You may not think it, but an auto-attendant is an important part of your business. It is typically the first point of contact with your customers, as they will call your main number with sales inquiries, troubleshooting questions, etc.
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Please note that I will be completely disconnected from email and will not be checking messages until I return. So, if you need urgent assistance, please send an email to [Contact Name] at [contact email].
Ha – I didn’t watch the video but still definitely get the condescension! It’s a LOT of extra explaining and direction when something like, “if you need immediate assistance, please contact Fergus at…” will do. In my opinion, cutesy stuff like this is mildly entertaining at the beginning but gets dumb/annoying shortly thereafter. Not just with OOO messages, but other instances where companies try to make being “cool/funny/laid back” parts of their brand in really obvious ways.
And it's worth pointing out—in case, like me, you missed it because you were awed by her approach to her parental OOO—the response is completely in sync with the New York Times' culture/brand. (You can find her OOO with live links here.)
Good lord. I would develop an irrational need to reply to the OoO with like, are you okay? It’s been 14.8 minutes.
I physically recoiled at the thought of my face appearing on a new browser tab. UGH. The pets do say who their humans are (usually just first name) and what the pet’s favourite things are. My phone is now filled with memes and photos of my monitor as I send pet photos to friends.
My project is entirely phone based and we don’t have voicemail, either for the project line or individual staff lines. We used to, but we found we spent so much time returning voicemails and getting people’s voicemails that it led to us missing calls and going in an infinite loop.
Thank you for your email. Your message is important to me and I will respond as soon as possible. Thank you!
Same, and I leave this template in my settings so all I have to do is change the date. Simple, to the point, and no one can say they didn’t know what to do while I was out.
My favorite one that I’ve heard is from TV. “You’ve reached {name}. I can’t answer. Don’t waste my time.”
1. Simple Autoreply Message #1. If you’re looking for a simple autoreply message sample for your business, you can use this template. Keep in mind that you’ll have to change the field id and the date before you save it.
If there's a year to take a break for the holidays, it's 2020! Since replying to email can make it hard to disconnect, set your vacation responder before you log off for the season.
I saw a version of this on IG that was an old school (paper) OOO from an associate pastor. It has a line like “if this is an emergency and you must speak to someone, Jesus is always available on the mainline.” Too funny.
Naturally, you want to help your clients and other business associates to contact you in the best and easiest way possible. For that to happen, you should provide out of office messages when you are not available.
Out of office messages are important because they let people know you are away from your regular work duties. These messages help businesses and projects run smoothly when a member of their team is away. They let people know you received their message and will respond by a certain date. This helps prevent confusion and frustration if someone is trying to communicate with you by email but not getting an answer.
I once had a coworker who attempted to put up an OOO for all of busy season that basically said “I’m busy with urgent deadlines, so please expect a delay in my response.” I think she was asked to take it down.