For the last few months, I’ve been bugging everyone in my field (rural healthcare and policy) to take the plunge and start using social media. Defined by Brian Solis:
social media describes the online tools that people use to share content, profiles, opinions, insights, experiences, perspectives and media itself, thus facilitating conversations and interaction online between groups of people. These tools include blogs, message boards, podcasts, micro blogs, lifestreams, bookmarks, networks, communities, wikis, and vlogs.
Like any profession, we find great value in connecting with our peers, learning from each other, sharing new ideas, and spending time with those who truly understand what we do all day long. Normally, this is confined to national gatherings, conference calls, and the occasional direct contact around a question. We work on very similar projects, each in our own state, and too often cut off from the great models our peers are creating.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could mingle with our peers more often than the occasional conference? Oh wait…there is. Yet, as obvious as this may be to your average college student, it’s a foreign language for us. Two of the most conservative (as in “slow to change”) arenas I know are healthcare and rural. Put them together, with a demographic mostly over 45, and you have a field that hasn’t fully embraced social media as a legitimate, useful tool for getting business done.
On the other hand, if you spend some time reading the Health 2.0 and Marketing 2.0 thinkers, or browsing the tech blogs, it’s like you just looked up and realized crowds of people are using flying cars, and have been for years. Ouch!
So my hope is to pull these two worlds together, one_blog_post_at_a_time . . . And I could really use your help! 
