message on hold image

Message-on-hold audio is something which many companies do implement, more so if they have more than one department or line a call could be directed to (If they don’t have a permanent receptionist etc). As you say, there are some horrendous ones out there – my aim is to start abolishing those and show how they can be implemented far better.

First port of call (in my opinion) is to hire a professional copywriter (e.g. Stefan Thomas/Mark Beaumont-Thomas – search for contact details on 4networking.biz) who can produce a highly effective script in accordance with your needs, in terms of including any company branding and specific material. Like with a lot of things, people think they can just ‘whack out’ a few words on a jotter pad and ‘that’ll do’.

However, you need to think about it – this is the first thing a potential client will hear, and they will start making preconceptions about you/your company, be it rightly or wrongly. We all judge, even if not consciously. We can’t help it, it’s human nature!

The question you need to ask yourself is, what do I as a business owner want them to think? How do I want them to feel when the call is answered?

What I can do is to produce the voice clips for those phone systems.

Some recent questions that came in (paraphrased):

Why is it important it’s done professionally?

It’s important because the customer needs to feel special and wanted, so being led through by a friendly, professional human-sounding voice will keep them a happy customer, before being put through to the department/person they want to talk to.

How easy to get it implemented?

In a word, very. You supply me with the script you’ve had written, and I can return the finished audio clip(s) usually same day in WAV or mp3 format.

Presumably this kind of thing is quite costly?

With me, not at all. I have packages starting from as little as £50. It all depends on the length of the script and how long it’ll take to produce. All you need do is drop me a line and I can quote accordingly…

Want more info?

http://www.richardheathcote.co.uk/voice-demos/messageonhold.html