Years ago, the only way you would know if one of your patients or clients was satisfied with a treatment, or had a complaint about a recent visit was if they contacted you directly via a letter, phone call or email.

Today, many patients turn to the Internet to share their opinions and comments with friends, family members and the world at large. Review sites and blogs have made it incredibly easy for anyone to publicly post their experience with you and your office within minutes.

Last week, we discussed ways to handle negative comments about your practice, and outlined some specific strategies that can help you continue to attract and retain clients. Since many online conversations happen without your consent, you also need a brand reputation monitoring strategy so that you can respond as quickly as possible.

One of the easiest ways to monitor reviews or posts about your practice is to set up a Google Alert on your company name, physicians and other medical practitioners. Google Alerts provide you with email updates on the latest Google search results based on the keywords you request. You can set up alerts that are delivered to you as they appear, once a day, or once a week. The alert goes straight to your inbox, and can make it easier for you and your office to keep tabs on what is being posted online at any given time.

Patients who maintain a blog, or individuals that post on other people’s blogs regularly may be leaving comments about their experience at your practice, or sharing information about a particular procedure. Backtype is a free service for monitoring blog comments. You can track where and how people are linking to your website, and follow those links to post a response when needed.

Services like BoardTrackers.com also allow you set up alerts on certain words and phrases, except this search is a little more comprehensive and keeps track of mentions across forums and discussion groups.

Again, keeping up with these posts puts you in a more powerful position because it gives you the chance to provide a professional response.

Next week, we’ll discuss some other tools and services that can help you monitor your brand reputation online…