Finding the Right Vanity Toll Free Number
July 8, 2008 – 4:46 am*A quick note. Some corrections to this article were recently made courtesy of the staff of 800Response.com
Apparently toll free numbers are not allowed to be sold at high bidding prices as provisioned by the FCC. I have seen this practice throughout my life and never questioned the legality. Thank you for the tip guys and this article is dedicated to you.
Toll free numbers are an excellent way to reinforce company brand awareness as well as increase phone response due to simplicity. Vanity toll free numbers are popular but can become harder to find and far more expensive than a run of the mill number. Remember, toll free numbers are limited by 12 numbers that can easily become other alpha names as well via an entirely different name altogether.
1-800-FLOWERS is an obvious example to refer to if not over the top example. A company who’s entire brand and communications revolve around the number itself! Their URL 1800flowers.com and their company name.
Sorry to discourage you in the first few paragraphs, but reality is a b***. No offense to all the lovely female canines in the world.
So what does it take to land a marketable toll free number? It is going to have to start at the very basic which will entail coming up with an industry term or your business name and finding a way to put it into the allowed digit count for a normal toll free call.
Chances are once you have achieved the first goal, the number will be taken. From there it will become another process obviously. The next process will be to find new ways to pronounce or abbreviate the words you want your number to spell. This process may lead you outside the box, don’t worry about it though, write it down anyways. Write everything down.
In this process you may catch yourself researching only 800 numbers. 800 numbers are toll free and seniority of the toll free marketing scene but remember there are other prefixes to fixate on that can work just as well for your business. Other toll free prefixes include 888, 877, and 866 numbers.
In your creative process imagine how some numbers can resemble or represent a letter sometimes. “4″ can mean “for”, “8″ can become “ate”, zero can become represent an o (not recommended), etc.
Come up with as many variable and industry relationships you can come up with and then begin your search which can be done at AT&T or you can cheat and use an industry related vanity number engine that can search relevant names for you at http://www.800response.com/directory/search.cgi
For 3.9 cents per minute you can order stand alone business toll free numbers by calling: 1-866-706-0007 Code: 11443 or visit http://topsavings.net/toll-free/png.html
5 Responses to “Finding the Right Vanity Toll Free Number”
I just want to point out that toll-free numbers cannot be bought and sold. According to the FCC it is illegal to sell a toll-free number. However, if packaged as a brand - like 1-800-Flowers - you can purchase the brand or company along with the rights to the number.
Also, vanity 800 numbers can be longer than 11 digits (11 includes the “1″ for country code). For example, 1-800-PRE-OWNED is 12 digits. When someone dials the technology stops at the 11th digit, but the vanity number can spell out anything.
By kouchilou on Jul 8, 2008
Wow … interesting to hear the legal aspect from the FCC because I have witnessed many marketable toll free numbers being offered for bidding at high prices many a time. Thank you for that information. Oh, and yes you are correct, with the 1 we have twelve digits to work with, thank you for adding to this.
Thank you Kouchilou
By TopSavingsNet on Jul 8, 2008
Actually it is also illegal to sell a toll free number as part of a brand, contrary to what KOUCHILOU says. It is against FCC policies and federal law to transfer a toll free number from one subscriber to another. See:
http://smsgov.com/reporting/fcc-toll-free-law/
It is also illegal to broker or wharehouse toll free numbers… See:
http://smsgov.com/2008/06/24/black-market-toll-free-phone-number-brokering/
SMSGOV
By SMSGOV on Jul 9, 2008
SMSGOV … I appreciate your feedback. The toll free related content on your site is very informative. Thank you.
By TopSavingsNet on Jul 9, 2008
Actually the information on SMSgov.com is very mysterious. It’s not a governmental organization and not only does the SMS not know who they are, but they are lifting articles directly from the SMS website.
The comments are all fake, and they go to great lengths to look official and at the same time, to hide their identity. The domain is registered to someone named DELL in the Netherlands. The whole purpose of the site is just as perplexing as who owns it.
I don’t mean to give them a hard time if there is some legitimacy to them, but when you really analyze their site and what they’re saying it’s just really fishy
See: http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/blogs/smsgov.html
Bill Quimby (my real name not hiding behind fake names, mr. SMSGOV)
By Bill Quimby on Aug 31, 2008