ASDS Annual Meeting 2016 – Total Social Solutions Talks About Reputation Management

The ASDS Annual Meeting for 2016 was held in New Orleans, LA, organized by ASDS (American Society for Dermatologic Surgery). Jennifer Kilkenny, Managing Director of Total Social Solutions, joined a panel that included celebrity dermatologist Dr. Doris Day to discuss reputation monitoring and management. Specifically, Jennifer was invited to teach dermatologists how to manage online reviews on websites like Yelp and Google.

Organized and managed by Drs. Mona Gohara and Ellen Marmur, the session was full of excellent tips for dermatologic surgeons struggling to promote themselves on social media, obtain press coverage, and manage their online reviews.

Reputation Monitoring and Management for Dermatologists and Dermatologic Surgeons

Managing online reviews is a struggle for any business, particularly for medical professionals. The usual tips for getting and responding to reviews doesn’t work in an industry that ensures total privacy for clients and patients. This makes reputation management, particularly responding to negative online reviews, problematic for many medical professionals. This is why ASDS and ADAM (Association of Dermatology Administrators and Managers) have both asked Jennifer to speak on this topic.

ASDS Annual Meeting 2016 Reputation Management Highlights

The presentation itself was a very in depth coverage of reputation monitoring and management, specifically focused on how to handle negative reviews in the most productive way. Here are some of the highlights your practice should be focused on:

1. Don’t Reply Publicly Right Away. Yelp tells business users to reply publicly to all reviews immediately. For physicians and medical practices, we do not recommend this approach. Medical care, even aesthetic treatments, is a much more delicate and serious matter. A negative review for a medical practice is not equal to a negative review for a restaurant or real estate agent. This is why we tell our clients to follow specific steps to identify the reviewer, discuss the review with staff members, and reach out to the patient personally through private communication channels before considering a public response. This is crucial to maintaining good, healthy relationships with patients.
2. Some Negative Reviews Aren’t Worth It. Some patients who come through your doors are just bullies. Don’t bother with their negative reviews. Most sensible people will read a their negative reviews and know that the reviewer is dishonest or troubled. That’s why we tell our clients not to sweat it when a bully or troubled patient leaves a ranting negative review. Just focus on generating more positive reviews.
3. Reach Out to Happy Patients. If you have patients you know love you, ask them if they’d mind leaving you a review. It’s true that Yelp may filter these reviews if they aren’t active Yelpers. That’s why, if they don’t use Yelp, ask them to leave you a Google or Facebook review instead. Those almost always stick.

Update: ASDS Annual Meeting 2017

We’re excited to announce that we were invited to the ASDS Annual Meeting in Chicago in Oct. 2017 to present once again on Reputation Management! See you in Chicago!

Need Help With Your Online Reputation?

Contact Total Social Solutions for a personalized consultation. We’ll work with you and your team to help you generate more positive reviews and create an action plan to manage negative online reviews.