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Thirdlane

Voicemail Greetings

Voicemail Greetings is a library of named recordings plus a simple choice of which one plays in each situation. Instead of re-recording every time something changes, you record “Vacation”, “Working from home”, and “Conference week” once, then switch the active greeting in a couple of clicks - and switch it back just as easily when you return.

The library

Each greeting in the library has a Name and an optional Description. The name is what you pick from later, so make it say when to use it (“Out of office - back Monday”) rather than what it is (“greeting 3”). The Length and Source columns show how long the recording runs and how it was produced, and Active For lists the situations it currently plays for.

A greeting that is active for at least one situation cannot be deleted. Point those situations at a different greeting first, and the delete will go through. This is deliberate: deleting an active greeting would silently drop your callers back to the generic system prompt.

Adding a greeting

You can produce the audio three ways. Whichever you use, the recording is converted to the format the phone system needs before it is stored, so you do not have to worry about file formats or sample rates.

Upload. Select a WAV or MP3 file. Useful when someone else produced the audio, or when you recorded it on your phone.

Text to Speech. Type what the greeting should say and pick a Voice. The audio is generated on the server and added to your library. This is the fastest way to get a greeting in place, and the easiest to tweak - if the wording is not quite right, edit the text and regenerate. Text to Speech has to be configured for your organization for this option to appear.

Record by Phone. Enter an extension or outside number under Number to Call and click Call Me and Record. Your phone rings, you record after the tone, and hanging up saves the recording to your library. Use this when you want the greeting in your own voice.

When you add a greeting you can also set Activate For to make it the active greeting for a situation right away, saving a second step.

Choosing what plays when

Below the library, each voicemail situation has its own selector:

Unavailable. Played when you do not answer.

Busy. Played when you are on another call.

Temporary. Played instead of all other greetings while it is set. This is the one to use for vacations and short absences - set it when you leave, clear it when you get back, and your normal greetings are untouched the whole time.

Recorded Name. Your spoken name rather than a greeting. It is what the company directory plays when someone looks you up, and what system prompts such as “please leave a message for” use.

Leave a situation on System default to use the built-in prompt. Click Save Active Greetings to apply your choices.

Editing a greeting that is already active updates every situation it plays for, so you do not have to re-select it afterwards.

Worked example: cover a week away

  1. Record the message. Click Add Greeting, choose Text to Speech, and enter “Thanks for calling. I am out of the office until the fourteenth. For anything urgent, please press zero for support.” Name it Out of office - March, pick a voice, and save.
  2. Make it play. Set Temporary to Out of office - March and click Save Active Greetings. Temporary overrides everything else, so callers hear it whether you are busy or simply not answering.
  3. Come back. Set Temporary to System default and save. Your normal Unavailable and Busy greetings resume immediately, and Out of office - March stays in the library for next time.

Best practices

  • Name greetings by situation, not by number. “Out of office - back Monday” tells you which one to activate; “greeting 3” does not.
  • Use Temporary for absences. It overrides your other greetings while set and leaves them intact, so coming back is one change instead of several.
  • Keep greetings short and put the useful part first - the alternative number to try, or when you will be back. Callers who have heard your greeting before will not wait through a long preamble.
  • Reuse instead of re-recording. Once a greeting is in the library, activating it costs nothing; a near-duplicate recording costs you a minute now and confusion later.
  • Say what you want callers to do. “Press zero for support” or “email sales@acme.com” gets a better outcome than a message that only explains why you are unavailable.