A key feature of Practo Ray is that it allows you to stay in touch with your patients. Apart from regular SMS’s or emails that can be sent to your patients, it even helps you stay on top of all scheduled appointments so that you are always one step ahead. The Communications tab is located on the menu bar.
Activating your mobile number:
You can use the Communications feature only after your mobile number has been verified.
To verify your mobile number, log into your Practo Ray account. You will see a notification on top of the menu that states ‘SMS not activated’. Right next to it, you will find an ‘Activate’ button. Click on it.
You will be redirected to a new page called ‘Mobile Verification’. You can verify your number by two methods:
SMS verification:
To verify your number through SMS, click on ‘Send Verification Code’.
You will receive a 6 digit mobile verification code on the number that you have registered while creating your Practo Ray account. Enter this code in the space provided and click on ‘Verify Mobile’.
Missed Call:
Call the number that is displayed on the mobile verification page. You will not be charged for this call as it will get cut after one ring. Please note that you should make this call from the number registered at the time of creating the Practo Ray account. Once you have made the call, click on the button on the mobile verification page.
Activating notifications for doctors
You can choose what kind of notifications need to be sent to doctors that are working at your clinic. This is done when you add a new doctor to your practice.
Click on the Settings icon on the top-right corner. You will see a drop down menu, click on ‘Settings’ here.
You will be able to see several tabs to the left side of your screen. Click on ‘Practice Staff’ located on this list. You will be able to view all details about the doctors and staff employed at your clinic currently.
SMS notification:
To enable SMS notification for a doctor, click on ‘Staff Notification’ located on top of this screen. This will show you a list of all the doctors and staff that are currently part of your Practo Ray account for your practice. There are several check boxes next to every name. To activate SMS notification for a doctor, check the appropriate box next to that doctor’s name.
There are 2 types of SMS’s that are sent to doctors-
Confirmation SMS: This allows doctors to receive an automatic SMS every time they have a confirmed appointment.
Schedule SMS: The schedule SMS feature allows doctors to receive notifications for their confirmed schedule at the start of every day.
Email notification:
You can even send emails to the doctors at your clinic so that they can know their schedule before hand. To enable email notifications, check the appropriate box next to that doctor’s name.
Delivery Reports:
You can view the status of all the SMS’s that have been sent through your Practo Ray account by using the Delivery Report function.
To view delivery reports, click on the Communication tab located on the menu bar. This will automatically take you to the delivery reports section. Reports can be generated for both transactional as well as promotional SMS’s.
There are 2 kinds of SMS’s that can be sent using your Practo Ray account.
Transactional SMS:
Day to day SMS’s that are sent out to doctors/ staff and patients for whom you have enabled SMS notifications are called Transactional SMS’s.
For doctors/staff: They include appointment reminders, appointment confirmations
For patients: Prescriptions and follow up reminders
The templates for various Transactional SMS’s are fixed and cannot be altered. They can be sent to DND(Do not Disturb) numbers as well.
Promotional SMS:
Those SMS’s that are sent only on a need basis to specified recipients are called Promotional SMS’s.
For patients: They include personalised birthday greetings, special offers, festival greetings, event invitations
For doctors/staff: Informational updates
By default, you will be able to the delivery report for that particular day when you click on the Communication section of your Ray account. You can view reports of any other day by clicking on the date picker.
Upcoming Birthday wishes and Follow ups:
You can view all the upcoming follow up appointments and birthdays on your Practo Ray account.
To view them, log into your Practo Ray account. Click on the Communications tab located on the menu bar. You will be directed to a new page with three tabs located on top. Click on ‘Upcoming follow ups and Birthday wishes’. You will now be able to see all the birthdays and follow ups that are coming up in the current month.
SMS Center:
You can view all your contacts through SMS Center. This is a single place where all the numbers that are being contacted via SMS can be seen at a shot.
To view SMS center, log into your Practo Ray account and click on the Communications tab located on the menu bar. You will be directed to a new page. Click on SMS Center to view all the contact groups that are currently receiving your SMS’s.
Patients: By default, the first set of contacts you would view on this page would be all your patient contact numbers. You can even search for a patient by typing his name/number in the search bar located on this page.
Sending SMS to patients:
To send SMS’s to your patients, click on the Communications tab on the menu bar and select ‘SMS Center’. Now, select all the patients that you want to send the SMS to by checking the boxes next to their names.
Once the recipients have been selected, you can type out the content for the SMS in the space provided on the right side of this page.
Creating an SMS template:
If you tend to send similar SMS’s to your patients you can use the SMS template option.
To use an existing template, click on the template that you want to use from your previously saved templates.
To create and save an SMS template, click on ‘Add template’ located on the bottom of this page.
Now type out the content that you want in your SMS and click on ‘Save template’.
Once you have saved your template it will appear on your page automatically and you can use them by checking the box next to that particular template. It will get selected and appear in the SMS text area.
Once you have verified the content for the SMS, click on ‘Send message’ to send it to all your recipients. Please note that there is a limit of 159 characters for every SMS. If you SMS exceeds this limit, you would be charged 2 credits for the SMS.
Groups:
You can select specific groups that you want to contact by clicking on ‘Groups’ located within the SMS Center.
You even have the option to add groups at this stage in case you want to create a new set of recipients. Just click on ‘Add group’ and name the group.
Once you name the group, click on ‘ok’ to confirm the group. This will take you to a new page with all your existing contacts. You can add as many members to the newly created group by clicking on the ‘add’ button. Once you have added all the new records for the group, click on save.
You have now successfully created a new group with a set of recipients that can be sent customised SMS’s.
Staff:
You can choose to send information to members of your staff by clicking on the ‘Staff’ tab within SMS Center.
This will show you contact details of all the staff that are currently employed at your clinic. You can choose the specific staff members that you want to send an SMS to, by checking the boxes next to their names.
Using SMS Add on packs:
You can view the many SMS packs that are available for purchase through SMS Center. Click on the ‘Buy Now’ button that appears on the SMS Center page.
This will take you to a new page which allows you to choose from among the many bulk SMS packs that are available for your account.
Click on the Bulk SMS pack button to view the different packages that are available. Once you select the pack that would be best suited for your practice, you will be redirected to a payment gateway where you can make the payment.
All SMS packs come with unlimited validity.