Omnichannel messaging

Omnichannel is how your practice talks to patients — text, email, and in-app chat — from a single inbox, so a conversation stays in one place regardless of how the patient replied.

Setting up channels

Go to Settings → Omnichannel — "provision a toll-free number for SMS and a dedicated email address for patient conversations".

• Toll-free number — "a dedicated toll-free number for outbound and inbound SMS", e.g. +1 (877) 415-0403.
• Email address — "a dedicated email address for two-way patient and lead conversations", e.g. clinic@mail.ona.health, shown as Active.
• Toll-Free Verification — "required by carriers to send messages at scale without filtering". When done it reads Verified with the date.

Don't skip verification. US carriers filter unverified toll-free traffic, so an unverified number can have its messages silently dropped. The Verified badge is what tells you texts will actually arrive.

The Chats inbox

Day-to-day messaging happens in Chats in the left sidebar.

The left column lists conversations, each showing the contact and the last message, with Chats and People tabs and a search box. Selecting a conversation opens it on the right.

The channel tabs at the top of a conversation are the heart of "omnichannel": the same thread can be continued over Direct message (in-app), SMS (the toll-free number), or Email (the dedicated address). You pick how to reach the patient, and their replies land back in the same thread.

Match the channel to the message. A quick appointment reminder suits SMS; anything with detail or an attachment suits email; a patient already in the portal may prefer in-app. Keeping it all in one thread means the next person to pick up the conversation sees the whole history, not just their channel's slice.

Where messages come from

Conversations don't only start here. The AI Receptionist turns inbound calls into leads you can then message (see Setting up the AI Receptionist), and leads carry their contact details into Chats. So a missed call can become a text conversation without anyone re-keying a number.

Create New Group at the bottom of the list starts a group conversation for internal or multi-party threads.