Media Music Blog

Recently, a client asked me why our on hold demo contained music and voice-over, with the voice-over repeatedly stating ‘thank you for calling Media Music Now…’ My client suggested that our demo sounded a little bit staged and a little bit false, as our demo was clearly created using our own script and did not contain any examples of previous work.

It has often been said in business, that your clients are your greatest critics. This is very true. In this case, when we conceived the idea of adding an on hold service to Media Music Now, (some 18 months ago) we had not generated any on-hold business prior to creating a demo and therefore our client was correct in their assumption. The demo had indeed been created using our own script.

Since that time, we have done many, many packages for numerous clients in the UK and across Europe. We had been really busy producing audio that we had overlooked the fact that the demo was very much out of date. Although this was not intentional, it does give a very narrow view of what we have actually done in terms of on hold music and on-hold voice-over.

To rectify the situation, and I must thank my client for the heads up on this, we have now compiled an additional demo using excerpts from some of the recent on hold packages we have created for clients. The audio is three minutes long demonstrating a good range of on-hold work that we have done to date.

I have made this available here as a playable and downloadable version so that you can listen and see what we have been doing and can do. You will also find our original demo there too.

Please feel free to download the track and let your friends, colleagues and clients have a listen.

We are happy to work directly with your business to create you a custom on hold package with custom voice-over and music or alternatively, we are happy to work as a supplier to you if you are a telephony hardware provider. We deal purely with audio and do not have any dealings with telephone hardware. If you are interested in finding out more about using us as your on-hold music and voice-over supplier, please contact us through the contact page on Media Music Now. You might be surprised to learn how affordable on-hold music and voice-over is through Media Music Now.

Enjoy the new demo! Your comments are welcome as always.

If you need any further information about our on hold services please visit Media Music Now.

Like this blog? Subscribe to my RSS feed!

As a producer of music, on hold and voice-over packages for telephone, IVR and on hold marketing, I am very aware of the telephone greeting services and on hold music that I hear on other companies phone systems. I know this sounds rather geeky, but I actually like being placed on hold for a short period of time when calling companies. This period of time gives me a chance to analyze the quality of their music, on-hold audio and the quality of their voice-overs.

What I tend to find is that many on hold sections are distorted, too quiet or too loud. Now, you could just blame the supplier of the music on hold package for their lack of quality. However, as a provider of these packages, Media Music Now are experts in audio production and audio quality, but we do not know much about telephony hardware. Likewise, it seems that providers of telephony hardware know little about audio production or audio file formats. The result is that very often we produce high quality on hold packages but are requested to convert them into an audio format that the hardware provider deems suitable. In many cases, this is fine as we can convert to many formats with no problem at all, but occasionally, we are asked to convert the on hold package to a file type that is actually so compressed that it distorts the quality of the music and on hold voice-over, before it is even added to the telephone system. Once added to the system, the audio is further degraded by the bandwidth limitations of the telephone network.

In our experience, it is better to put the highest quality file possible into the system to start with. By doing this, the only degradation that is introduced is the bandwidth limitations of the telephone network. We find that MP3s or 16 bit, 22 kHz wave files provide the best audio quality on the end of the telephone receiver.

Many telephony hardware providers will argue this point and say that the telephone network degrades the quality to four bits, 8kHz anyway and for this reason they don’t need a higher quality audio file. I would have to say I really disagree with this. In my opinion, it is like taping a really old tape on to another really old tape, it doesn’t sound very good at all.

My view is that some of the highly compressed file formats they request make the audio sound very distorted before it even goes on the telephone system. With the added distortion/limitations of the telephone line, the final audio that the listener hears can end up excessively crackly or distorted. In my opinion, if you are spending money to have a bespoke on hold music & voice over package produced professionally, the last thing you want is it to sound distorted and poor quality.

I firmly believe that putting a higher quality file in the telephone system to start with, makes the delivered quality to your caller much higher and much more acceptable to the ear.

In conclusion, start with good quality in your telephone system to avoid distortion, crackle, bad volumes levels and any other audio anomalies that cause a bad listener experience. Granted, the telephone system will limit the quality anyway, but having the sound the best it can be will always present a much more positive image of your company.

For information about Media Music Now’s music & voice-over on hold service go to
http://www.mediamusicnow.co.uk/telephone_audio/

By Lee Pritchard

Like this blog? Subscribe to my RSS feed!

Just the other day I was having an interesting chat with somebody about protecting your Copyright in your own music. I was really surprised to hear that they had been told by a copyright advisor (sent free by their local authority) to do something that I thought would have been obsolete advice years ago. They advised to post a copy of their own music on CD via recorded delivery to themselves and then keep it safe without opening it.

I was aware of this practice, however, I thought there would be new ways of proving ownership of copyright with digital and online technologies. For those who don’t know, I will just explain the point of the posting practice.

The idea is to post a sealed copy of your work to yourself to prove that you own the copyright. This is proved by date of the postal mark and you keep it un-opened unless you need to prove, in court, that you created the content first. Obviously, any fraudulent user will not have proof of ownership from an earlier date than you.

I remember doing this many years ago and unfortunately when the envelope arrived the date was actually ineligible. Fortunately, I had the foresight to include a page from a daily newspaper in the package.

Anyway back to my point, I did not think this advice was still be going around and surely it makes more sense nowadays is to e-mail it to yourself using a free e-mail account. When something is sent using an online e-mail account it is automatically stamped with the date and time that it was e-mailed. I would of thought that this would be sufficient evidence and just as valid as using the Postal Service. To be honest I think it would be easier to forge the date on an envelope than it would be to forge the date in an e-mail account hosted by Yahoo or Hotmail. I guess the only thing you would have to watch is that the account doesn’t go dormant as the free ones do when you don’t use them for a period of time.

Another thought of mine is to use these file transfer sites that allow you permanent storage of files. You could basically upload your content and the upload process would time and date stamp it.

If I was trying to protect my own Copyright in this day and age I would probably put my music in as zip file along with a scanned image from the front page of a daily newspaper including the date, the headline and lead story.

Whichever way is best to do it it’s still boils down to the same conclusion. If somebody tries to steal your Copyrighted music you need to take legal action and go to court if needed. This should be done as a matter of principle or if the fraudulent use is making money from the material to claim some of the revenue. In any case your evidence will be the fact that you can illustrate ownership at a time before the fraudulent user can.

Anyway, at this point I should make it absolutely clear that this is just my considered opinion and I am not a music lawyer or copyright attorney.

Like this blog? Subscribe to my RSS feed!