How to use SMS Marketing for Healthcare?
When you are presented with the choice of a text message or a phone call, which will you choose? According to recent surveys, over half of the people given this choice will choose a text message. SMS (text) messaging is quick, easy, and convenient. You can be sitting in a meeting while exchanging text messages with your client in another country, something you couldn’t do with a phone call. It’s easy to see how SMS messaging can be beneficial and utilized in businesses. But, it may surprise you to learn that SMS messaging is revolutionising the healthcare industry as well. Need proof? Just keep reading!
Appointments and Prescriptions
A major benefit of SMS messaging in healthcare is the ability to make, confirm, or cancel appointments. Patients all over the world are now being sent reminder text messages prior to their upcoming appointments. These text messages have the option of replying to confirm or cancel your existing appointment. Some healthcare providers also have the capability of scheduling an appointment via text messaging.
Prescription reminders being sent through SMS messaging have become invaluable to both patients and medical personnel. A patient may receive a reminder when an automatically refilled prescription is ready for pick-up at the pharmacy. This is especially handy when the prescription is only filled every 3 or 6 months!
Wait Times, Surveys, and Following Up
As discussed above, many healthcare providers offer text messaging options to patients regarding their appointments. However, did you know that a doctor’s office can inform a patient of delays in the office the day of the appointment? It’s true! This cuts down on wait time for patients when they arrive on time for their appointment only to find out the doctor is running behind schedule and they will have to wait.
Conducting customer satisfaction surveys is pretty much expected after appointments, surgeries, hospital stays, etc. These surveys help the facility improve the patient experience for future patients. Now, you can complete a satisfaction survey through SMS messaging instead of having to spend time and a stamp on mailing one in.
Following up after a procedure or visit is imperative to customer-medical personnel relationships. If your healthcare provider sends you a text message one or two days after your procedure to “check in” on you, that’ll make you feel wanted/cared about. Checking in with patients to be sure they are recovering well is a gesture of kindness and care that patients remember for years to come.
Treatment Options
When you are given a diagnosis, a doctor will discuss treatment options for you. However, if the options are life-threatening or simply expensive, you probably won’t make a decision right there on the spot. Instead, you will ask to get back with the doctor later in the week, once you have had time to discuss it with your family, friends, etc. Giving patients time and space to make a treatment decision can be made simpler by sending them text reminders about the treatment options and details on the procedures. Not every patient is going to remember details about all the options, so sending a text message describing the procedure (and costs) will be advantageous to the patient and his/her support group.
Internal Relations
In a hospital or 24-hour clinic, every nurse, doctor, orderly, etc. will work different shifts. So, what does Human Resources do when they need to discuss important information with all employees? SMS messaging is a wonderful solution to this problem. All an HR employee has to do is set up the text message in the facility’s messaging program, select who it is going to, and push send!
SMS messaging is revolutionising the healthcare industry in so many ways, large and small. Want to know the best part? It is only getting better! More features, updated systems, and a larger patient outreach are all pushing healthcare into a brighter future!
Gomeeki
Email: enquiries@gomeeki.com
We want to help you and your organization reach its ultimate potential by using proven marketing strategies, including SMS marketing.
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