A guide on editing hold music, adding intro messages, periodic message, and queue status messages.
Music on Hold (MOH) is referring to the music that is played when a User places a caller on hold, or when a caller is waiting in a call queue. MOH is also referencing introduction and periodic messages that you can configure to play during the MOH.
Music can be assigned to 4 different locations:
- Domains
- Sites
- Users
- Call Queues
Music assignment works on a priority list, music assigned to the domain will apply to all users and queues in the domain, assigning different music to a site will then overwrite the domain music on all users and queues in the site, uploading music to a queue or user will then overwrite the music on the site for that particular queue/user.
However, uploading music to a queue will not apply to agents in the queue, music on a queue only applies to the music that plays when callers are waiting in the queue and not the music that plays when the agent who answers puts them no hold. There is currently no way to have different music play on the user depending on what was called.
To begin modifying music on hold, you can go to the site/queue you want, or change it for a user in that user's profile view. For this guide we will show how to change it from the domain level, as here you can change it easily for all others. First, navigate to Music on Hold under the domain view.
Upon loading loading into the tab, you will be greeted with a bunch of options.
1 - Search: Look for specific music (searches for the filename of the music, not the name of users).
2 - Type: Filter to only show user, site, queue or all MOH.
3 - Hide users: Tick to hide any users from the list who don't have any MOH configured.
4 - Hide System Users: Tick to hide system users.
5 - User List: A list of all users as well as what music/messages they have configured.
For this guide we are going to modify the MOH on the domain, but if you'd like to modify the MOH on a site/user then the interface will be the same. Queues get a few more options which we will discuss further down in the guide.
To reach the domain MOH configuration, click on the owner with name "Domain", it will be at the top of the list.
Configuration
1 - Music: This is where you add music.
2 - Messages: This is where you can add an intro or periodic message.
3 - Enable MOH: Turn the MOH on or off, note that turning the MOH off does not stop music from playing, it just turns off the custom configuration and inherits music from one step above.
4 - Quick Jump: Enter the extension of another user/system user to quickly jump to their MOH config page.
Music
To add music, click the "Add Music" button, and then navigate to a file on your computer that you'd like to upload. As with greeting message, this supports .wav and .mp3.
Once your music is uploaded it will appear in a new list showing the name, duration, and file size. As well as option to preview what the music sounds like after being uploaded. You can change the name of the music by clicking on the name.
At this point you can continue to upload more music files if you wish.
When you have multiple MOH files configured, by default it will linearly play through all files in order from top to bottom when a user places someone on hold, however you can tick the "Randomize music" box to change this so that it will pick a random file at the end of each song.
Messages
The messages feature lets you add intro messages, and also periodic messages that are spliced throughout the music that plays.
To add an introduction message, click the "Add Introduction", this will bring up the standard greetings configuration box, see What options do I have when uploading greeting messages?.
Just like with music, you can see the name, duration, and file size, as well as a preview button.
Note: there's no option to add further intro messages as there can only be 1 intro message. To change the intro message you must first delete the current one.
Now we're going to add some periodic messages that we want to play throughout the MOH, to do this we click "Add Message" which also brings up the standard greetings panel.
Here we can see options of periodic messages.
The way this works is that when a person is placed on hold, it will first play the intro message and then it will play music for 15 seconds. After 15 seconds the first periodic message will play, and then it will wait a further 15 seconds at which point it will play the second periodic message.
This continues until all periodic messages have played, at which point it will loop back to the first periodic message.
The intro message does not get played again as it only plays at the start of being placed on hold.
The 15 second delay between messages can be changed by clicking the time delay button.
Queue Differences
Queues are unique in that they get some extra options on top of the standard greeting options when uploading a periodic message.
Queues get to select a "Wait Status Updates", this is an automated message that you can choose to play periodically throughout the queue MOH that will announce the callers Estimated Wait Time or Current Queue Position (or both).