Too often, choosing royalty-free music to play on hold means choosing the track that’s least annoying.

Our business is based on the idea it shouldn’t have to be like that.

But if you make a conscious decision to improve the way your brand sounds, you’re starting to think about strategy. After all, you’re now shaping the way clients hear you – creating associations that connect sounds to images.

So, whether you’re making the most of an audio branding service like ours, or simply paying for a licensed track you think works well with – and best represents – your brand, it makes sense to think about what kind of audio fits with people’s image of your company.

Get this wrong, and you could end up sending mixed messages.

In December, we picked up on the week Delta Air Lines played ‘Let It Snow’ to callers whose planes were cancelled owing to, well, a lot of snow. Outrage on Twitter besides, it’s obvious the company didn’t do it on purpose – it was the season to be jolly, after all.

But it shows that something a lot of companies regard as unimportant is actually a major part of a caller’s experience. Association has a lasting effect, and without enough forethought, it could be all too easy to lose valuable enquiries. Don’t forget – you and your staff will rarely hear your hold music, so it’s important to make sure it’s right first time.

Below you’ll find three examples of good and bad music choices for a few different businesses, plus a bit of rationale. And while these are a bit daft, they serve to prove a point. Callers, like visitors, have an expectation of the brands they choose.

Criminal lawyers

Bad: The Godfather Soundtrack. A grand way to sound a bit dodgy. And sure, you might not go this far, but lounge jazz would present the same sort of image.

Good: Ambient; chill-out. Chances are, your clients are a bit stressed out. But by playing something low-key, it means you’re not making anything worse. But then again, we don’t mean too low-key. Whale songs probably won’t wash.

Garden centres

Bad: Techno. Since your customers want to associate your centre with a relaxing environment. And because class doesn’t grow on trees.

Good: Classical or ambient music will set the tone perfectly. Oh, and plants like classical music, so if they were calling it would get their vote, too.

Hotels

Bad: Romance, business or holiday, there are loads of reasons to stay in a hotel – and absolutely millions of reasons a hotelier shouldn’t put 70s disco music down the blower.

Good: If it’s an inner-city establishment, chill out or ambient will likely suit the brand. If the hotel’s a little more provincial, it might be worth choosing something a little more traditional.

It’s 2010, which means it’s officially The Future. We’re all using jetpacks to get to work, using teleporters to go on city breaks, talking to family with our watches, that kind of thing.

Well, sort of. Google and Apple taking over the world besides, we’re not quite as advanced as our forefathers imagined. It’s easy to laugh at old science fiction stories, movies and games now we’re here, but some of them really did think we’d be in flying cars by now. Even Arthur C. Clarke, one of the most nerdy celebrated science fiction writers in the world, thought we’d be playing with gas monsters on Jupiter by next year.

So, in the spirit of predicting the future (and because it’s trendy to talk about the next decade), we thought we’d gather ideas about the way On-Hold Marketing might change and develop. Click ‘read more’ to see what we came up with.

The near future

Intelligent remote management systems

Soon, we’ll be launching a new on-hold player that allows us to load new productions onto client hardware remotely, at scheduled intervals, via the net. Web-controlled messaging means no more CDs, USB sticks or otherwise – and it’ll be simple because it’s remotely managed from our office, allowing playlists and music to be constantly updated.

Day parting

Day-parted messages are all about flexibility. So, if it’s 9AM when somebody calls, on-hold messages will say, ‘Good morning,’ and so on.  Eventually, clients will be able to manage what their callers hear before and after hours – with a different message for the day and another for the evening. Events and holidays would be covered similarly.

The not-so-distant future

On-hold video messaging

We’re already seeing rapid developments in the industry as telephone technologies grow closer to, and merge with, the internet. We reckon there’ll be a closer relationship between products like Google Wave, video and voice communications. In turn, this could mean that a kind of On-Hold Marketing shifts online if video conferencing becomes more widely used. Who knows: you might be able to SEE advertising while you wait…

The flipside is that more B2B and B2C communication is carried out live, via text, instead of on the phone. Companies like Dell already use live web chat to access and fix computers.

Targeted messaging

We also think that On-Hold Marketing, just like web marketing, will become increasingly personalised. So, you could ring a company, they could match your number to your name on their database, and when you’re put on hold, the messages you hear will reflect the services and products you haven’t used before.

The far-future

Your call, your choice

You’ve made the call to a company who doesn’t believe in music on hold with messages – so you get to decide what you want to listen to. It’d be a licensing nightmare for the company and the supplier, but you’d get your very own, hand-held pub jukebox. And if that sounds really far-fetched, don’t forget you can already get Spotify on your mobile!

Celebrity voice modelling

Call centre staff have their voices digitally altered into the voice of your favourite celebrity — alive or dead. You could be talking about your council tax bill with Arnold Schwarzenegger! And, when you’re placed on hold, Arnie’s waiting for you there, too.

Live on-hold messaging

Neural implants will play on-hold content to individuals at all moments of mental downtime: standing at bus stop, waiting for microwave oven, showering, scratching, etc. No boredom, only relentless information.

The Always-Factor

Phones might be unrecognisable in the future, but the value of a good-old sing-song is eternal. That’s why, whenever you’re asked to wait, scores of television talent show runners-up will be dispatched by orbiting satellites to sing on-hold songs to phone callers in person.

The ultimate on-hold technology

Voiceover artists will merge with playback equipment to become trans-human on-hold-borgs — the only people on Earth who can actually read this sentence aloud.

Have any ideas of your own? Share them with a comment below!

Photo credit: Iostash @ Flickr

In the same way we now watch Blu-ray over Betamax, and listen to MP3s instead of cassettes, the technology for on-hold messaging has advanced greatly in the last ten years.

At PH Audio we’ve used a number of methods to deliver music on hold, and our use of audio technology is something we’re always looking to improve and develop. So, from CD players that jumped and warped, to digital playback with a lot of flexibility, in this post you’ll find our own rough audio technology timeline.

1998 – On-hold CD players

Our first on-hold systems were huge industrial playback units that played discs 24/7 (literally). Playback quality was excellent, but unfortunately this format meant productions were prone to jumping and stopping at the end of a message instead of looping. The CDs themselves also had a very short shelf life due to the discs warping after time.

2003 – MP3 on-hold players

In 2003, MP3 players were introduced as our new standard on-hold systems. These units were five times smaller than the existing CD players, and used removable media cards to play productions. This meant we could send new production more securely by post and now, by email. These players also had a greatly extended shelf life.

2005 – Remote download technology

In 2005 we introduced a new range of MP3 on-hold units with remote download technology. These units feature an internal hard drive, making it easy for the completed audio file to be downloaded remotely via the internet. This means we can update the message without involving the client in any way, shortening the time it takes to get a new on-hold marketing production live.

2009 – New innovations

After extensive field testing we’ve just launched our brand new unit. The unit isn’t a traditional playback unit; it’s actually more like a mini PC, which means enhanced flexibility and much more room to store a number of messages for day, out of hours messages and even seasonal changes. Like the players before, it offers remote access, and we continue to develop software which in the future will allow us to further develop the unit, meaning greater functionality will be available soon.

Future on-hold marketing – 2010 onwards

As the unit in use currently is software based we’ll soon be offering the following:

• Scheduled messages
• Times specific messages
• News feeds
• Live streaming

What do you feel would be a good feature for an music on-hold unit?

It’s powerful, emotive and often controversial – music has a strange effect on us humans. Music on hold is unique in that it finds people when they’re not expecting it and can transport them (emotionally speaking) to another place.

The on hold music tracks below are the most popular choices among PH Audio clients in 2009.

They’re not listed in a particular order, because we want to know what you think – which is your favourite?

Tea for Two      

Ebb & Flow        

Cold as Ice        

Ocean Sunrise

Rule the World

Vote for your favourite track below right now and why not post a comment to tell us why you think it is the best track. If you feel that your on hold messaging could do with a fresh sound - contact PH Audio today!