the show floor inside the Orange County Convention Center for eight hours, but the weather outside was absolutely perfect!

While sitting in meetings with clients, ad reps and editors from Healthcare IT News, Health Data Management and Healthcare Purchasing News, I learned that this year’s HIMSS conference was the biggest to date with the number of attendees roughly at 31,000. It was my first HIMSS. Not my first tradeshow by any means, as I’ve worked many tech/telecom focused shows over the years, but this was HUGE.

As I walked for what seemed like miles across the trade show floor, I wondered, if I was a company exhibiting here, how could I attract people to visit my booth? Especially if my booth isn’t a 2-story mansion with video walls from floor to ceiling flashing my company’s name, taking up 3 rows of real estate on the floor. And how do I keep people’s attention long enough to learn what it is my company is trying to promote? After all, tradeshows are all about enhancing brand awareness, increasing sales leads and expanding your customer base, right?

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