Implementing Texting Best Practices to Boost Patient Convenience and Recoveries

• 87% of consumers will not answer an unrecognized phone number
• 67% don’t listen to voicemail from unrecognized phone numbers
• 80% prefer a text over a voicemail

As patients increasingly prefer text messages over phone calls, ensuring that your organization effectively uses this communication channel is critical to maximizing patient satisfaction and recovery.

In 2024, State’s text messaging-driven payments exceeded those of USPS in terms of the number of payments and the average payment size.

After sending more than 4 million text messages, below are the best practices developed by the expert team at State:

Patient Convenience

• Include a link to your payment portal, enabling patients to easily pay their bill online at their convenience
• Include a one-click-to-call link to a live representative for patients who have questions or prefer to interact with a human

Compliance

• If the cell phone consent status is unclear, use a texting system with human intervention to ensure TCPA compliance until consent can explicitly be obtained
• Include opt-out instructions in every message
• If a required message is unread, resend the communication using print communication

To learn more about how your organization can expand outreach capabilities through text messaging, join the State team for a Webinar on April 10 at 2 p.m. CT.
Click here to register.