FAQ
Most frequent questions and answers
General Questions
On-Hold Marketing is a mix of music and information about your company that plays on your telephone system when you place callers on hold. People are generally receptive to hearing more about a company they’ve just called, so take advantage of this valuable marketing opportunity! Music and message on-hold are a welcome alternative to silence, a beep or the radio; a solution that generates a more positive caller experience.
Marketing on-hold turns silence into sales! It promotes the products and services you offer, helps present a polished, professional image to your callers, and in a pleasant and entertaining way, encourages callers to stay on the line until you return.
A Message On Hold program (MOH) plays to callers waiting on hold or in queue. It features recorded announcements (paragraphs) and music that plays in a continuous loop. All other project types, such as voice prompts for telephony, website audio, voice mail greetings and others, are considered “Voice Productions”. While these projects can feature music in addition to voices, they are delivered as separate files and do not play in a loop.
Most businesses require a very basic day greeting and main menu, and a night menu. However, your specific needs will be dependent on not only your business needs, but on the capability of your phone system. We provide a library of auto-attendant / voice menu / IVR scripts that you can use, but for specific information about your capabilities you will need to work with your phone system manufacturer or provider.
It is illegal to play copyrighted music for commercial use (which includes your on hold programming) without paying royalties. Music provided by IVR Prompts use is royalty free because IVR Prompts licenses it for Message on Hold usage.
On average, 5 to 15 seconds of music plays between each message blurb. Keep your audience in mind: musical breaks that are too long are boring, but message blurbs that are long or too detailed can be overwhelming. In most cases, 5 to 15 seconds, between message blurbs that don’t exceed 30 seconds are usually appropriate.
Service Questions
Yes. IVR Prompts is pleased to offer a significant discount to additional business locations using the same production at each location. Need a slight variation? Want to include the addresses and hours? It just costs a fraction more.
We have a large library to choose from with ever-changing samples for you to listen to on our samples. Don’t see what you’re looking for? Just talk to one of our associates for additional selections.
Yes. IVR Prompts has a wide variety of voice talent to choose from. Check out our samples.
IVR Prompts engages broadcast-quality professionals who can provide an extraordinary range of reads to reflect the image your company wants to portray. Check out our samples.
Script writing is always included in our on-hold packages (conditions apply). Our professional scriptwriters will call you to discuss your goals and answer any questions before beginning to write your script. Don’t have time? Not to worry! We can get started with info from your website. If you prefer our one-time fee service, a small additional charge will be added to the price.
Yes, French recordings are available in our “bilingual” packages. Check out the French section of our samples page. We also offer most other languages and can provide samples upon request.
We provide the best and most experienced voice talent in the industry, along with a rigid post-production process to insure the best possible sound for your specific application. The growth of our company and our reputation in the industry is based on us getting it right, time after time.
Technical Questions
YES! As long as you have a phone system on-hold will work. Some of our services includes playback equipment, .wav files or any other type of files formatted to work with your phone system. Have a VoIP or cloud based system? Absolutely!
Playback equipment is connected via a patch cord to the music-on-hold port of your phone system (located in your phone room).
File formatting specs are noted in your system manual or can be ascertained from your system provider. If you can provide us with the specific make and model, our producers will be able to determine the format required.