Why phone messages on hold are critical to your business

Phone messages on hold are criticized unfairly. In fact, I, a producer of phone messages on hold, unfairly describe them as "annoying" when I say, "My company does voiceover for podcasts, commercials and videos, and we produce those annoying phone messages on hold." Yep, I sometimes say it ... even though I know how important on-hold messages are.

My brother-in-law asked me at the Thanksgiving table a couple of days ago what we're doing these days at Audiobag. I told him we've been busy with various audio projects.

"Like what?" he asked.

I answered, "Well, we're number one on Google (actually, we keep changing between number one, two and three) when you type in phone messages on hold. So we've been busy creating phone messages on hold for customers."

"Oh, I hate those!" someone at the table exclaimed. And, of course, I agreed that they can be annoying. But then I can't believe what came out of my mouth next. Talking like a professor (or a phone messages on hold salesman), I said "Did you know that 60% of callers will hang up after one minute if they hear silence?"

Lots of mumbling and gasps around the table. Okay, maybe no gasps ... but nodding of heads. One of my nieces said, "Yeah, that's right. I always hang up if I hear silence."

I'm not making up this conversation. We actually talked about phone messages on hold on Thanksgiving day. And everyone seemed to agree that they work. They keep people on the phone while they wait for you.

However, phone messages on hold don't have to sound annoying. They can be fun. We created some fun phone messages on hold for a customer who sells bar supplies in South Carolina. He wanted messages that would entertain his customers while they waited for a sales rep to take their order. You can listen to what we came up with at http://audiobag.com/funphone.

The moral of this story is: Talking about phone messages on hold is safer than talking about politics and religion. No wait, that's not the moral. The moral is: Phone messages on hold are critical for keeping customers waiting on hold. Learn more about phone messages on hold at Audiobag.

A phone interview is a great way to get started in podcasting

Occasionally someone contacts us because they want to get their company into podcasting but they don't know quite how to jump into it. They usually don't have a script and some even are reluctant to attempt to write one. Here's what we tell them.

We don't know as much about your business as you do to write the script for you. However, there is a fast and easy way to get started podcasting without a formal script. Why don't you come up with five questions about your business, products, and/or services and send them to us. We'll write an open and close for your podcast, then set up a time to call you to ask you your questions. Customers like this approach because they are in complete control of what is asked of them. In fact, we tell them don't worry about making mistakes when answering the questions. Just stop where you make the mistake and pick it up from there. We'll edit. Yes, the magic word "edit" makes everyone feel at ease. Even us. We make mistakes, too.

The phone interview usually takes about 15 minutes. Then we go do our magic with editing. The finished presentation sounds very professional, I assure you. In fact, I guarantee you'll like it or we'll recut it or refund your money. Here's a phone interview we recently conducted with Tom Freiling of Samaritan Fundraising. Tom liked it so much, he's already making plans for the next interview.

How to get listeners to return for your next podcast

Podcasting is simultaneously easy and hard. The easy part is just grabbing a recorder and punching the record button.

The hard part is making your podcast sound good enough for people to come back for more. Few will come back if your content is uninteresting, if you make verbal mistakes throughout your show, and if there's too much noise (hiss, hum, thumps, thuds) in the background. Using a digital recorder is a good start on eliminating hiss and hum. The thumps and thuds are going to need to be taken out.

Verbal flubs (like "uh"), long pauses, shuffling of paper, coughing, sniffling, smacking your lips are also distractions to podcast listeners. If you want listeners to return for your next show, edit out the flubs and extraneous noise. An occasional "uh" may make you sound more natural and like you're not reading a script. But saying it throughout your show sounds unprofessional. Oh, and if you think sounding unprofessional is going to get you listeners, then check out the top 20 podcasts on iTunes. All of them are professionally-produced.

If you don't have the time or know-how to edit your podcast, we do it at Audiobag. You can find out more about our audio editing services, see our prices, and make a purchase online at http://audiobag.com/audioediting.html.

Audio software for creating high quality podcasts

If you're going for the highest quality possible in a podcast (and I realize not everyone needs or wants the highest quality), I’d suggest using several software programs. We use Sony Sound Forge for recording and editing our voice, Adobe Audition for “painting out” extraneous noise, and Cockos Reaper for compression (we use the “Smile” setting ReaXcomp plug-in). And finally, we use Sony Vegas Pro for mixing our voice with a podcast intro, outro and short music transitions. Vegas Pro has a fairly low learning curve and there are some nice plug-ins you can use to enhance the sound quality. We use PreSonus Firepod for our equipment (and Presonus Firebox when we’re traveling) because we like to record at 88kHz 32bit (then downsample our podcast to a 128 MP3 file). Of course, once you records, edits, and mix a podcast, then the real fun begins. Promoting it.

Making your voice recordings sound better

Although we produce voice overs and production music at Audiobag, our specialty is post-production work (audio editing). In fact, we have a section on our website dedicated to audio editing at http://audiobag.com/audioediting.html. We love to improve the sound of your voice recordings.

The most common problem in recordings customers send to us is background noise (room ambiance) such as air conditioners, refrigerators, reverberation caused by nearby walls, and of thumping the microphone. We can eliminate most of the thumping noise and decrease the other background noise, but it's impossible to totally eliminate it all. However, there are a few things you can do to improve your recordings.


Place pillows against nearby walls to help decrease wall reverberation noise. If you're in your home or office where you can turn off hum generating equipment without causing any problems with your associates or family members, temporarily turn off the air conditioner, refrigerator and any other noise makers. Just don't forget to turn that refrigerator back on.

One more item that will definitely improve your recordings is a windscreen on your microphone to knock out the plosives (or "popped P's" as we call them). We eliminate plosives every day (sounds like Rolaid's, doesn't it?), so don't worry too much about them if they happen even while using a windscreen.

These are just a few tips to help you improve your recordings. If you'd like expert editing of your recording, visit us at http://audiobag.com/audioediting.html. You'll find a description of what we do to improve audio.

New Mobile Podcast Service

Recently we've been busy adding new services at Audiobag. One we're particularly excited about is mobile podcast recording. Starting in mid-October, we'll come to your location in the Austin, Texas area and record you and your associates (or guests). We'll arrive about an hour before recording to set up our microphones and audio board. Then we'll head back to our studio to edit the audio (taking out long pauses and flubs), add an intro and outro to your podcast, and deliver it via the Internet as a MP3 file -- ready for you to post on the Internet for the world to hear.

Learn more about our service at http://audiobag.com/mobilerecording.html. If you're interested, contact me to discuss your project and to reserve a date and time for the recording. I can be reached by email at jack@audiobag.com, or by phone at 1-800-773-5259.

Why you might need audio editing help

1) You want to create a presentation (like a podcast, for example) using a portable field recorder (you know, one of those cool handhelds) but you don't want to spend the time, energy, or money buying extra equipment and software to edit it into a professional presentation.

2) You've recorded an interview and you want to omit all of the coughing, lip smacking, and extraneous chatter.

3) You have a recording that simply needs sweetening (improving). Perhaps you need more volume, or maybe you want it less muddy sounding.

4) You want to preserve, clean up, and transfer a tape recording to digital format.

If you find you need help with your audio editing, I hope you'll visit us at Audiobag.