Music On Hold News

Credibility Sells

A custom music on hold message can make your company sound professional. Go a step further, however, and be sure to include trust-building statements that are backed up by facts.

What evidence does a decision-maker have that your company is a good choice? Making general claims such as, “We’re dedicated…” or, “No one beats our deals…” just won’t tip the scales in your favor any more. You need to provide proof.

Want to be credible? Be specific. As in numbers. In an effort to add real meat to the message on hold,  articulate specific, relevant facts. Here are some examples:

• Ten years in the business. Fifty-five parts professionals. Five-hundred-thousand parts in stock.
• This winter, four out of every ten homes will lose fifty dollars-worth of energy because of leaky windows.
• Last year we answered one-hundred percent of our service calls within five hours.
• One dealership offers free car washes for life. One dealership provides a one-hundred-thousand-mile warranty on every certified pre-owned vehicle.
• While many businesses are reducing staff, Omnicast increased our service staff by 25 percent in 2009.
• Our fourteen service vehicles cover all of northern Ohio, so you won’t have to wait when you need us.

Your hold music message is not a company brochure. It’s a golden opportunity to put forward facts and ideas that tell a potential buyer that they’ve made the right call.

3 Tips For Keeping Callers On The Line

“Verizon has absolutely bizarre hold music. …and then the bot hung up on me. What utter indignity!” Hey, Verizon! That’s one of your customers in a recent tweet.

Could your caller be tweeting about your music on hold?

Here are 3 quick tips to generate a positive reaction from callers on hold:

1) Talk to one caller, in personal terms. Speak as though there is only one customer on the line. Phrases that address, “you”, “your” as opposed to referring to “our patients” or “customers”. I don’t want to hear that you’re helping someone else–I want to be treated like the only customer you have.

2) Let the caller know you understand their situation. Your caller has a need; perhaps a problem that you’re going to solve. Start by addressing the need. Show understanding for the reason your caller is on the line and willing to hold. For example, a waste management company says, “It can be frustrating if your trash wasn’t picked up on time…” A medical office might show an understanding for billing needs, or talk about a focus on making patients comfortable.

3) Keep messages short. How much can someone remember from a message on hold? Not much. Make short statements that are wrapped around one idea. Avoid long lists and detailed descriptions.

Try a free music on hold message demo and play around with this approach.

Your Call Is Not Important To Us, Please Hold

“If my call is so important, then why did you place me on hold?”

As a business owner, you may not have a choice. Some “on-hold” time is going to happen. The problems start when you ignore your hold time or mismanage it.

Boston area Internet marketing consultant Bill Enross puts forth a thought-provoking profile of today’s consumer. Among a long list of characteristics are:

* She expects someone to answer the phone when she calls that can actually HELP.
* She is SICK of off-shore call centers, erroneously called “help desks.”
* She is SICK of you telling him how important her call is while she stands on hold.
* She is SICK of your recorded hold message.
* She demands the truth. All the time.

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: Your caller knows she is on hold. Use that time to talk to her. Imagine what help she could use and provide some insight using short, conversational statements.

If hold time is inevitable, then use it strategically, using the caller’s perspective.

Increase The Average Sale

Business consultant Mark Salmon writes an interesting post on the four ways to increase business:

• Increase the number of customers of the type you want to have
• Increase the number of times customers come back
• Increase the average value of each sale
• Increase the effectiveness of each process in the business

While all of these deserve attention, today I would like to suggest a way to increase the average sale.

Educational Information Plays A Role In Increasing Sales

Communicating educational information about your products or services can help build customers’ confidence in your business and increase the sale value. Your collateral material, such as “leave-behinds”, signage, newsletters and e-mails may impress potential buyers. Do not overlook your message on hold system.

Mr. Salmon writes:

Surprisingly, your on-hold messages can spark a customer’s interest and increase the average sale.  For example, if you call a business about a specific product or services and you’re put on hold for a moment.  A recording comes on that tells you about other products or services that you may not otherwise have known about — causing you to ask for more information or come in and see for yourself.

Shopping Music On Hold System? 2 More Tips

If you’re looking into getting a music on hold system to help callers endure on-hold time, you’re not alone. Every day I speak with owners of small businesses, technicians, marketers and office personnel who are looking for advice. In our previous post we mentioned 5 Tips.

As promised, here are more considerations that will help you make a smart hold messaging purchase.

Request A Custom Demo. Typically, message on hold providers will play an audio sample of messages on hold they’ve produced for other businesses. That’s fine, but it doesn’t really show you what they’ll do for you. Will you get the same voiceover/announcer, script quality, production quality, etc. as the sample? The only way to know for sure is to discuss your business with a music on hold producer. Let them take a couple of days to write up a short script–about your business. Listen to the voiceover for your actual production. Listen to how the music works with the voice. You don’t need to be completely satisfied, as the script can be modified, the music can be changed, etc., but the demo should tell you if the producer “gets” your business. Also, consider how the production process was handled. Were deadlines met? Did the script speak to the caller, or was it all fluff and corporate-speak? Don’t let the script writer get away with using a boring template.

Is The Music Licensed? I’m assuming you haven’t been staying up at night studying copyright law, and I’m  not a lawyer either, but I have learned about the proper way to use music in my business. Please review my report, Understanding Music On Hold Copyright. Since the telephone is a wired communications device regulated by the Federal Communications Commission, any use of music on hold is considered a re-broadcast. Check your telephone equipment manual. Chances are, it includes a warning against use of unlicensed music. Here’s the point: not all music and message on hold providers cover the performance license you need. If the music on hold provider cannot explain how you’re covered, be suspicious. Please visit a page on our site called How To use Music On Hold Legally for more information.

REVIEW:

1. Contract or No Contract? You may not be served well by a contract or pay-as-you-go program.
2. What Is A Message? Be sure you understand the difference between a “message” and a “paragraph”.  Terms can be tricky.
3. Get To Know Your Phone System. If you already have music on hold, find out how the audio gets into your phones. If you don’t have any audio on hold now, learn the make and model of the phones or phone system.
4. How Often Will You Change Your Message? Ask about discounts for multiple messages; don’t buy more messages that you realistically will use.
5. Beware of Unnecessary  Installation and Setup Fees. You may be able to install yourself and save.

Shopping For A Music On Hold System? 5 Tips

You’ve decided to take care of the “hold button problem”–you know, that silence or fuzzy radio that callers endure while waiting for someone to come back on the line. Now you need to choose a music on hold provider. Here are 5 quick tips–things to watch out for when shopping messages on hold.

1. CONTRACT OR NO CONTRACT?
There are services with ongoing contract payments and there are “buyout” message-on-hold providers. If you want to own your equipment and messages, mention this up front. If you simply want to pay a monthly fee for complete service (equipment, message changes, scripting) then remember that at the end of the contract you have silence on hold once again.

2. WHAT IS A MESSAGE?
Some companies call a short paragraph a “message” –then they say you’ll get 8 messages. This means you get one on hold production containing 8 paragraphs of copy. Often a “message” refers to a self-contained 4-minute production that will loop continuously. Ask about word count. How many words will I get in my script? How many unique scripts?

3. GET TO KNOW YOUR PHONE SYSTEM
First, do you need equipment? If you have had music-on-hold on your current phone system, state this to your prospective supplier; it may keep you from paying for unnecessary equipment. Your phone system may allow messages to be entered into an internal memory, in which case you may not need any equipment at all. You might have a 2 or 4 line phone you purchased at an office supply store. These types of phones cannot play music on hold without the help of a special adapter that allows music to be piped into the phone line.

4. HOW OFTEN WILL YOU CHANGE YOUR MESSAGE?
The on-hold message industry calls message changes “updates”. If you have a seasonal business, or if you hold monthly webinars, events and shows, you should ask for pricing on a package of custom hold messages. You may also find a plan that allows unlimited message changes over the course of a year. Easy On Hold offers an “Anytime Plan” for a flat annual fee of $850. This can cut the per-production cost considerably. If you plan to just use a place-holder as opposed to a marketing message, ask about a smaller package of 2 or 4 unique productions–but beware of time limits. Often you are forced to use all productions within a 12-month period. Easy On Hold offers packages of 2 to 4 on-hold productions that “roll over” like unused cell phone minutes that never expire. You could take 14, 28, or 100 months to use them up.

5. BEWARE OF UNNECESSARY INSTALLATION AND SETUP FEES
Chances are, you can plug the message on hold equipment in yourself. If you have never had music on hold playing on your phone system, you can place a call to your system installer and ask about the MOH INPUT, which may be as easy as plugging headphones into your iPod. Speaking of iPods, please don’t cheap out and try to use a consumer-grade audio player in place of a professional message on hold player. Lithium batteries should never be plugged in day after day. The idea of a message on hold player is that it repeats 24/7 so any time a caller is placed on hold, your message will play.

There are many other considerations, of course, such as whether the music is properly licensed, whether you can hear a custom made sample of a custom production made specifically for your company before purchasing, and how long the company has been in business (why not get references?).  We’ll cover these in our next post!