Why I Abandoned Using Voicemail In 2016.

Just after Christmas 2015, I was driving from my hometown of Santa Fe, NM back to Handshakin' Headquarters and my home base in Denver, Colorado.  I dialed my google voice number to check voicemails because there was nothing else I could do to be productive while driving.

“You have 54 new voice messages.”

About 90% of them were obsolete because we had already dealt with the issue.  Another 5% were low priority for me and ignored--I couldn’t write down anything while driving. (And honestly, who wants to write anything down. Just text me a number I can click to call.) The remaining 5% I would have liked to have gotten to sooner, but surely, months later it was too late.

So, what’s the next logical step after dealing with that bullshit?  

Cut out the bullshit.  I instantly made the decision to update my personal and business line voicemail message to say the following:

“Hi, you’ve reached Matt Holmes, Founder of the Handshakin Video Series.  I don’t check voicemails more than once per year, so please shoot me a text message or email me at matt@handshakin.com.  That’s handshakin’ without the ‘g’.”

Before I tell you what will happen moving forward, you should know about two tools I already had working to my advantage.

1. My personal voicemail box had been full for a while.  It’s unprofessional.  Don’t do that.  However, one perk of that was that people would email me saying “Your VM was full, but I was just calling about XXXX.”  This still accomplished my goal of obtaining information in the most convenient and efficient way for me.
2. My business line is actually just a Google Voice phone number--therefore it texted me automated transcriptions. I could usually get the picture of what the message was about.  So I wasn’t 100% out of the loop with voicemail like I plan to be in 2016.

These two thing had helped, but weren't enough and didn't come across to the level of professionalism I hold myself accountable to today.  

As my business grows I realize more and more that time and network are the most valuable resources. I do not want phone calls or voicemails that can be answered in literally 2 seconds via text message or email. Get straight to the point when you communicate with me, please. I'm sure a number of you out there feel the same way!

I'm working towards being a better communicator with everyone I interact with professionally and personally by setting expectations up front, even if it’s not traditional.  I encourage you to do the same so your friends, for example, don't text you when you never check your texts.  Get crazy!

Oh, I'm also big on Twitter & Quora. So get at me there.