Hold Music for Business: How to Put Callers on Hold Without Losing Them

Research on hold behaviour is consistent: callers who hear silence when placed on hold hang up within about 40 seconds. Callers who hear music wait close to three minutes. That gap, 40 seconds versus three minutes, is the difference between losing a customer and keeping one. Hold music is not a phone feature luxury reserved for big businesses. It is a basic retention tool, and most small businesses in Australia do not have it because their current phone setup physically cannot do it.

Why You Cannot Put Callers on Hold Right Now

If your business phone is plugged into the green port on the back of your modem, the port your internet provider set up when they installed your NBN or broadband connection, you have a single ISP-provided phone line. That line does exactly one thing: carry one call at a time. There is no hold feature, no transfer feature, and no second line to pick up while someone waits.

When you press "hold" on a basic cordless phone connected to this kind of line, one of two things happens: the caller hears silence and nothing else (no music, no message, just dead air), or the call drops entirely. You cannot park the call and pick up another one, because there is no second call to pick up, the line is already in use. This is not a fault with your phone handset. It is a fundamental limitation of the single ISP line underneath it.

You are not doing anything wrong. This is just what that default setup was designed for: residential use, where one call at a time is usually fine. For a business that needs to transfer calls, consult a colleague, or keep a caller comfortable while you look something up, it simply does not work. Check out the guide on your current ISP phone service if you want a full breakdown of what these lines can and cannot do.

What Hold Actually Means on a Proper Phone System

On a hosted cloud phone system (the kind that runs over your internet connection rather than a copper line), hold works the way most people assume all phones work. You press hold, and the caller is parked inside the system, sitting in a virtual waiting room, while music or a recorded message plays automatically. You are then free to answer a second call, look something up, speak to a colleague, or transfer the caller to someone else.

Think of it like a waiting room at a medical clinic. The patient (caller) is comfortable, they know they have not been forgotten, and there is something to listen to while they wait. The receptionist (you) can deal with whoever is in front of them, then come back to the waiting room when ready. That is what hold does, it creates a buffer that keeps the caller in the system rather than sending them back out to call someone else.

This is a standard feature on every hosted cloud phone system, not an expensive add-on. If you have a proper cloud VOIP service, hold music is already included. The question is what audio you want to play and how you set it up.

Music vs Messages on Hold: What Is the Difference?

There are two things your callers can hear while waiting. The first is hold music: a continuous track (or playlist) that plays on a loop while the caller waits. Most hosted phone systems include a default music pack of royalty-cleared tracks, so you can switch this on immediately without any extra work or cost. If you want a specific style or more variety, many providers offer upgraded music packs for $5-15 per month.

The second is on-hold messages: recorded voice content that plays over the music, or alternates with it. These are typically short promotional or informational clips, "Ask us about our spring specials," "Did you know we also offer X service," "Our team will be with you shortly, thank you for your patience." Professional on-hold message production (a script written for you, recorded by a voice artist, and mixed with music) costs roughly $200-600 as a one-off expense for a small business package. Most systems also let you record and upload your own audio in-house as an MP3 file, which costs nothing beyond your time.

For most small Australian businesses, the practical starting point is simple: switch on the default music that comes with your phone system. Add one or two recorded messages later if and when it feels useful. The music alone dramatically reduces hang-ups and is worth doing immediately.

What System Do You Need?

Any hosted cloud phone system supports hold music as a standard feature. You do not need special hardware, a server, or a premium tier plan. A typical hosted VOIP service costs $20-35 per user per month including GST and includes hold music, call transfer, voicemail, ring groups, and an auto-attendant (the menu that greets callers when no one is available) as standard features. See the full breakdown in the guide on what a cloud phone system costs.

You do not need a physical desk phone to use hold. A softphone app on your existing mobile or laptop works just as well. You press hold in the app, the caller hears your music, and you handle the second call or conversation before coming back to them. The whole thing runs over your existing internet connection.

DIY vs Professional Hold Content: What Is Right for You?

Most business owners overthink the hold content decision. Here is the simple version. DIY hold music: download a royalty-free music track (there are free libraries available), upload it as an MP3 to your phone system portal, and you are done. Takes about ten minutes. Cost: zero. This is the right starting point for the majority of small businesses.

Professional on-hold messages: suitable once you have a stable system and want to make the on-hold experience do some work for you. A production company writes a short script, records it with a professional voice artist, and delivers mixed audio files you upload to your system. Budget $200-600 for a small business package. Some providers include this as a service. Refresh the content once or twice a year to keep it current.

The one thing to avoid is silence or, almost as bad, a single 15-second loop that repeats obviously every quarter minute. Both erode caller confidence. Music that loops naturally, or a mix of music and short messages, keeps callers comfortable for the two to four minutes most small business calls actually take to answer.

Music Licensing in Australia: What You Need to Know

This is the one area where Australian businesses sometimes get caught out. You cannot legally play commercial music (anything on Spotify, Apple Music, or a standard streaming service) as hold music for a business without a separate commercial licence. Streaming services licence music for personal listening only. Using it in a commercial context, including playing it to customers on hold, is a different licence category entirely.

In Australia, this is managed by APRA AMCOS, the organisation that collects music royalties on behalf of Australian and international songwriters. If you want to use commercial music tracks as your hold audio, you need an APRA AMCOS licence for business phone on-hold use. The cost is relatively modest for a small business (typically under $200 per year), but it is a real compliance obligation.

The practical way most small businesses avoid this entirely: use the cleared music packs included with your phone system provider. Reputable hosted VOIP providers include royalty-cleared music libraries specifically licensed for commercial on-hold use. You are covered by their licence, not yours to manage. If you upload your own audio, make sure it is either royalty-free (labelled as such, from a legitimate royalty-free source) or that you have the appropriate APRA AMCOS licence in place. Use the cost calculator to estimate your monthly system cost and factor in any production budget.

What Most Businesses Get Wrong

Using silence as hold. This is the single most damaging thing you can do. Silence tells callers that the call has dropped, that they have been forgotten, or that the business is unprofessional. Within 40 seconds, most people hang up. Even a generic music track from your phone system's default library is dramatically better than nothing. If you currently cannot provide hold music, that is a sign your phone setup needs replacing, not tweaking.

Overly long or sales-heavy on-hold messages. A 90-second promotional script that plays on repeat every two minutes is exhausting for callers. The research on this is clear: callers prefer music with brief, occasional voice messages over constant voice content. Keep messages short (15-25 seconds each), conversational in tone, and spaced out. One message every 60-90 seconds of music is a reasonable ratio for a small business.

Not testing hold from a mobile phone. Your hold audio may sound fine on your office phone but distorted, too loud, or cut off on a mobile. Mobile networks compress audio differently to fixed lines, and callers on mobiles make up the majority of incoming calls for most businesses. Always test your hold experience by calling your own business number from a mobile and placing yourself on hold. What you hear is what your customers hear.

Your Next Steps

Here is a practical checklist to go from no hold music to a polished hold experience:

• Confirm whether your current phone line even supports hold. If it is plugged into the modem green port (ISP line), it almost certainly does not, move to a hosted cloud phone system first.
• When choosing a provider, confirm that hold music is included as standard (it should be) and ask whether their included music packs are APRA AMCOS cleared for commercial on-hold use.
• Switch on the default music pack immediately. Do not wait until you have recorded custom messages, music alone is 80% of the benefit.
• Test your hold from a mobile phone before going live. Call your own number, have someone place you on hold, and listen to the full experience as a caller.
• Once your system is stable, consider a simple on-hold message script (one or two short clips). You can record these yourself in your system portal or commission professional production later.
• If you plan to supply your own music rather than using your provider's cleared library, check your APRA AMCOS obligations before going live.

If you are starting from scratch and need a phone system that supports all of this, get a free recommendation matched to your business. A specialist provider will confirm what hold features are included, what audio you can upload, and how to get it working from day one.

For a breakdown of which Australian cloud phone plans include custom hold music in the base price and which charge it as an add-on, see our guide to the best phone system for small business in Australia.

Not all cloud phone systems handle hold audio the same way. Some include custom hold music in the base plan. Others charge it as an add-on. Our guide to the best phone system for small business in Australia covers which providers let you upload your own audio, which ones use generic hold tones by default, and what the pricing difference looks like.