One Call Now sends hundreds of thousands of voice messages and phone notification messages a day for schools, churches, synagogues, youth groups and businesses. In every case, making sure the message is clearly undersatood is critical to effective communications.
I listen to dozens of messages every week, and have a few tips to offer based on what we hear…..
1- Have Caller ID set to display YOUR local number and name. Leading notification services offer this feature, it dramatically improves the ‘pick-up’ rate, how many people will answer the phone when it rings and hear your message.
2- Make sure calls do NOT start with the dreaded telemarketing ‘dead air’ syndrome. Some Notification Services start calls the way those pesky telemarketing calls do… with a long pause of dead air. Most parents just hang up at that point. Make sure the call immediately starts with your greeting.
3- Start with a consistent greeting. Make sure you can, and do pre-record a consistent greeting for all messaging from your school or organization. Such as “This is an important message from Heywood Elementary”, or “This is Pastor Bob from United church, with news for you…” It quickly identifies the call and tells the family what to do next, which is simple. Just listen for a moment.
Write down what you want to say before recording the message. Make sure to follow the five “W’s” of broadcast journalism- go ahead, pretend you are a TV anchorperson or newscaster!
Include the WHAT WHEN WHERE WHO and WHY. (and usually HOW- which is a W if you read it backwards)
4- WHAT are you calling about “The Upcoming Meeting has been cancelled”, or “The fundraiser will start Thursday”
5- WHEN is key… If changing an event date or time, be clear about which date is canceled and when the new one is. When announcing a new date, say the day, date and time. I suggest you repeat it.
“The rehearsal for tonight has been changed due to icy roads. The new rehearsal date is Friday at 7PM in the auditorium, that’s 7pm Friday in the auditorium for the changed rehearsal time, pray for a thaw!”
6-WHERE is obvious, if the venue has moved it’s crucial. “The 4pm game tomorrow has been moved from North Field #2 to The South Park, field #3; That’s South Park Field #3, tomorrow at 4pm instead of the published site on your calendar.”
7- WHO… You never know who will pick up the phone, so it’s usually a good idea to say who the message is for. “The youth choir rehearsal will start at 4:30pm instead of 5pm tomorrow Friday”
8- WHY: Whenever changing or moving an event or activity, you cause families to change their schedules to accommodate you. If there’s a good reason, they will understand, but if there’s not, it can appear you are being capricious or scatter brained! So say why the change is needed. If it’s a safety issue, not only will they move things around, but they’ll appreciate your action.You don’t need much detail, but a quick few words make a big difference.
Example: “Due to icy roads…” OR “Due to a bank robbery near the school…” OR “The other team has a transportation issue…”.
9- HOW: Here we mean HOW to confirm message receipt, or HOW to contact you with their availability. The best Messaging systems allow you to ask a poll type question such as “school will be dismissing early due to forecast for more snow and treacherous conditions later today. Press ’1′ if we can drop your child off at home when we dismiss at noon; press ’2′ to say you will call the school to make other arrangements…” OR “To help us plan for the picnic, please use touch tone key to tell me how many people will be attending saturday at noon”.
10- WOW ‘em with clarity: Speak clearly, slowly and avoid slang expressions that may confuse folks at home who don’t know you, but will need to hear and act on your message. ex: “That’s a 10-4 on the re-do guys, game on!” (I really heard this!) when you mean, “The other team confirmed the change so we will have our re-scheduled tournament game today at 4PM on field number 5″.
PS. If your Notification Service offers on-line message reports, check to see that everyone was reached, particularly just after loading a new call list roster. It’s easy to mistype a number, or misread the scribble the parent gave you. Send a test message before using a new roster for a real message!
Communications, whether to a team of 10 or a school district of 10,000 is all about speaking clearly, and including everything necessary for the message to get through.
You may not make the six o’clock news, but your group will know exactly what is happening, when to be there, where to be, who is affected, why the change, how to confirm receipt and they’ll say WOW! what a great communicator you are!
For more examples and detailed ideas, goto www.onecallnow.com
PPS… A phone message is NOT the place to emulate a TV broadcaster by sending a message like this… “There’s a big change coming, details at 11!”
