When reading the Wall Street Journal article about Ernst & Young’s Facebook-centric recruiting effort, I was struck by the reference to reaching your audience in “their lair.” It’s an important point. People are reallocating the time they spend online to venues where they can interact with other people, whether that’s Facebook, Twitter, the blogosphere, whatever. The time they spend in these places is time they won’t spend on your corporate website.

It also points to the importance of identifying the right lair when trying to engage in conversation with members of the public you’re trying to reach. That’s the approach Parkland Health & Hospital System, a Dallas-based healthcare organization, took in reaching out to local teens. Teens, the communicators at Parkland reasoned, are mostly on MySpace, so that’s where a profile was created.

Charise Thomason, who works in Parkland’s Corporate Communications department, sent me an email outlining the effort after reading some of my stuff on Ragan Communications’ website. She pointed out that social media is new to Parkland, but that the MySpace page has worked out well as a means of addressing sex, reproduction, and general health topics.

On the page, there is a question and answer blog where doctors at Parkland answer any and all questions visitors have. This interactive tool has already helped several teens find their way to Parkland???s family planning clinics. Several people have also inquired about working at Parkland.

Social media may be new to Parkland, but they clearly understand the need to use it for conversation instead of broadcast. While public education is one of the hospital’s goals, the family planning department is tapping into the conversation ethos as a means of providing that education. The fact that doctors are taking the time to respond to queries can only lead to word-of-mouth among teens who spread the word that doctors are answering sensitive questions with candid answers.

So far, the page has 227 friends. Other than the doctors’ time to field questions, it’s a low-cost initiative that targets the right people in their lair.