WhatClinic.com remedies billing and call tracking woes with Twilio Voice

WhatClinic.com sought to change the way people access healthcare by building a search engine to connect prospective patients with physicians worldwide. When they realized they could enhance their productivity with telephony apps, they switched from their original telecommunications provider to Twilio.

Business Challenge

Caelin King, CEO of WhatClinic.com, first realized the absence of an online, global system of connecting physicians with patients when he was traveling in Southeast Asia and needed non-emergency medical care. Without an easy way to evaluate providers, he simply chose a doctor and hoped for the best. Several years later, he found himself in a nearly identical situation in his hometown of Dublin, Ireland, and that’s when the idea for WhatClinic.com was born. He wanted to create a simple way for patients to find treatment in any corner of the world.

WhatClinic.com chose a telecommunications provider with broad international coverage. But it wasn’t long before they realized they wanted complete transparency when it came to billing and call tracking, something their original telephony provider couldn’t offer. They needed greater flexibility, accompanied by proven reliability and international reach, so they turned to Twilio.

Solution and Results

WhatClinic.com integrated Twilio with its .NET, ASP Excel infrastructure, repurposing much of the same code they’d already written for their previous provider’s API. “It was a painless migration that took only a couple of weeks,” said Dave Roe, VP of product at WhatClinic.com.

After going live on Twilio, WhatClinic.com immediately began to benefit from more detailed metrics. By connecting calls between clinics and consumers, the company could now see when calls were being made and returned. This allowed it to gauge how many connections turned into actual sales for the clinics. “Before we integrated Twilio, we would pass on basic patient information to a clinic, but we had no way of knowing if they returned the call,” said Philip Boyle, marketing manager at WhatClinic.com.

With Twilio, the company has been able to determine that around 20 percent of calls result in sales for the clinics, so missed calls can mean lost revenue. The call tracking feature enables clinics to log onto the website to view missed call activity. “Being able to integrate call information with CRM systems for the clinics has been a real step forward for us in terms of metrics,” said Boyle.

WhatClinic.com has experienced more consistent phone rates since switching to Twilio, and the transparency in billing allows them to know exactly what they will be spending every month. With their previous solution, they had no breakdown of costs, and phone rates ranged from 2 to 15 cents per minute.

As a result of streamlining call costs with Twilio, consumers don’t pay long distance rates if they are calling out of their area. They simply dial a local number provided by Twilio on behalf of WhatClinic.com and enter an extension for a particular clinic. Additionally, premium customers pay to have a unique number that patients can contact directly.

WhatClinic.com provisions approximately 30 numbers per day for its new premium customers and has over 5,000 in all. “Ideally we will continue to add more clinics and new numbers everyday, and we are confident in Twilio’s ability to scale as we grow,” said Boyle.