Since launching MyHealthAccess.ca in November 2014 we are regularly asked by our users what are some strategies that they can use that will allow them to have the most success with an online booking program. Below are a number of different strategies to get patients to sign-up on their own which are a) easy to do b) high impact c) provide continuous booking stimulation to patients.
1. CHANGE YOUR PHONE MESSAGE
Of all the things you can do to get your online patient booking program jump-started the most important and effective thing you can do is change your phone message to tell patients to go to MyHealthAccess.ca to book appointments. Patients are currently calling in to book many appointments and putting MyHealthAccess right in the middle of their normal booking path is the biggest thing you can do to change their behavior. A sample message could go something like this:
“Thank you for calling 123 clinic. If you would like to book an appointment with one of our doctors please hang-up and go to www.MyHealthAccess.ca. To continue and speak with a receptionist please press 0.”
For an even greater reponse change your on-hold message to go something like this:
“All of our staff are currently unavailable. If you would like to book an appointment at your leisure please hang up and connect with us online at www.MyHealthAccess.ca”
2. PUT YOUR BUTTON ON YOUR WEBSITE
On your MyHealthAccess clinic dashboard is a small html code snippet that will put a book online button on your website which will direct users to a sign-up/login page that is branded for your specific clinic. This will make it easy for any of your more tech-savvy patients to find your online booking information and get started.
3. TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS FOR ALL APPOINTMENTS
We recently released a great new feature for MyHealthAccess which will allow automated appointment notifications for all patients in your EMR. This means that patients will get emails from MyHealthAccess before all of their appointments which will contain information on their appointment so they show up on time as well as information about how to connect with your clinic online. This provides an on-going stimulus for your patients to begin using the web to streamline their communications with your clinic.
If you have any tactics that have worked well for you in your practice please let us know!