Writing the Perfect MOH Script

Music-on-Hold or MOH scripts have quickly become a standard communication solution for small to medium businesses that need to keep customers engaged, whilst on hold. During Peak call-times through the year, you may be finding that opportunities are being missed because the customer can’t wait for the conversation to begin and ends the call. With an MOH script, the conversation starts as soon as the customer picks up the phone and dials, helping keep your customers engaged even if no one is directly available to answer the call.

Did you know?

Customers know their call is important to them but how can you make the call a memorable experience for them? By giving the customer unique, personalised and relevant information, your customer will be more inclined to stay on the line and wait for an operative.

Let’s go through a couple of the most useful tips to discover how the personal touch makes such a difference:

Decide what information your customers need to know?

This is the MOST IMPORTANT part of the process – get down as many ideas as possible, This is where the brainstorming comes in (brainstorming techniques) now keep them safe and periodically update and refresh them. Decide the main points you want to convey, complete the remaining sentence structure for each and whittle those sentences down until only the vital information remains.

One script is not enough

Businesses and information can change in an instant, so why shouldn’t your MOH messages change too? Find a calendar and go through each month to make sure you haven’t missed any useful opportunities like a new product launch, Christmas special offers or opening times over a Bank Holiday. Then go through it again, whilst cross-referencing with your brainstorming ideas, to create a plan to determine what messages you want and when.

Once they are all written, you can swap or mix-and-match them with minimal effort or having to spend valuable time redrafting.

If you’d like to discover how much revenue/margin you could be missing, try out our Calculator

Write simple words with simple sentences

Remember your customers aren’t reading the message and they can’t rewind. You need to package the information so that it goes in one ear and sticks. Long words and complicated grammar will alienate your customers and make them feel inferior and that your business may not be the right fit for them.

Keep everyone on-message

Are your operators following up on the info the customer hears on hold? Do they know what those recordings sound like? Keeping on top of training and encouraging them to listen to your messages helps keep the business focusing on current needs, looking professional and driving results.

Stay Positive

Have you won any competitions recently or passed a milestone? Letting your customers know about the wins of the company can help produce an image of professionality and success to your customers before they have even spoken to you. If there are points you need to get across with a negative connotation, try and flip the perception. For example, “all our agents are busy at the moment…” becomes “we’re getting an agent ready for you…”  The message is the same but far more positive and personal.

Find information that isn’t easy to find themselves

Is there any interesting information that isn’t on your website? For example, an anecdote about how the company started or an interesting fact that helps put your businesses’ USP into context. If you can educate your customers and give them a factoid or two that they didn’t have before, their perception of your business will improve, helping to maintain a personal connection with your customers.

Know your enemy

Sun Tzu was right; knowing your competition can help find new solutions and ideas that you may not have thought of before. What do your competitor’s messages sound like? Is there anything you’d want to replicate or change? These can be great methods of inspiration – just make sure not to copy them so closely that your message loses its individuality.

If you’d like to see what other tips we have for your specific industry, look at our Toolkit.

Repetition

Is there a time of year you need to hammer a particular message home? For example, deadlines for a delivery service over a holiday? Repeating something at the start and finish will improve the chances of your caller remembering the information. This is where having several messages is vital; using repetition within a message is fine, but if you only have the one message, callers are soon going to get frustrated hearing the same information over and over … and over again.

Inform your customers about the call

Depending on your business, letting customers know where they are in your queue could be a good or bad idea. The deciding factor is usually decided by looking at your call volume/length and any customer feedback figures you have. If you find customers are getting frustrated, being on hold too long, this may help alleviate their frustrations as it keeps them informed and able to make their own decision as to whether to hang on the line. If you’ve only ever got 1 or two on hold and your call lengths tend to be long, this may be more detrimental as a caller may expect a quick answer. Look at it from your customer’s point of view and ask yourself what they would prefer.

Make it Memorable

Everyone sighs when they hear an automated message, why not try and add a bit of brevity? Alliteration, a pun, and interesting facts can all take what is generally viewed as a negative experience and ‘flip the script’.