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Your Studio Voicemail back to magazine homepage
Making your answering machine work for you
Nothing will kill an enquiry from a prospective student faster than a phone that rings with no answer. Unless you can guarantee to be home 24/7 to answer phone calls, you need to have something that will do it on your behalf—otherwise callers will simply move on to the next number in the Yellow Pages.
Simply having the machine is only part of the story though. When prospective students hear your recorded message, they will establish first impressions about both you and your studio. If that impression is not good, they're likely to just hang up, and your relationship with the student is terminated even before you meet.
It can take months of bad lessons to lose an existing student. But you can achieve the same unhappy outcome with a prospective student in less than ten seconds if your phone message is weak.
We'll look in a moment at some dos and don'ts for your voicemail message, but in the meantime, here's a simple test:
If you spent less than an hour designing and then recording your answering machine message, you weren't taking the task seriously enough.
Ask yourself this. If you were hiring someone to answer your studio's phone, what expectations would you have of their telephone manner? Remember, this person will be talking to potential students long before you get a chance to weave your magic at an interview, so they need to be friendly, polite, confident, clear, articulate and welcoming. Otherwise there's not going to be an interview in the first place.
Not only that, you should think carefully about what they say when they answer the phone. How would you react if you overheard your receptionist answer the phone like this?:
"Hello. I don't really have time to listen to you at the moment. Tell me some way of getting in touch with you, and I'll get back to you when I don't have better things to do."
With that statement ringing in your ears, now think about your existing outgoing message. Does it sound like the following? (A lot of music teacher's do!):
"Hello, this is Sandy. I'm not able to take your call right now. Leave your name and number after the beep."
Look at this message for a moment from the caller's point of view. There are plenty of problems, and they start with the first sentence:
"Hello, this is Sandy."
You may well be Sandy, but if your studio is called "Happy Flutes Music School", then callers are going to be confused by a greeting that doesn't refer to that. With nothing else in the message that identifies you as providing music lessons, there will be some doubt as to whether or not it's actually the right number. At that point, a lot of people will simply hang up.
Even those who proceed regardless will be struck by the fact that the message sounds alarmingly like a residence phone message (rather than a business one), creating an impression of an amateur home based operation.
Even if your studio is home based—and most music teachers do work from home—if your phone number is also the studio phone number, then the message has to be for the studio too.
So instead of:
"Hello, this is Sandy."
Add on
"Hello, this Sandy, and the number for Happy Flutes Music Studio."
A lot of music teachers don't refer to their studio at all in their message, because the telephone line also doubles as a personal line and such a message feels inappropriate for family and friends who might call. You can't afford to be coy like this—teaching is your business, and your voicemail message needs to clearly confirm that. If a dual-function message like that still feels uncomfortable for you, then consider taking out a second phone line, dedicated to your studio.