What are the best practices for creating effective on-hold music and prompts for my industry?

Creating effective on-hold music and prompts for your industry starts with understanding your callers’ expectations and the purpose of each call. On-hold time should feel purposeful, not like a delay or inconvenience. This means selecting music that reflects your brand, complies with licensing requirements and is comfortable to listen to over the phone for extended periods. Avoid tracks that are too fast, too loud or overly repetitive, as these can increase caller frustration. Instead, choose calm, neutral styles and ensure consistent volume levels between music and spoken messages. For multiline and cloud-based telephone systems, it is also important that audio is properly formatted and tested so it sounds clear on all devices and connections.

Equally important are the prompts and messages that accompany your on-hold music. These should be concise, clearly voiced and relevant to the caller’s likely reason for contacting you. Good practice includes using professional voice talent, scripting messages that are easy to understand and updating them regularly to reflect current services, seasonal information or changes to your operations. On-hold prompts can be used to manage expectations by giving realistic wait times, explaining alternative contact options and signposting self-service resources where appropriate. By combining well-chosen music with informative, well-structured prompts, you can reduce perceived wait times, improve caller satisfaction and support a more professional image for your organisation.