The COVID era changed entirely the way patients and doctors used to communicate. The lockdown and social restrictions forced patients and healthcare professionals to start communicating over different channels.

Before COVID, more and more doctors and health care professionals were starting to use text communications to schedule and confirm appointments, to provide follow-up notifications, and more via SMS. This is correlated to the growing amount of people not willing to receive calls, and indicating text messages as their preferred contact channel, mainly over millenials and previous generations. As SMS texts become more ubiquitous in the healthcare industry, it also presents a significant opportunity to enhance patient satisfaction, communications, and of course, the engagement of patients with their health care professionals.

It’s essential for healthcare providers and medicine professionals to use SMS services in a compliant, professional and respectful manner. Remember that SMS communications targeted to clients of online shops, and many other business lines, do not have the same importance, urgency, and sensitive information as the SMS communications related to health/medical issues. For this reason, here we’ll share some guidance & advice for creating the perfect SMS texts for health and medical purposes.

Appointment Reminders:

SMS appointment reminders can help you to reduce the number of no-shows and to decrease the number of phone calls your customer service area receives. Using easy to customize templates, you can save a lot of time by sending the reminders to many of your clients in just a few clicks. Remember to always go straight to the point and to keep the texts professional. Here is a template example for your reference:

Good day [NAME]! Just a friendly reminder for your upcoming appointment with [DOCTOR NAME] for [SERVICE] on [DATE] at [TIME]. Hoping to see you soon!

General healthcare updates:

As healthcare is a very delicate subject, the more personalized your message is, the better, as custom text messages help to gain patient’s trust, enhance overall customer experience, and of course, give an extra boost to the customer satisfaction. Keep your communications short, straight to the point and including the relevant information only. Creating a clear call-to-action and easy to access link is a must in this communication line.

Promoting health prevention campaigns:

Thanks to SMS unique reach capabilities, you can use bulk SMS campaigns to send to the clients who opted in, health care tips and advice in general. For achieving a better impact, segmenting your SMS subscribers according to their needs and interests, is a must. Pay extra attention to your database segmentation, do not segment based only on gender, age, and demographics. Their interests and reason for attending your practice are a huge thing to consider while segmenting.

With a 98% open rate, and billions of users having a smartphone with the ability to send and receive messages without any internet connection, SMS is one of the most powerful tools to promote health education, send appointment reminders, give relevant medical updates, follow-up advice and many other types of medical communications. At the same time, SMS will help you show your patients that you care about them and their health. SMS text communications have proven to help businesses to grow strong relationships with their client base and to deepen brand loyalty.

SixFive is ready to help you send your health related SMS texts anywhere in the world, at the best market prices. Forget about technological complications, our easy to use in-house technology will have you sending your bulk SMS campaigns in just a few clicks. Contact us now for more information or assistance!

TAGS: BULK SMS, BULK SMS PROVIDER, DIGITAL MARKETING, MOBILE MARKETING, SMS, SMS FOR BUSINESS, SMS MARKETING, SMS SERVICE PROVIDER, SMS TEXT, TEXTING

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