Shawn Hakl is head of new products for Verizon's business division. Before the digital era, he says more than 80 percent of business lines had voice mail. Now, he estimates only a third of office phones have it.
Letting callers know to leave their name and number so you can call them back is an excellent way to get the right information that you may need from someone that you missed a call from. Otherwise, you might be left with a number with no name to ask for or vice versa. If you run a business and want to include something that usually comes up in professional phone calls, include that as well. For example, if people often ask you to check on business orders, ask them to leave the shipping number so you can get back to them with a ready response.

Humor also leaves a lot of room for misinterpretation—which subsequently weakens sincerity and authority. A caller can be very turned off by merely misinterpreting your joke. Why take this risk? Additionally, this could even cause callers to question your character. Say, for example, the president of a company’s mobile phone voicemail greeting was funny. What’s to happen if the caller didn’t like or get the joke? What if they found it offensive? Another scenario is that a caller is reaching out to you for the first time—i.e. they have no idea regarding your personality. What next? The point is, with this type of greeting, humor is bound to be more divisive so just avoid it altogether. c. Poorly Pacing Your Message and Bad Time Management: Don’t speed through your message. Speak clearly so callers know what to include in their message and when to leave the message. At the same time, don’t drag your message out. No one wants to sit through a diatribe. Just get to the point clearly.
“Thank you for calling [company/person’s name]. We are currently unavailable, but if you leave your name, phone number, and message, we will get back to you as soon as possible.”