Please Leave a Message

How to get people to leave messages on your answer phone.

Lots of companies and field sales reps tell me a high number of callers hang up when they reach an answer phone. Getting callers to leave a message for you makes a huge difference to how you plan your day or week, how you manage your business-by-phone and your sales potential and revenue. But persuading people to leave messages on your answer phone can be tricky.

Before I offer a proven message for you to try, let me explain a little how callers feel when they hear an answer phone message on a business line that may go like this:

“You’ve reached the answer phone of Spanners Limited.”

Does a caller want to hear they’ve reached an answer phone? No. 40% of hang-ups occur right there.

They go on:

“Sorry, but were busy at the moment” or “All our operators are busy” or “Sorry we can’t take your call right now”.

Callers are busy too and they don’t care if you are or not. Plus, once they hear you can’t take their call another 40% of hang-uppers do just that – hang up! The fact you’re sorry about it means little to them except you’re apologising so it must be your fault. So far the message has all been about your problems but nothing that the caller wants to hear. It may go on:

“Please leave a detailed message along with your name and phone number after the tone and we’ll call you back as soon as we can...”

If, and it is a big if, the caller is still there, many won’t leave a message anyway. Most people in business don’t need to be told what message to leave or to do so after the tone. Is it any wonder that hang-ups occur?

Here’s a message that works well that you could adapt. While nothing is guaranteed 100% of the time, try this and measure the number of messages left over a month.

“Hello ... this is the phone for Matthew Mewse, The Telephone Man.”

First up, this is the phone; you’re in the right place! You called the right number!

“I’m really glad you called me today…”

It’s personal; glad is an emotion, a feeling. People have feelings, answer phones don’t! I’m glad you rang me and that you did today. How many answer phone messages say that?

“Please leave me a quick message and I’ll get right back to you.”

Notice there’s no mention of “I’m too busy for you” or “Sorry” or “After the beep”.

Before they know it, the caller has the opportunity to speak and leave a message. What kind? A quick one because that’s what we asked for. Also, I, me, the guy they were trying to speak to is communicating in the first person and making a commitment to call back.

There’s not one negative word or long, drawn-out sentence in this message so the caller gets to the tone very quickly. Many answer phone dodgers now find they are speaking down the line, saying who they are, where they’re from and the reason for their call. Simple and it works!