“R-i-n-n-n-g” goes the cell phone.

The dilemma… to not answer would be to possibly miss an “opportunity”. To answer would be to break two unwritten rules: no cell calls on the course, and don’t ever answer your phone on Friday afterooon.

I answered it.

As often happens in situations when you can barely hear the caller, her accent was a bit hard to understand, and she wanted to know some details about one of our products.

I did my best to answer her questions, using the usual “Sorry I’m not in front of my computer right at the moment” line.

Then I noticed my buddies were waiting for my up by the green, and the next group was bearing down from behind.

“Ahhh… just a second… excuse me for just a minute…”

I don’t know if she heard the “whack” as I hit the ball, but when I picked the phone up off the ground she was still there.

“OK… sorry for the interruption… Why don’t you just email me with your questions and I’ll get back to you right away.”

Turns out she bought one of my most expensive programs and has become a good customer.

So there you go… Never answer your phone on the golf course on a Friday afternoon unless it’s someone who is going to turn into a good customer.

I love the sarcastic tone. In reality, you have two lists here, but I think your approach was more effective.

But here are two reasons why you might NOT want to have your phone number in neon in your header.

I understand this is a shaky argrument, but it works for my practice and type of services.

In some endeavors you do not want to talk to every Dick and Jane that might have an urge to kill some time and pick your brain. I do not mind at all putting a simple additional step in the process, like an obvious Contact button in the main navigation.

And this leads to maybe the primary reason you might want to think twice about a phone number splashed across every page in some circumstances.

Tracking.

Having your contact info on a distinct page is a nice initial sort when trying to identify what traffic is likely to have the greatest value.

Don’t get me wrong, having a phone number conspicuoaly displayed on all pages is a proven tactic in most situations.

But like so many things in search and internet marketing one size does not fit all.

-Tom Hale