Phone tag got you down? No matter how understanding you can be as a small business owner, when a potential sale keeps slipping through your redialing fingertips, it can really test your patience — not to mention your bottom line. But, what if you didn’t have to wait for a call-back to get the ball rolling on your sale? What if you could all but close the sale right in your voicemail? If this were possible, it would not only save you time when the call finally comes through, but it would also give the customer a great incentive to get back in touch in a hurry: they want what you’re selling!

As it turns out, it is possible to do exactly that. In fact, there are a variety of ways that your voicemail can accomplish the work you intended to do once you got the customer on the phone.

When was the last time you called your own business and listened to your voicemail greeting? If you’re like most, it’s probably not that often. Voicemail greetings are one of those things we all tend to set and forget. The thing is, your voicemail is often the first impression a new customer gets of your business.

“Leaving the generic greeting either says that you don’t care or that you don’t know how to change the greeting,” says Ivana Taylor for DIY Marketers. And if you can’t handle voicemail settings, what does that say to customers about your business?

Robotic voicemail messages can give customers the wrong impression about how you run your business. Don’t make the same mistakes you’ve heard on other businesses’ voicemail. Create a voicemail greeting that makes customers feel as welcomed and delighted as they would be by walking in your door.

Phone ringing off the hook? What a great problem for a small business have! Though you’d probably agree that too many phone calls is preferable to the sound of crickets, managing a tidal wave of customer calls is a tough job.

Is it better to have an employee field every call? If you ask anyone who’s spent an entire day fielding calls, you’ll probably decide it’s not.

After hearing how many times the same basic information was repeated and how many calls resulted in messages you or another staff member need to return anyway, all of the other things you could have had that employee working on instead of acting as a human voicemail greeting suddenly seem a lot more important.

I was recently talking to one of my friends who is in the midst of starting her own home-based cookie business. While she wants to have a separate phone number for her business, she isn’t at the point of needing a full virtual PBX system, nor is she at the point of getting a ton of calls. What she would like to have is a business phone number & voicemail that she can pay for only when she uses it.

Did you know you can do this with Grasshopper?

Despite the fact that we are a full featured phone system, at our core, we enable customers to have a phone number and voicemail for their business that they can access from anywhere. Plus we have a pay as you grow plan that you only pay for when you use it!

Why are you pitching me Grasshopper?

Well, sometimes we get caught up talking about all the great features we have and we forget that for many of our new customers, you don’t need all of them just yet!

If you are looking to start a home-based business or already have one, here are some tips on getting your business phone number & voicemail system set up:

1. Choose a phone number. Do you want a toll free number? Local number? Check out a few tips on choosing the right number for your business.
2. Secure it. With the Pay as You Grow plan you are securing the number you want and you pay only for the minutes you use.

In an ideal world, you wouldn’t need voicemail. You’d have time to answer each and every customer call as it came in–with a smile in your voice, of course. In the real world, that’s just not possible. Even if you put in a 60 hour workweek, you have to get up and use the bathroom or grab a snack eventually.

Luckily for you, there’s a convenient little thing called voicemail. Voicemail is great for your business, because it allows customers to contact you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Voicemail is also great for potential customers, because it gives them a sneak peak at your personality–and yes, they’re judging you when they call.

So what should you say in your voicemail? How long should your recording be? What type of voicemail makes a potential customer want to do business with you, and what makes them hang up before you even finish your recorded greeting?

Try these tips for recording a great voicemail greeting:

1. Smile

You might be shaking your head right now, saying, “But they can’t see me through the phone…why should I smile?”. Customers are smart. A study by the University of Portsmouth shows that people can tell when you’re happy to hear from them, despite the fact that they can’t see your facial expressions or body language. The Headquarters, Department of the Army (HQDA) has specific rules pertaining to office etiquette, including recording voicemails with a smile. If you don’t think smiling makes a difference, record two different voicemails: one where you’re smiling and one where you’re not. Which one sounds better?

2. Identify Yourself

This might seem like a no-brainer, but many businesses fail to state their name in their voicemail.  This confuses customers and makes them hesitant to leave a message. Many of them worry they’ve reached the wrong company and hang up, and they don’t always call back.

3. Speak Clearly

“Hi, this is momeroumgsljl and I’m ahaljfoufofoirold”. Don’t mumble in your voicemail. If you are a chronic mumbler, have somebody else record your voicemail for you.

4. Be Creative

Your callers have done this before. They know that you are unavailable, they know this is a voicemail, and they know to leave a name and number so that you can “get back with them as soon as you can”.  There’s no need to tell them what they already know, so be creative. Incorporate a fun fact or statistic into your message, such as “A Duke University study found that many voicemails were not heard within 7 days, but don’t worry, we listen to all messages within 24 hours”.