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Does your number mean anything?

Depending on what type of business that you are in may depend on what type of telephone number you have. If you are a business with most of your customers and clients located in your local area, you don’t want to have a telephone number that is based in another town or over 100 miles away.

Before text messaging became the fad, the letters on the numbers of a telephone keypad weren’t used much. But if you ask folks who had telephone numbers in the 40’s and 50’s those letters meant something. I’m sure you may have heard of something like Klondike 5-3825.

In the 80′s and 90′s there was a craze for vanity numbers. Do you recall the commercials featuring 1 800 CALL ATT. I personally didn’t like vanity numbers. It always seemed to take me 2 to 3 times longer to dial. I’ve never memorized the letters on the keypad and had to hunt to dial.

Once when I was involved with converting a company to a new telephone system as well as a new exchange, we thought about vanity numbers. We did have the cafeteria’s number end in FOOD, a friend of mine kept DICK and another DAVE. Can you guess their names?

We used some and others were reserved. It probably wasn’t a good idea when we issued the chief executive 3932. He didn’t want his private number published.

This process was taking up too much time for us to complete the project on-time so we only went with some common ones. We used those that came to mind quick or if a person or department asked us if a certain number was available. In the long run maybe it was a good idea, since if we looked deeper we may not have issued some of the numbers to those we did.

Have you ever looked to see what your number spells? FOOD is 3663. Dick is 3425. Dave is 3283. Look around. You may be surprised what can be spelled from a telephone number.

Let’s look at Klondike 5-3825 for example.

The letters for 3 are DEF, 8 are TUV, 2 are ABC and 5 are JKL. With those letters you can make Klondike 5-DUCK. Can you see what else it spells? A word that is not commonly used in conversation, unless it’s in a bedroom.

You may be surprised with the result and may wish you hadn’t looked.

© 2006-2008 Steven G. Atkinson – All Rights Reserved

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Steven G. Atkinson is the author of the book Technology Tips for Small Business. The book offers over 55 informational tips to assist the small business owner or office manager better understand the technology they use every day.

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