Answering the Phone so Everybody Knows You are Ready for Business

• 00:05 Hello, what do you want?
• 00:07 Obviously, that's not how you answer the phone.
• 00:11 Now, there are different customs in different organizations.
• 00:14 What I think is the easiest for most people to do is just state their name and
• 00:18 their organization.
• 00:19 Someone calls me, doesn't matter what time of day or night,
• 00:23 because I've different phone numbers, but
• 00:26 I use my personal phone same as my office phone, I have things forwarded to this.
• 00:32 And unless, I see it's from a friend or family member,
• 00:36 I'll just answer 'TJ Walker, Media Training Worldwide.'
• 00:40 This does a couple of things.
• 00:41 If I just say TJ Walker and someone went to my website, and
• 00:45 they didn't see my name anywhere.
• 00:47 They just wanted to call and ask for a proposal, for media training, or
• 00:51 public speaking training.
• 00:53 If I just say, TJ Walker, they're going to be confused.
• 00:57 They're going to wonder, if they messed up.
• 01:00 Did they dial some wrong number?
• 01:02 Did they bother someone?
• 01:04 By saying the organization, it makes it easy for the person calling me.
• 01:10 So I do recommend you state your name and your organization.
• 01:14 Now, some people highly recommend you say, how may I help you?
• 01:19 I don't do that, it's not wrong if you want to, I don't think it's essential.
• 01:24 The main thing is you want to sound pleasant.
• 01:27 You may be in a tense conversation with another colleague.
• 01:30 You may have just been fired.
• 01:31 You may be in a bad mood.
• 01:32 You may have a stomach ache.
• 01:34 Nobody else cares.
• 01:37 A prospect calling you, doesn't care.
• 01:40 A colleague on the other side of the planet doesn't care.
• 01:44 They just want to talk to you now.
• 01:47 So be pleasant.
• 01:48 Put a pleasant tone of voice on, not super fake, fancy,
• 01:53 syrupy, but just a pleasant tone of voice.
• 01:58 And that let someone know, okay, I'm here for you.
• 02:02 That's all it takes when you're answering the phone.
• 02:06 Try to answer your phone as quickly as possible.
• 02:08 For most people, if a phone call is going to their cellphone, it's right there,
• 02:12 it is pretty quick.
• 02:13 Some people still like to let the phone ring a whole bunch to somehow act like
• 02:18 they're not too eager.
• 02:20 I don't think you can really answer a phone too quickly.
• 02:23 I don't think there's any negative vibes anyone's going to pick up on that.
• 02:28 I would suggest to you many cell phone plans have an option
• 02:32 of how many rings it does before it goes to voicemail.
• 02:37 You don't want to make someone have to call and go through 10,
• 02:41 12 rings before it hits their voicemail.
• 02:43 I would say after four rings, if you can't pick it up, let it go to voicemail.
• 02:49 That's less time that you're taking of the person trying to call you,
• 02:52 just makes it a lot easier.
• 02:54 So I would go ahead and put your setting on that.
• 02:57 That's your homework assignment right now.
• 02:58 Call your own phone.
• 03:01 See how many rings it takes before your voicemail.

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