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10 Mar 2022 Our top 5 tips to make the most of on-hold marketing
As business communications systems get ever more sophisticated, a growing number of businesses are making use of on-hold marketing to communicate with callers who are waiting to get through. On-hold marketing offers a lot of opportunities, but we’ve found that some business struggle to make the most of them. We’ve written this blog to help.
What is on-hold marketing?
First off, let’s cover the basics. On-hold marketing is pretty much what it sounds like. When customers are on hold, instead of playing generic hold music, you play messages that are custom-recorded for you. This could be anything from useful information like opening hours, or plugging your latest promotions.
The benefits are clear. On-hold callers are clearly interested in your business, which means their time on hold is a sales opportunity waiting to be taken. This service allows you to upsell to them, or just provide useful info, with no additional effort. Studies show that on-hold marketing reduces dropped calls, while its marketing potential is immense.
At One Connectivity, we offer an on-hold marketing service that’s easy to use and completely bespoke. You can choose from a range of professional voice actors, and we’ll even advise on scripts. There’s barely any admin at all – just let us know your message, sit back, and leave the rest to us. We’ll get it recorded and scheduled, and it’ll be live whenever you need it.
We’ve been offering this service for some time now, and we’d like to think we’re ahead of the game when it comes to what works. We wanted to use this blog to offer some advice on how to make the most of it. So without further ado, these are our top five tips …
1. Find your voice
We mean this literally! You need to think carefully about the vocal quality of whoever’s delivering your on-hold messaging. Of course, as a bare minimum you need someone who speaks clearly so your callers can understand your messaging. But beyond that, there’s the question of what kind of voice suits your brand identity and customers’ expectations. You need to think about your own image, and which age group, gender and accent best represents it.
At One Connectivity, our on-hold marketing service can help. First off, we only use professional voice actors. This means that whichever voice you go with, you can be sure that callers will hear every syllable! As well as this, we can offer both male and female voices in a range of accents, ages and vocal styles, from formal to informal. This means that your customised messages will always be delivered by a voice that matches your brand.
2. Match your messaging to your business goals
We’ve already covered how the voice you choose matters – next, it’s about what the voice says! Think of on-hold marketing as part of your broader marketing strategy. This requires a bit of joined-up thinking. Essentially, you need to figure out what you need to promote, how, and when. If you’ve got an important campaign coming up, use your on-hold marketing to promote it.
Make sure you include a call to action as well – you’ll want to send people to where they need to go. For instance, if you’re promoting a sale on your website, direct callers there.
3. Plan ahead
A major benefit of on-hold marketing is that it the professional image it gives you. When callers hear useful information from professional voice actors, it’s bound to enhance their impression of your company. Don’t mess this up by continuing to tell them about your Christmas promotions in February! Your messaging is likely to change throughout the year, and it has to stay relevant. This follows from our previous point. If you’re thinking strategically, you can plan your on-hold messaging well in advance.
We can help with all this. We’ll advise throughout, and can have your scripts recorded and scheduled as far in advance as you need. Let’s say you’re closed over Christmas, before returning with a sale for New Year. That’ll require a couple of different messages to be recorded and scheduled in. At One Connectivity, we’ll make it easy, so you can be sure your messaging is always up to date.
4. Keep it simple
The potential offered by on-hold marketing makes it an exciting prospect. But it’s important not to get too carried away and overdo it. If you record long, complicated messaging or change it constantly, this can easily lead to confusion and disengagement from customers. Like everything else in marketing, short and snappy messages in plain English are always best!
At One Connectivity, we’ll use our extensive experience to advise on your scripts. We’ll help you figure out everything you need to include, and make suggestions on the most economical and straightforward ways of expressing it.
5. Analyse your performance
Good-quality analysis can make or break a business, for obvious reasons. You need to be able to understand your market, anticipate changes, and determine what’s effective. This applies just as much to on-hold marketing as anything else. It’s simple: you need to figure out what works and why, so that you can keep doing it!
Your phone system is an integral link here. At One Connectivity, we can offer analytics add-ons that give you rich insights into your call statistics. How does this relate to on-hold marketing? Well, you can tell how long people are waiting, which means you know exactly who’s hearing your messaging. Do you lose fewer calls? Are your promotions gaining more traction? These are the sorts of questions our analytics tools can help you answer.
What One Connectivity can do
We hope this has clarified a few things for you. On-hold marketing is a powerful tool with many benefits – it just takes a bit of planning and thought to get the most out of it. We can help with every part of this, from your scripts to the scheduling.
Our belief is that it should be as easy as possible for all our on-hold marketing customers. Once you’ve decided on your messaging and preferred voice, we’ll do the rest. You’ll have professional, relevant messaging all year round, and you’ll barely have to lift a finger.
To find out more, call us on 0115 896 88 60.