What to Pay Attention to When Choosing the Right Vanity Number for Your Business

There may be more to take into consideration than at first thought.

If you are familiar with vanity numbers, then you know that they are telephone numbers that spell out specific keywords, or have a repetition of numbers for simpler, easy-to-remember marketing numbers.

Before choosing a vanity number that is right for your business, you should consider that something you deem “easy to remember” may not be so for others. There are a few factors to take into consideration or at least be aware of before choosing the perfect vanity number.

Spelling

The conventional way of spelling in a particular language is called orthography. Although this may not be a word you hear in your typical day-to-day, orthography does affect our daily lives.

The ability for adults to spell is a lifelong skill – one that often carries bad habits learned at a young age along with it. Tools such as autocorrect, grammar checks, and spell-check help to get by most of the time, but even the best of these tools are not perfect. When choosing a vanity number for your business, a big question to answer is – does the spelling ability of adults impact the vanity number you should select?

Put simply, yes. You should consider the spelling ability of your audience when you are shopping for a vanity phone number – it can make a difference! Remember, vanity numbers need at least 7 letters/numbers in them (after their prefix), and anything past 10 digits is not recommended. The simpler the word(s) used, the better.

Choose the vanity number that’s right for you!

How Do We Spell?

Knowing the way people spell may help you better choose words that are simpler for most people to spell. Here are a few step-by-step ways that we spell words.

1. Create and maintain an accurate visualization of a word in your mind from memory.
2. Analyze the word order and decode it into letters and sounds based on rules.
3. Relate the letters and sounds analyzed into a lasting order in short-term memory.
4. Recite the order from your analysis.³

 

What about Dyslexia?

Childhood dyslexia problems persist into adulthood¹. Dyslexia data suggests that this group misspells about 1 in 40 words¹. Most adults learn to compensate for earlier problems in reading, but spelling remains a difficult and persistent issue for dyslexics even into adulthood².
Point being – most likely, a dyslexic person may misspell words, but most likely will not have as much trouble reading, so they should be able to make out words easier than if they had to spell it themselves – especially if it is a word that they are already familiar with and don’t have to put too much effort into figuring out.

Pick out your easy-to-remember phone number now.

Memory

The point of vanity numbers is to make calling to your business easier for your customers to remember your phone number. Most words require memory, even for largely arbitrary spelling information⁵. The actual spelling is rarely compared to the incorrect memory of the spelling – in poor spellers⁵. It’s not all about memory, but about the ingrained knowledge of the rules that govern how to spell particular words in a language – defined as orthography⁴.

Many high-quality vanity numbers require consumers to spell – or remember how to spell – a particular word or phrase. Since most adults who would be your customers and calling your business should have some memory of spelling the particular word(s) you would choose to use in your vanity number, this should make it easier for them to remember rather than memorizing a random set of numbers.

Choose a vanity number consumers will remember.

Reading Ability

Does consumers’ reading ability matter?

Mostly no, the inability to read results in a minor impact: disabilities in reading and spelling results from a lack of specific skills in perception, memory, or analysis of speech³. Some adults are poor spellers despite having above average reading experiences¹.

This is where their memory will come into play as well – if consumers have read the word(s) before and can remember them, it will make it easier to read now. Also keep in mind that it’s reported Americans have, on average, a 7th or 8th-grade reading level. So, they should have no trouble reading, and consequently remembering your vanity number. Besides, one or two words should not be too difficult of a word since the whole point of a vanity number is to make it easy for consumers to remember.

Ready to choose the right vanity number for your business? Go check out what’s available and/or speak to a representative at 855-GOT-VANITY to get a quote now!

1. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1534508408318808
2. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1130374?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
3. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/074193258500600608?journalCode=rsed
4. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1008071802996
5. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/226930559_Adult_spelling_strategies