MAKE SURE YOUR VOICE [MAIL] IS HEARD

By Karen Conole

Voicemail is pretty standard in most offices these days, so it is surprising how many of us have difficulty with this form of communication.

Think of the times you’ve had to decipher a phone message that was too garbled, too faint or too fast to hear. Ever just give up and delete the message, assuming the caller would call back if it were “important enough”?

Along with the aggravation that comes from receiving a poor voicemail message comes lost time and productivity while attempting to hear the message. A bad, unintelligible message does not just waste your call—it could cause you to lose ground with your listener.

If you don’t want the intended recipient to respond to your message with frustration and resentment, you need to be sure to leave it in a form that’s comprehensible.

First, don’t assume that the listener knows who you are. Unless you are the only one with your name, give your full, first and last, name: “Hi, it’s Santa calling,” is fine, but “Hi, it’s John calling,” is not. Ideally, you should give your title and company name: “Hi, it’s John Williams, assistant to Attorney Ralph Brown, of Smith, Brown and Smith.” That prepares the recipient to be an active listener to your message by providing context for your call.

Second, don’t assume the listener knows why you are calling. Take a moment to refresh her memory with a brief “history” of your contact, in addition to the purpose of your current call: “You asked for the best times to schedule our next deposition and I’m calling with those dates.”

Third, be prepared to leave a message, even if you expect to get through to the party you seek. Avoid having to leave extemporaneous, “off the cuff” messages, which tend to get drawn out and can make you sound disorganized and flustered. No one wants to hear your thought processes while you think about what you want to say, so always have a clear, concise message ready, just in case.

Fourth, be as brief as possible. Say just the key elements of your message and sign off. A good approach is to jot down those key elements in order of importance on a sheet of paper then take a few seconds to compose your message—before calling—to include those points as succinctly as possible. When leaving your message, check off the points as they’re mentioned. If the voice mail turns out to have a time restriction and cuts you off, at least you’ll have gotten in the most important information.

Fifth, end by giving the recipient a brief indication of what you expect to happen as a result of your message: “I’ll await your call to discuss this further,” or “I’ll call back Friday morning.”

Sixth, slow down when leaving your telephone number, and repeat it. We all tend to quickly rattle off our personal information as if everyone else should be as familiar with it as we are, and this one thing is often the most common complaint about voicemails. No one wants to be left without the one piece of information necessary to respond to a message—the return phone number—especially if a response is expected from them, so leave your number as if you were dictating it to someone writing it down. That is, slowly and clearly.

Lastly, leave your phone number at the beginning of the message in addition to reiterating it at the end—especially if your message is a longer one. That way, the listener doesn’t have to listen to the whole message all over again if she missed getting your phone number the first time around. It’s also more likely to be included, should you get cut off before finishing.

Keep in mind that your voicemail message represents you, in your absence, so make a little effort to make a big impression, and be sure the message you leave furthers your goals for calling in the first place.