The big issue I have with the example in the post is that not only is it unnecessarily long-winded, but you have to listen through all the chattiness to get to the “here’s who to contact in a real emergency” part. The tone does rub me wrong, but I’m willing to roll with that as a personality/company culture thing.
About the “overshares”: You linked to a previous column that mentioned this point, “Sometimes the over-sharing of plans can even come across as suspect — similar to how when someone’s calling in sick with genuine illness, they usually just say, ‘I’m going to be out sick,’ but fakers will generally give you a long list of overly specific symptoms, like they feel they have to convince you.”
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People often forget the power of an out of office message. One could even start their own language, as shown below:
The one exception: When I was out for a week and a half on my wedding/honeymoon, I included something about “Additionally, I am out of office getting married, so shortly after my return my name will change from Red Bookworm to Red Reader.”
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Not me, but a friend of mine once received an OOO that simply said “I am having an out-of-office experience.”
The main thing to equivocate over for this sort of response is what details to include as a backup contact method. If your line of work means clients might need to urgently contact you, a mobile number might be appropriate, or if you’re lucky enough to have an assistant (must be nice), you can list their contact details.
My husband does this with his phone (not a number he uses for work). My parents do this as well and I can’t figure out if it’s due to lack of tech skills or not wanting to deal with voicemails (I think it’s a combination). I had surgery a couple years ago and had to give the hospital all three numbers and then my brother an hour away as backup since he’s the only one besides me with functional voicemail.
I have a deep paranoia about out of office messages ever since a previous (bad) job. Every year I worked on a huge project that took nine months, and three separate weeks (or more) of that involved correcting, editing, and reviewing a dense 300 page document.
IDK, I try to change my OOO if I’m out for a day. It might not be completely necessary, but I’d rather inform people, and it doesn’t happen often enough to be annoying for me.
A simple greeting like, 'Season's Greetings,' or 'Happy Holidays," is appropriate, followed by, 'I hope the season is treating you well. I wanted to thank you for your business this year and wish you and your team a Happy New Year. ' A sign-off of, 'Regards' or 'Best wishes,' is inclusive and business-friendly. What's a good out of office message?
Thanks for your email. I’m on vacation. On the couch. Eating chips. And bingeing Stranger Things for the eighth time (don’t tell anyone).
Just imagine the ease your customers feel when they receive a warm and friendly automated message that sounds human. Hence when you craft autoresponders, keeping your brand’s voice and style is very important to give a human touch.
Website: https://www.weavehelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/360060999791-Listening-to-Voicemail-Messages
Okay. Before you go into fancyland or funnyland about how you're in the woods protecting yourself against bears, remember Rule 1! Make sure you have all the pertinent details in your out of office message.
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