With 40+ pediatric specialty areas and 700+ pediatric specialists, Children’s Mercy is highest level of pediatric trauma centers and provides the highest level of neonatal intensive care. US News ranks Children’s Mercy among the best children’s hospitals in the country. So why is social important to a well-reputed hospital like Children’s Mercy?

At a recent Social Media Club of Kansas City (@smckc) breakfast, Jake Jacobson (@jakesjournal) explained why social matters to Children’s Mercy (@childrensmercy). He presented a few ways that Children’s Mercy has used social to benefit the hospital and to better serve their patients and fans.

Why does social matter to Children’s Mercy?

1. Reputation: Locally, Children’s Mercy want parents to know their kids are in good hands. Social is a good way to share news and feature CMH doctors and patients.
2. Referrals: Regionally, Children’s Mercy wants physicians to be confident in their decision to refer patients to CMH.
3. Recruitment: Nationally, Children’s Mercy wants top doctors to see CMH and Kansas City as a destination for their career and innovative care.
4. Resource Development: Overall, Children’s Mercy needs to educate people that CMH is a nonprofit and donations make a difference.

A few ways Children’s Mercy has used social to build reputation, gain referrals, recruit better staff, and develop resources:

• LAWN MOWING INCIDENTS: On June 2, Children’s Mercy tweeted about the high number of lawn mower injuries they treated this spring with a link to helpful lawn mower safety tips. Not long after they posted this tweet, two different news companies contacted Children’s Mercy wanting to interview a doctor on the topic. CMH posted a similar message on Facebook that received 235 likes and 1,077 shares. CMH used social to create awareness and promote safety in the community, hopefully preventing future injuries related to lawn mowing.

• BIG SLICK KC: Children’s Mercy uses social to promote Big Slick KC, their annual fundraiser hosted by Paul Rudd, Jason Sudeikis, and other celebrities. Last year, Children’s Mercy posted a variety of photos from the weekend of events, including a photo of the celebrities playing with children from the hospital and a photo of the doctors who attended. These Facebook posts received 599 likes and 305 likes, respectively.

• BREATHE KC: Children’s Mercy created a twitter handle specifically for allergy & asthma called @breatheKC. This account shares the pollen count and mold count in Kansas City on a daily basis and they host chats to share info related to allergies and asthma. On May 14, @breatheKC hosted a twitter chat called #foodallergychat, led by Dr Dinakar of Children’s Mercy Hospital. 57 twitter handles participated in the chat and there were 89 retweets/ favorites of CMH tweets.

• INSIDE PEDIATRICS: KMBC aired a documentary series about Children’s Mercy Hospital that featured 28 patients’ experiences at CMH. Children’s Mercy used social to promote the series: they created a Facebook page with episode air dates and times, they shared the YouTube teaser for the show via twitter, and they hosted live twitter chats between viewers and doctors during each episode. These promotions were very successful. Inside Pediatrics has 5,200 Facebook fans, there were 2,955 tweets/ posts on Inside Pediatrics and 1,188 different users posted or tweeted about Inside Pediatrics.

Children’s Mercy is an excellent example of how an organization can use social to build reputation, gain referrals, recruit better staff, and develop resources. To learn more about companies and brands that have successfully used social, check out our other blog posts about social.