“A wise man said that you can have everything in this world if you sacrifice everything for it”. But what he meant was…“Nothing comes without a price.” I am sure that hospitals currently successfully engaged in Social Network have figured this out. For those that are considering it, you need to really take a look at the costs, commitment and potential public exposure before just “Setting Up” a free account. So, what really is the cost of Social Networking? Let’s take a look…

Tangible Costs

I have Tweeted daily on behalf of Santa Rosa Consulting, starting with one a day, now up to five times daily on a good day since October, 2009 and have 121 followers on Twitter. The average Twitter account has 124 followers. I am the CTO of the company and enjoying the social networking aspects of my job, but how do I find the time to Tweet all day?

I was amazed when I searched “Social Networking Jobs” as to the numerous employment positions available for Vice Presidents, Managers and staff to establish and manage social networking strategies on behalf of many companies. When reading the fine print, you will see these are “New” positions being developed in the organizations. Most salary ranges were stated as negotiable, some noted in upwards of $110,000 for a manger level. Large companies today are not just hiring “a “ employee to manage social networking, they are building teams led by Vice Presidents to manage it. It has become a new marketing arm that requires skills in Social Networking and Web Technologies. So why is that? Well, recent statistics show that social networking may be bigger than you think.

• By 2010 Gen Y will outnumber Baby Boomers….96% of them have joined a social network
• 1 out of 8 couples married in the U.S. last year met via social media
• Years to Reach 50 millions Users: Radio (38 Years), TV (13 Years), Internet (4 Years), iPod (3 Years)…Facebook added 100 million users in less than 9 months…iPhone applications hit 1 billion in 9 months.
• If Facebook were a country it would be the world’s 4th largest between the United States and Indonesia (note that Facebook is now creeping up – recently announced 300 million users)
• Because of the speed in which social media enables communication, word of mouth now becomes “World “ of mouth

Source: http://ow.ly/11Yaz

In my blog post in December, I shared stats on how Hospitals were using Social Networking. Since Nov. 2009 and January 2010, a significant increase, 67 more hospitals engaged in Social Networking in 2 months.

Last Update November 27, 2009 http://ebennett.org/hsnl/

• 473 Hospitals total
• 218 YouTube Channels
• 254 Facebook pages
• 356 Twitter Accounts
• 57 Blogs

U.S. Hospitals that use Social Networking tools. Last Update January 10, 2010

• 540 Hospitals total
• 247 YouTube Channels
• 316 Facebook pages
• 419 Twitter Accounts
• 67 Blogs

Source: http://ebennett.org/hsnl/

Intangible Costs

Unfortunately the potential for intangible costs exist, ones that can hurt your organization’s image. With traditional marketing we control our message and image, now consumers can say what ever they think about an organization openly, no gatekeeper in place. Here are a few examples, I agree extreme situations, however, buyer beware, nothing comes without a price.

• What do Dan Leone and Jon-Barrett Ingels have in common? Their Way Out of Jobs. http://ow.ly/11WC9. So they were fired, what about the reputations of the companies they worked for, National Football League's Philadelphia Eagles and Barney Greengrass in Beverly Hills?
• The devastation to Domino’s Pizza after employees shared a disgusting video, even after Domino’s posted a YouTube video to protect their brand, there are still other videos posted by consumers that are not favorable . Nothing I would want to share, if interested, go to YouTube.com, search “Domino’s Pizza”.
• An article you can reference: “Social Networking Lawsuits Are Big Risk to Business” by the Connecticut Litigation Blog http://ow.ly/11YO1

So, my conclusion, Social Networking has become the next generation of Marketing, with a twist. A strong Social Networking Team, Strategy and Policy are required and “Buyer Beware”!