As I discussed in a previous blog…When used properly, Messages on Hold (MOH) is a great resource for your company. You can tell your customers about specials, new products and services…anything that may have an impact on your callers…and those 20 percent who make up 80 percent of your business. Repeat…when used correctly, MOH can be very effective.

During the last 23 years of producing MOH, I have developed some serious pet peeves. I covered the first in a previous blog. Just to review:

That brings me to Pet Peeve #2: Clients who want to write their own Messages

Don’t get me wrong. When clients write their own messages, it means we don’t have to spend a lot of our time writing on that endeavor. However, we employ writers for that very purpose, and we keep them very busy. (Soundstrategies has several file cabinets full of scripts from 2008, alone.) And, once again, in the category of “don’t get me wrong”, some companies are pretty good at writing their own messages. But the majority of our clients may not fall into that category.

Here’s the problem. We often write from our own perspective. Sometime the people elected to write the Messages on Hold for their company are not the best candidates for the job. For instance, someone in the Information Technology department may be accustomed to a specific, technical way of communicating, and his/her scripts will probably reflect that paradigm. Instead, we need to think about what an average caller wants to hear, and consider that old cliché: Less is More. Then, write (y)our copy with that intent. In other words, keep it simple.

And that leads to Pet Peeve #3: Long (really long) messages.

As we enter our 24th year of writing Messages on Hold, I must say that we often think in terms of time. We think about the time it takes to build up a strong clientele, and the time it takes to write high-quality, effective copy. We also have thought a lot about the ideal length for an individual Message on Hold. Twenty seconds seems to be optimum length of time.

The shorter, the better…is a great rule to go by. Unfortunately, we have clients whose messages contain so much information, that they last more than FIVE times longer than the ideal spot. A caller will often be placed on hold at some arbitrary point in that message…and must sit and listen to the second half of something they don’t understand. This can be as frustrating as listening to silence while on hold.

Let’s keep it simple; Simple for all of us. Messages should be short and sweet and to the point. No rocket science, here. Your callers will thank you.