“Hello, is that 0800 REPAIR?”
The memorability of their simple phone number has helped this company to become the leading UK repairer of white goods for the home.
Similarly, 1 888 523 9582 is not an easy string of numbers to recall. But dialing 1 888 LADY LUCK will get you through to the Lady Luck casino in the US.
Words are much Argentina mobile number list to remember than numbers, especially when printed on vehicle livery or building signage. Why should your prospective clients have to check their address book or store your number into their mobile phone contacts list? If you want them to remember your details easily, you can just choose a descriptive alpha-numeric number.
Just as personalised number plates say something about the driver, personalised phone numbers say something about the organisation. Strangely, this marketing technique has taken off more in the US than in the UK, but it is slowly becoming more popular on this side of the pond.
Possibly the most well-known alphanumeric within the UK currently is 0800 Reverse established in 2003 the number offers a specialised reverse charged call.
There are various online alpha-numeric ‘calculators’ where you can enter a string of numbers to find the matching word/s, or enter word/s of your choice to find the matching numbers. Choose your number tool allows the user to select the suffix and last 4 digits.
Alternatively, just check this list of letters to see their numeric equivalents:
ABC = 2
DEF = 3
GHI = 4
JKL = 5
MNO = 6
PQRS = 7
TUV = 8
WXYZ = 9
Example of usage: From the list above you can see that 0800 043 7637 spells out 08000 HEROES. That could be the basis of a clever marketing campaign for a suitable business!
In psychological terms, most people can remember 7 +/- 2 items at a time. That’s why phone numbers used to be in the form 123 4567. However, with so many people (and so many phones), we soon ran out of numbers! So standard dialling codes (STD codes) were added as a prefix, such as 020 which is currently used for London (note that it’s not 0207 or 0208 as commonly believed).
The best way to remember numbers is to ‘chunk’ them, which is why phone numbers are usually presented in the form xxx xxxx xxxx. The spacing is important!You’ll notice that the numbers 1 and 0 do not have corresponding letters, due to their similarity with the letters I and O and because 0 was the number used to call the Operator (left over from the days when a human Switchboard Operator connected all calls).
Although we can’t change the prefix these days, we are able to choose the suffix. So isn’t it time we started to use phone numbers more intelligently. Not only does a non-geographic alphanumeric number increase its memorability but users of can also benefit from the higher call volume which in turn can boost sales, create a greater company recognition, increase enquiries and enhance national presence.
Although we can’t change the prefix these days, we can choose the suffix. So isn’t it time we started to use phone numbers more intelligently again?
© Copyright Neil Barrall, Telecoms World 2012.
