We’ve been running outbound sales campaigns on Retell and have noticed an interesting pattern.
Our AI conversations perform well when a prospect answers, but our callback rate from voicemail has been significantly lower than expected.
In previous campaigns, we had much better results when someone from our sales team leaves a real recorded voicemail. Prospects perceived it as a genuine outreach from a person instead of an automated system, which led to noticeably more callbacks.
Currently, Retell allows:
- AI-generated voicemail prompts
- Static text messages spoken by the AI voice
However, we haven’t found a way to upload and play an actual pre-recorded audio file (voicemail drop) when voicemail is detected.
It would be extremely valuable if voicemail detection could support something like:
- Upload a WAV/MP3 recording
- Play the recording after the voicemail beep
- Support multiple recordings per campaign or agent
- Optionally use variables before or after the recording (e.g. the prospect’s first name)
This would allow sales teams to preserve the authenticity of executive outreach while still benefiting from AI-powered outbound calling.
For many outbound campaigns, the voicemail is often the only interaction a prospect has with the company. Hearing a real human voice instead of a synthesized one can make a meaningful difference in callback rates.
Is this currently on the roadmap, or is there another way to accomplish this using Retell?